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Review
Summary of the Literature
Julie
Linehan Spring 2002
EMERGENT
READERS
“We
view research and theory as a resource for educators to make informed
instructional decision. We must use
research wisely and be mindful of its limitations and its potential to inform
instruction.”
Taken from the position statement from the Board of Directors
of the International Reading Association (IRA, 1998)
The purpose of this review
is to organize and summarize collected references into a meaningful picture of
the current state of exemplary instruction for successful emergent readers.
With a review of research, theory, and practice, I strive to provide a
framework that can furnish a synthesis explaining related yet diverse
territories of the topic. The
review of the research reveals what is best stated in this following quote of
the International Reading Association, “There is no single method or single
combination of methods that can successfully teach all children to read.
Therefore, teachers must have a strong knowledge of multiple methods for
teaching reading and a strong knowledge of the children in their care so they
can create the appropriate balance of methods needed for the children they
teach” (IRA, 1999).
Inductive reasoning gleaned
from the literature written by Diegmueller (1996) suggests a “balance” in
instruction. Children learn to read
by a variety of materials and methods. Success
is achieved when the method matches the student.
It is sensible then that educators must possess a “toolbox” filled
with varied methods to promote experiences that directly and indirectly teach
reading, to compliment the realization that different children learn in
different ways. “Balance” refers to the intensity of one approach as it
relates to another (IRA, 1999). Balance has been a “hot” topic since the late 1990's,
and most educators claim to advocate a balanced reading program.
However, when you ask those who teach reading to define the term, the
term “balance” means different things to different people (Fitzgerald, 1999;
Asselin, 1999).
Historically “The Great
Debate” over practices in beginning reading instruction sparked from two basic
views on the process, the skills-based approach, and the meaning-based approach.
Jeanne Chall and Marylyn Adams highly influenced an emphasis on the use
of phonics. Both scholars claim
“effective reading instruction” is to be based on direct instruction in
phonics along with lots of exposure to reading materials and time to practice
reading (Chall, 1989; Adams, 1990). “Sequence
and explicit” are key terms in the review of phonics practices.
Students progress in a set pattern of learning letter sounds and symbols,
then onto decoding words and ultimately sentences and paragraphs.
What falls short in this process, however, is the question of “word
calling” verses reading. The children may be able to speak the printed word, but it is
questionable whether or not meaning is derived and motivation is accounted for
and maintained (Diegmueller, 1996).
Kenneth Goodman contributed
much to the meaning-based approach, but claims not to be the founder (Goodman,
1992). The meaning-based approach,
or whole language approach, is, in his belief, “the grass roots creation of
professional educators, mostly classroom teachers”. One definition by Goodman is “whole language is producing a
holistic reading and writing curriculum which uses real, authentic literature
and real books.” It puts learners
in control of what they read and write about (Goodman, 1992).
Curriculum is integrated around self-generated student inquiry; putting
children, not teachers “in the driver's seat” (Haberman, 1989).
Using literature and language that relates to children's lives supports
The International Reading Association's (IRA) definition of reading (IRA,
2000). Motivation is maintained,
and reading is seen as a meaningful process.
Phonics was never taken out of whole language, but learned while children
are immersed in reading (Goodman, 1992).
This
method, sometimes referred to as “embedded phonics”, is a non-systematic
direction to phonics instruction.
Research on the
effectiveness of one approach over another by Jeynes and Littell (2000)
concludes strongly that students in K- 3 benefit from basal (phonics)
instruction more than they do from whole language instruction, specifically true
for low-SES children. Works by
Manis, Doi, and Bhadha (2000) imply that phonological processing problems in
young readers reduce the children's opportunities to learn from exposure to
printed words. This study implies
the necessity of phonics instruction to be included in every primary curriculum.
Literature confirms that the teaching of reading requires solid skill
instruction including phonics and phonemic awareness, imbedded in enjoyable
reading and writing experiences with whole texts to facilitate the construction
of meaning (Fountas and Pinnell, 1996). Work done by Allor (2001) indicated that
the best predictor of future reading ability might be a combination of
intelligence, lexical retrieval, and phonemic awareness.
In other words, the choice is the combined approach, called “Balanced
Reading Instruction”.
Diegmueller (1996) discusses
a definition of balanced instruction in an article titled The Best of Both
Worlds. It is a simplified
explanation in that a balanced approach is one that takes the best elements of
phonics instruction and whole language. Children
are explicitly taught the relationship between letters and sounds, but they are
also reading interesting stories and writing their own.
My review of the research and literature reveal solid findings to support
a “balanced approach” (Allington, 1997; Diegmuller, 1996; IRA, 1999).
Literature on reading
success very often speaks of the critical importance of phonemic awareness (PA).
Defined briefly here, PA is the ability to recognize that a spoken word
is comprised of a sequence of individual sounds.
All research reviewed indicates that children who acquire PA become more
skilled readers than those who don't (Allor, Fuch, Mathes, 2001; Diegmuller,
1996; IRA, 1998; Manis, Doi, Bhadha, 2000).
For some parents and educators, phonics can be confused with phonemic
awareness. In clarification; as the
letter symbols (graphemes) come into play, and study is focused on the relationships
between the written language symbols and the sounds they represent, it is then
that one is in the domain entitled “Phonics”.
It is imperative to note that the literature has strongly suggested that
an understanding of phonemic awareness is essential for the acquisition of
phonics skills (Diegmuller, 1996; Griffin & Olsen, 1992; IRA, 1998; Yopp,
1992; Yopp & Yopp, 2000).
Phonemic Awareness is a
critical component of any comprehensive reading program.
The importance of PA to beginning reading is clear, accepted, and
supported by a large body of literature (Blachman, 2000; Cunningham, 2000;
Eldredge & Baird, 1996; Goswami, 2000; Griffith & Olson, 1992, IRA,
1998, Yopp, 1992, Yopp & Yopp, 2000). Sadly,
the knowledge of PA and more broadly, the knowledge of how kids learn to read
has not yet become a part of our general cultural knowledge (Cunningham, 2000).
The best means of acquisition of PA may not be so evident to our
instructors of young children. Work
in this area explains a hierarchy of skills ranging from hearing syllables
within words to competence in segmenting and manipulating words into onsets and
rime. Cunningham (2000) in Phonics
they Use explains that a most important premise to this body of knowledge is
the revelation of how the brain operates to process text.
As easy as speaking “Pig Latin” as a kid, children use their ability
to hear onsets and rimes to make letter sound correspondences.
Brain research suggests that the brain is a pattern detector, not a rule
applier. The brain is consistently
looking for familiar patterns, and analogies between known words
and unfamiliar ones to recognize words and associate them with meaning easily
and efficiently.
Cunningham (2000)
and Moustafa (1999) support that using letter-sound correspondences (return to
pure phonics) is not how kids learn to read.
Children don't analyze speech into phonemes before they begin to read
the way we literate adults have traditionally thought they do.
Therefore, how can learners understand and succeed with instruction in
letter-phoneme correspondences? The
theory called “Parallel Distributed Processing” (Cunningham, 2000) explains
this ability of the brain to recognize words and associate them with meaning.
Simultaneously, information about a word is gained from it's spelling
(orthography), it's pronunciation (phonology), it's meaning (semantics), and
the context in which the word occurs, and is rapidly processed by the brain.
The more words available to
the reader learned holistically, the greater the chance for the brain to make an
association and therefore decipher the word (Moustafa, 1997).
The “Matthew Effect” plays a significant role with beginning reading.
When children are able to decode words efficiently, attention and energy
are then available for focus on meaning. From
the biblical reference of “the poor get poorer and the rich get richer”,
children who recognize most words automatically, read a lot more.
The more children read, the better readers they become.
Those who suffer from a lack of PA, also suffer from little phonics
knowledge, thus decoding is difficult. These
students read less, and therefore have less experience and opportunity to
improve (Moustafa & Maldonado-Colon, 1999).
Reading instruction is to
teach children to read (IRA, 2000). To
understand the best approach to a goal, the goal should be clearly defined.
A definition of reading provides this clear direction for our teachers,
and thus dictates applied methodology. This
definition of reading is taken from the IRA's position statement titled
“Using Multiple Methods of Beginning Reading Instruction” (IRA, 1999).
The definition comes from a great deal of converging evidence.
Definition of Reading
Reading is a complex system
of deriving meaning from print that requires all of the following:
Ø
The development and maintenance of a motivation to read.
Ø
The development of appropriate active strategies to construct
meaning form print.
Ø
Sufficient background information and vocabulary to foster
reading comprehension.
Ø
The ability to read fluently.
Ø
The ability to decode unfamiliar words.
Ø
The skills and knowledge to understand how phonemes or speech
sounds are connected to print.
A professional, skilled
teacher adjusts the balance of instruction accordingly in light of this
definition as well as the instructional needs of the students; a balanced
approach to reading instruction (IRA, 1999).
Books are to readers as
highways are to industry. Age
appropriate materials are the infrastructure that supports effective reading
instruction (IRA, 2000). A
whole-to-part phonics approach advocated by Margaret Moustafa (1997) uses
predictable text and shared reading to support research findings.
It is accepted that early readers read better in the context of familiar
language than outside of such context (Moustafa, 1997).
Predictable texts are stories with natural language where the print and
pictures are redundant. Such books
are read to, with, and by the student. Moustafa
professes that what we have discovered on how children learn to read is a change
as fundamental as the realization that the world in round!
Part of this new understanding is that whole words can be identified
faster than letters, and sentences can be identified faster than random words.
Therefore many words learned holistically, allow for the reader to look
for familiar patterns or analogies to decipher unfamiliar ones.
Children use letter-onset and letter-rime correspondences in print words
they already know to figure out how to produce new words with the same letter
sequences, (i.e. the brain searching for pattern and analogy).
Access to enjoyable
experiences with books affects reading proficiency. Low-risk, pleasant experiences develop and maintain a
motivation to read and consequently become a powerful precursor to independent
reading. Students who undergo class
time filled with varied text (non-fiction, fiction, poetry, music) are
inductively taught that reading is a meaningful activity (Moustafa, 1997).
Reading to children helps
children learn to read (Moustafa, 1997). As
with any skill, the more you engage in it, the more expert you become.
Schema, background knowledge or knowledge of the world, has a powerful
effect on a readers ability to gain meaning from the text.
Implications are to develop schema prior to reading. Schema is gained through wide and varied life experiences
(Goodman, 1992; Moustafa, 1997).
Effective reading
instruction requires both knowledgeable teachers, who are current in the
understanding of how children learn to read; as well as age appropriate
instructional materials (IRA, 2000). Components
of a balanced reading program include the best of the skills based approach and
the whole language approach (Diegmuller, 1996).
Professional space must be granted for teachers to make informed
decisions and to “balance” their instruction in compliance to the needs of
their students. The realization
that different children learn in different ways supports the assertion that no
one approach is so distinctly better in all situations, that it should be used
exclusively (IRA, 1999). The
components of balanced literacy programs; reading aloud, guided reading, shared
reading, independent reading, and their shared counterparts in writing, are
vital in every emergent program (Fountas & Pinnell, 1996).
Balance is realized when children obtain the requirements described in
the IRA's definition of reading (IRA, 1999), for they all have essential
influence in this complex system of deriving meaning from print.
Taken from M. Moustafa,
“Learning to read should be a joyous adventure, as exciting for youngsters,
their families, and their teachers as when children learn to walk and talk”.
Our applied knowledge and understanding of the research on how children
learn to read and remain readers, is the key to making this journey a happy one
(Moustafa, 1997).
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