Are the “Five Pillars of Literacy Instruction” in Our C - PowerPoint Presentation

Slide1

Are the “Five Pillars of Literacy Instruction” in Our Classrooms?

Stephanie FuchsSlide2

The Five Pillars

The

Five Pillars

of literacy

, identified by the National Reading Panel (2000) are:

phonemic awareness, phonics, reading fluency, vocabulary and reading comprehension.

These are considered crucial components in any literacy instruction program for English as a first language (L1).Slide3

Phonemic Awareness

Phonemic Awareness

is the ability to focus on phonemes in spoken words and manipulate them in language activities

(Adams, 1990; Cassidy et al., 2010).

identifying sounds at the beginning or end of words

practicing oral rhyming

counting the number of sounds in words

deleting or switching one sound in a wordSlide4

Phonics

Phonics

is the correspondence between graphemes and phonemes which must be taught systematically and explicitly

(Adams, 1990; Moats, 2000;

Rayner

, 2001).

Teaching the letters and their sounds

Teaching the orthographic patterns (letter combinations) and their sounds

Teaching spelling rules

Providing phonic

texts for reading practice (texts that can be read by sounding out each letter or letter combination that

have

already

been taught

, with no or very few irregular words

) Slide5

Reading Fluency

Reading Fluency

is one of the strongest predictors of overall reading ability

(

Rasinski

, Homan, & Biggs, 2009;

Rasinski

, 2012)

and is defined as the ability to read text quickly, effortlessly, and with good, meaningful expression

(

Begeny

et al., 2012;

Grabe

, 2009;

Meisinger

et al., 2010; National Reading Panel, 2000).

Silent repeated reading

Reading aloud to a partner or small group

Listening to the teacher reading while following the text to expose the pupils to correct punctuation and intonationSlide6

Vocabulary

Vocabulary

knowledge promotes the ability of students to derive meaning from text

(

Brusnighan

& Folk, 2012; Hawkins, Hale,

Sheely

, & Ling, 2011)

and knowledge of the words in a text has been shown to highly affect reading performance

(Moats, 2000; Schmitt, Jiang, &

Grabe

, 2011).

Teaching single words or chunks of language (a) connected to the topic of the currently taught unit (b) frequently used that are not directly connected to the topic in the unit (only, just, but, etc.) (c) phonically connectedSlide7

Reading Comprehension

Reading comprehension

requires students to read and extract meaning by interacting with the text

(

Grabe

, 2009; Solis,

Ciullo

, Vaughn, Pyle,

Hassaram

, &

Leroux

, 2012).

identifying the main idea of a text

independent reading of simple texts silently and demonstrating understanding by answering questions orally or in writing

comparing what pupils have read to their own personal experiences or to other things that they have read

making predictions about what will happen next in a text

identifying and describing types of textsSlide8

EFL Literacy Instruction

English as a Foreign Language (EFL)

literacy instruction depends on multiple skills which are in many ways similar to those incorporated in L1 instruction (

Lipka

& Siegel, 2012), including the

Five Pillars

of

literacy.

As

in L1 instruction, providing a strong foundation of the language skills in the early stages of instruction is essential for EFL as well, with an emphasis on reading and writing which are intertwined from these initial stages (

Olshtain

, 2014).Slide9

The Five Pillars in EFL

EFL literacy

instruction

should be based on the

Five Pillars

.

Since

reading requires both bottom-up and top-down skills that must be integrated, the critical lower-order skills

must be taught in parallel to

meaning and comprehension, the higher-order thinking skills, from the beginning of

EFL

instruction and throughout the school years (

Ediger

, 2014;

Grabe

, 2009; Wolf &

Katzir

-Cohen, 2001).Slide10

EFL Specific Literacy Instruction Components

It is important to remember that there are EFL

specific

literacy

topics

including grammar, speaking, listening,

writing and spelling which also need to be incorporated in our literacy programs.

These must be taken into consideration when examining a textbook.Slide11

Do the Textbooks Provide “Five Pillars” Activities?

Let’s look at an example in a widely used textbook:

Click 1, Unit 3, Animals

Examining Textbook CLICK 1 for Literacy Instruction Components.docxSlide12

Percentages of Coverage

The percentages of coverage for the

“

Five Pillars”

in this unit are

:

Phonemic Awareness

-8.77

%

Phonics – 19.29%

Reading Fluency – 0%

Vocabulary – 10.52%

Reading Comprehension – 8.77% Slide13

What Do We Need to Add?

For which of the “Five Pillars” do we need to add activities in our literacy instruction, in your opinion?

Can you suggest additional activities for these pillars?

Here’s an idea for a reading fluency lesson:

The_Fluency_Development_Lesson_Rasinski_2009.docSlide14

Activities: Examining the Textbooks

In pairs

: Choose one of the textbooks commonly used in elementary schools.

Choose one unit to examine.

Fill in the given table to find out

what percentage of

activities in this unit

is devoted

to practicing each of the five pillars.

Share your findings with the other participants.Slide15

References

Adams, M. J. (1990).

Beginning to read: Thinking and learning about print.

Cambridge, MA: MIT.

Begeny

, J. C., Ross, S. G.; Greene, D. J., Mitchell, R. C. & Whitehouse, M. H. (2012). Effects of the helping early literacy with practice strategies (HELPS) reading fluency program with Latino English language learners: A preliminary evaluation.

Journal of Behavioral Education, 21

(2), 134-149. doi:10.1007/s10864-011-9144-7

Brusnighan

, S.M.& Folk, J.R. (2012). Combining contextual and morphemic cues is beneficial during incidental vocabulary acquisition: Semantic transparency in novel compound word processing.

Reading Research Quarterly, 47

(2), 172-190.

doi

: 10.1002/RRQ.015

Cassidy

, J.,

Valadez

, C.M., Garrett, S.D. (2010).

Literacy trends and issues: A look at the five pillars and the cement that supports them.

The Reading Teacher, 63

(8), 644–655. DOI:10.1598/RT.63.8.3

Ediger

, A.M. (2014). Teaching second/foreign language literacy to school-age learners. In

Celce

-Murcia, Brinton, D.M., & Snow, M.A. (eds.)

Teaching English as a second or foreign language.

Fourth edition. Boston: National Geographic Learning. (pp. 154-188).

Grabe

, W. (2009a). How reading works: The building blocks of fluency and comprehension. In

Reading in a second language:

Moving from theory to practice

. (pp. 21-38). New York: Cambridge University Press.

Hawkins, R.O., Hale, A.

Sheely

, W., Ling, S. (2011). Repeated reading and vocabulary-previewing interventions to improve fluency and comprehension for struggling high-school readers.

Psychology in Schools, 48

(1), 50-77. doi:10.1002/pits.20545

Lipka

, O. & Siegel, L. (2012). The development of reading comprehension skills in children learning English as a second language.

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, 1873-1898.

doi

: 10.1007/s11145-011-9309-8

Meisinger

, E.B., Bloom, J.S. &

Hynd

, G.W. (2010). Reading fluency: implications for the assessment of children with reading disabilities.

Annals of Dyslexia

,

60

, 1–17.

Moats, L.C. (2000).

Speech to print: language essentials for teachers.

Baltimore: Brookes.

Olshtain

, E. (2014). Practical tasks for mastering the mechanics of writing and going just beyond. In

Celce

-Murcia, Brinton, D.M., & Snow, M.A. (eds.)

Teaching English as a second or foreign language.

Fourth edition. Boston: National Geographic Learning. (pp. 208-221).

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, T., Homan, S., & Biggs, M. (2009). Teaching reading fluency to struggling readers: Method, materials, and evidence.

Reading & Writing Quarterly, 25

(2-3), 192-204.

Rasinski

, T. V. (2012). Why reading fluency should be hot.

The Reading Teacher, 65

(8), 516-522.

doi

: 10.1002/TRTR.01077

Rayner

, K.,

Foorman

, B. R.,

Perfetti

, C. A., &

Pesetsky

, D. & Seidenberg, M.S. (2001). How psychological science informs the teaching of reading.

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(2), 31-74.

Schmitt, N., Jiang, X., &

Grabe

, W. (2011). The percentage of words known in a text and reading comprehension.

The Modern Language Journal, 95

(1), 26-43.

Solis, M.,

Ciullo

, S., Vaughn, S., Pyle, N.,

Hassaram

, B., &

Leroux

, A. (2012). Reading comprehension interventions for middle school students with learning disabilities: A synthesis of 30 years of research.

Journal of Learning Disabilities, 45

(4), 327-340.

doi

: 10.1177/0022219411402691

Wolf, M. &

Katzir

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