Reading Realities

I Can't Differentiate My Way Out of This feat. Faith Howard

Science of Reading Center at SUNY New Paltz Season 1 Episode 8

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0:00 | 29:30

Faith Howard, a grades 6–12 literacy specialist and former secondary English teacher based in Pinedale, Wyoming, joins host Rose Else-Mitchell to discuss her journey from teaching Shakespeare to teaching older students how to read.

Faith shares the moment she realized that creating multiple versions of texts and heavily differentiated materials was not helping her students in the long run. While teaching Othello, she found herself spending hours differentiating for students who still lacked the foundational skills or fluency needed to access complex texts independently. 

Rose and Faith discuss the unique challenges facing older students who have spent years hiding their reading difficulties and how Faith's Literacy Lab intervention model evolved and grew over time. They explore the importance of trust, family partnerships, student ownership, and helping adolescents see themselves not only as readers, but as leaders.

References and Resources:

Credits:

  • Guest: Faith Howard, 6-12 Literacy Specialist, English Teacher, and Goyen Literacy Fellow based in Pinedale, WY
  • Host: Rose Else-Mitchell, Executive Director of the Science of Reading Center at SUNY New Paltz
  • Produced by the Science of Reading Center at SUNY New Paltz, Rose Else-Mitchell, and Onalee Smith
  • Original music and audio editing by Ross Gentry

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Keywords: science of reading, adolescent literacy, secondary literacy, literacy intervention, morphology instruction, structured literacy, high school reading, middle school reading, reading intervention, reader identity, literacy leadership, fluency instruction, vocabulary instruction, decoding, literacy coaching, knowledge building, family engagement, secondary English, struggling readers, literacy specialist

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