Melissa & Lori Love Literacy ® | Science of Reading for Teachers

Routines for Reading & Spelling Big Words with Faith Howard

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Episode 256 

Faith Howard shares practical strategies for improving literacy skills in middle and high school students, focusing on decoding multisyllabic words, spelling routines, and fluency practices. This episode offers actionable insights for educators aiming to enhance reading comprehension and word attack skills.


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Why Older Readers Guess Words

Melissa

Here's a moment I'm sure many of you have seen. Students hit an unfamiliar word in a text and don't have a way to work through it. They skip it, I guess, or lose the meaning of the word. As texts get more complex, what actually helps students read those tough words?

Lori

Today we're joined by Faith Howard, a reading interventionist, who shares how she supports students with complex words in text. She walks us through word pyramids for decoding, a simple spelling routine connected to reading, and a weekly fluency routine that builds accuracy, automaticity, and expression over time. Hi, teacher friends, I'm Lori and I'm Melissa. We are two educators who want the best for all kids, and we know you do too.

Melissa

We worked together in Baltimore when the district adopted a new literacy curriculum.

Lori

We realized there was so much more to learn about how to teach reading and writing. Hi, Faith.

Melissa

Welcome to the podcast.

Faith Howard

Hi, I'm so excited to be here.

Lori

I'm a huge fan of you guys. We are super excited to have you. We cannot wait to talk to you today.

Melissa

Yeah, and I'm really excited because you know I was a middle school and a high school teacher. And I think we probably see a lot of the same things, or you're seeing a lot of the same things with your students, which is like a lot of them could read a lot of words. It wasn't like they were completely illiterate, they couldn't, they didn't know their phonics at all. They could read, but they would get tripped up a lot, right? And they didn't have anything, they didn't have any strategies to know what to do when they got to those words where they're like, I don't know that word. And they would get frustrated, they would give up, they would, you know, there was not good coping strategies when they hit that mark. So excited to hear from you what you do to help that. I wish I knew all these things when I was teaching my sixth graders. Um, but before we even get there, I want to just like does that resonate with you, Faith? Like, do you see those same kinds of things with students when they hit those hard words? And yeah, like what are you seeing with your students?

Faith Howard

Yeah, um, so I work with middle and high school students in these literacy labs, intervention classes, right? And there's all sorts of uh issues when you can tell that they they don't have a word attack strategy or they can't decode multisyllabic words. So it's anything from partial word reading. Um, and often it's like missing the morphemes. So they'll read part of the way through a word, um, and then they'll kind of stop tracking the word. And by the time they get to the end, they make up the rest of it. So they completely miss the morpheme. So um reactionary versus reactionable or something like that, right? So they're reading the incorrect word, but it's close, it's an approximate. Um, then there's ones where they initially are correct, but you can tell that they don't know how to syllabicate because they'll start reading the word correctly, then they'll see that it's longer, they get overwhelmed, and they make something up in the middle syllable typically, or middle two, three syllables if it's like a four or five syllable word. Um, and then it sounds right at the end again. But often that's like not even a real word in that case. Um and then I think the approximations or guessing happens a lot where they're not using any kind of like phonics or sounding anything out. It's simply um, let me look at a couple of words, right? Some of this probably dates back to like three cueing or if they've got these old habits, but um, they're they're literally just looking at a couple of word letters in the word and then they're just making something up. So it's completely wrong. Um, and then my favorite one is the the mumble. It's the cued up mumble where they're reading and then all of a sudden they're like, hmm. And it's because they don't know it, or they just completely skip the word. I'll see a lot of teenagers do this where they'll just stop, pause, and then they'll say, I don't know that word, and then they'll keep reading. And so they never did work through it at all. They just skip it. Um, and so I do this activity with my students where I say, we we take a piece of really challenging grade level text that has a lot of really challenging words, and I say, okay, go through every larger word on here that you're like not sure what it is. And I want you to take your pencil and poke a hole, like pierce through the paper. And then they do that, and it's kind of a fun thing at the beginning of the year. And then hold up your paper and look at all the gaps here. And then I want you to try to read this. And they do, and it's kind of funny, and we laugh about it, but it's like this is what happens when you cannot correctly decode these multisyllabic words, and the older you get, the more you're gonna see them.

Melissa

Yeah, and I almost feel like they were never taught that, like, or like they they were taught when they were younger, or they got this mindset that because you learned phonics, right, and you learned how to it, hopefully they did. Then if they did, like, then you should be able to read any word. And I don't think they got that message that like some words are gonna be harder, and we're gonna have to use some different strategies to be able to figure them out. And that's okay. You know, like I felt like my kids didn't ever get that message of like, it's okay that you're gonna hit these hard words. So I like that strategy that you're like, let's just talk about this. There's gonna be hard words.

Faith Howard

Yeah, well, and I think there's like there's this, yeah, like you said, there's this misnomer that um in early elementary, we teach students how to decode words, right? They're they're syllabicating or they're doing scoops, and it's usually like two syllable words. And so we think as educators, that there's going to be this transfer, like, oh, well, now they can do it with two syllable words. So clearly they're going to be able to continue that and do that with three, four, five, six, seven syllable words. Um, and it's and it's just not always true for kids. Like that, that strategy, that uh ability in one isolated space doesn't transfer when the text complexity ramps up in upper grades.

Lori

Yeah, that's such a good point. That like, and I think, Faith, like you being honest with your students, like, you know, adults come to hard words. We all have hard words that we encounter. And I'm gonna teach you ways to do that. I I think that's really smart because skipping is not a strategy. That's not an effective word attack strategy. And we know that that is like typically, like you said, those first things that I love the mumbling strategy. Like that is just what kids they'll do anything to not have to do the work of the word, right? So I love that you're teaching them strategies. And I want to get into some of these practical routines, practical strategies that help students work through and spell these more complex words. So I'd love to get into what these look like in

Word Pyramids For Decoding Practice

Lori

practice, right? And the first one that I want to talk about is word pyramids. Um, you use these to help your students work through tougher words. Can you walk us through word pyramids and just share what they are and how you use them for teaching your students decoding?

Faith Howard

Yeah. Yeah. So I'm a part of the literacy fellowship, the Goyan Literacy Fellowship. And this year, um, an elementary teacher, Tara Hess, gave a presentation and she talked about doing word pyramids. And um, you know, I've been doing like a decoding multisyllabic words routine and started with one that was more like uh OG style and then have shifted to some of the ones that you guys have shared actually through your podcast, um, just to simplify the process and to focus more on the sounds. But I noticed that my students were still struggling with decoding multisyllabic words, even with doing um a routine we do every single Monday where, you know, we break down and syllabicate, we use the steps. Um, we've been using the steps that that I modified based on some of your guys' recent work that you shared on the podcast. Um, but they needed more reps and it needed to be more intentional. And so after watching Tara Hess's um presentation on word pyramids, and she was doing this with elementary, lower elementary students, but I thought it's really hitting at some of the challenges that my students are having, which is um visually tracking through the all the way through the word. So we read all parts of the word um from left to right, also focusing on each syllable as separate sound units that we're pronouncing separately and then blending together. So that's segmenting and blending. Um, and so yeah, basically uh from that I made a uh Google Slide template and it just has a pyramid and then it has animations. And so um I'll put the first syllable of the word and then we and and then you know, through the animations. Lately I've adjusted it to where it moves even more like from left to right instead of from top to bottom in the pyramid, just to reinforce that visual. And so basically they say the first sound out loud, and then I give corrective feedback as a class if um they're not pronouncing it correctly. Then we move to the second syllable, we blend first syllable, second syllable, then first, second, third, first, second, third, fourth until we get to the end of the word. And at the bottom of the pyramid, they see the full word. And we're talking like these are more challenging, larger words so that are coming straight out of the novel that we're reading. And these are grade level texts. Um, and so they're gonna be seeing those. It kind of works as like a front-loading um opportunity for them to work through and get that initial exposure, but having to slow down and do it the right way. Um, yeah. And so been experimenting with that and using that in the classroom this year. And uh I just feel like it adds this extra piece. And the the best news to me this week, I was progress monitoring my middle school literacy students um for their oral reading fluency. And I had a girl correctly decode, I'm trying to remember the word. Um, I think it was altruism or something like that. I mean, it was really challenging. And she afterwards, and I was giving her kudos, and afterwards she told me that she used the strategy. She like chunked and said each syllable out loud, and that's how she was able to get the word. So I was like, it's working.

Lori

Oh, we love that. So, like you're you're noticing students work through these words and like seeing the parts of the words and then say each part. Can you like elaborate just a little bit more how these word pyramids, I mean, because really I think what you're doing is you're just giving them a visual of just the part they need to look at first, right? Like you're really giving that, like if I I'm I'm like I'm holding my hand right now, almost covering up the word that I'm, you know, envisioning because I'm thinking, okay, you're just giving them the beginning, and I don't mean just, but you're giving them the beginning of the word, you're giving them the the second part of the second syllable, you're giving them the third syllable, you're helping them do the work that they can't do, which is like break it apart, right? And then blend it back together. So segment it and then blend it back together. So like, how have you noticed that maybe their word attack skills changing over time of use with either word pyramids or or multisyllabic word routine, probably the combination of both.

Faith Howard

Yeah. I mean, we also pair this with morphology instruction. And so they are able to identify the morphemes in those pretty quickly and they know how to pronounce those. So what some kids have commented on is like, oh, I know how to pronounce that part, I know how to pronounce that part. So they're starting to realize like the only tricky parts are really um vowel teams or where it's an open or closed syllable and they're trying to determine right how to pronounce that vowel sound. It's the schwa's, it's always the schwa's that get them right.

Lori

And so that's what I was gonna ask. How do they, how do you teach that flexing, like that flexing if there's a stress or a schwa, or just, you know, just being flexible? Because some of the morphemes sound different in different words.

Faith Howard

Yeah. So initially, um, when they're doing the word pyramids and they'll they'll, as a class, say the sound out loud. And then when they get to the next syllable, and I leave it, initially I don't correct them because I kind of want to see, and we talk often about flexing the vowel sound. We do like a flexing motion with our arms, and then this whole idea of vowel variability. And I'm really trying to open their eyes to this idea. And so when we get to the next syllable, then what I'm looking for is do they adjust, right? So um prevalence, right, would be a good example of a word where they might see the pre the prefix or they might see that first syllable and say pre-P-R-E. Then when we get to the second part, right, they're gonna have to figure out that it's prevalence, preval, not pre-val. Um, but sometimes it takes them till the third syllable where they actually see it all together and then they're trying it out and they're like, that doesn't sound right. That doesn't sound like a real word. So that's the last step of the decoding multisyllabic words routine as well, is like make it sound like a real word. Does this sound right? And if it doesn't, you need to go back and flex the vowel. And so they're testing it out. And um, I would say, like a majority of the time, a lot of the time, they're able to do that. But this is why vocabulary instruction is so important, because some of these words they've never heard before. So they don't actually know if it sounds right or not. And so in addition, we're talking about the meaning of those. So I've added to my word pyramid slides since then a picture of um something that represents the meaning of the word, so that really quick, it's just a quick touch point. It's not a full vocab lesson, but I'm trying to teach them in conjunction just an initial exposure to what the word means as well, so that they're not just pronouncing the word, but they're actually maybe learning some some quick incidental vocabulary. Um, and then I've really gone down this road of linguistic phonics, and um, and that's a that's newer for me. And so it can be kind of daunting or scary in the field of literacy, all these things are coming out. But for me, I was like, it's really important to focus on the sounds, right? And so trying to go back to that key idea. And so in the word pyramids now, I'm adding like a little bonus, it's a little quiz quiz question. And they use their mini whiteboards then afterwards. We write out the word, right, sound by sound. So I say, say it, say it, sound it, spell it. And so they're each sounding out each syllable and spelling it. And then I saw something really amazing this last week in a presentation where a teacher then as they erase, they had to erase each letter and then say it out loud as they were erasing each letter, um, which I thought was really clever too. And with elementary students, they said, um, teacher or your eraser needs to know how to spell the word too. So then it's reinforcing the spelling. But on the review with their mini whiteboards, what I do is I I show them it's kind of like a multiple choice question, but I I give them a list of other multisyllabic words. And um, I like this last week we focused on long E vowel sound, right? And um the different vowel variabilities that can make all the different letter combinations that can make that long E sound. And so the question asks, which other words in this list use the same spelling pattern to make that long E sound? Then another question might ask, what other words have that E, that long E sound, but are using a completely different combination of letters? And so then by the end, I had them list all of the different um opportunities, sort of ways that they're hearing that long E sound. And so they listed those out. And so it's sort of like helping them to crack the code, right? Since since English was such code-based, the idea is we've got to get them to a place where they're actually able to crack that code and start to see these patterns. And if they can see it both in pronunciation and in spelling, the next time they see an EA in a word, they're not just automatically gonna say eh, they're gonna flex it if it doesn't sound right and maybe say E and actually get the word correct. Um, so that's the theory behind that, at least, that I'm attempting right now with students.

Flexing Vowels Schwa And Stress

Lori

Yeah. Can I actually I know we're gonna transition to talking about spelling, but I do want to ask a quick question. So when students are sounding out these words and let's just say the word is prevalence, and you're let's say in you have your word pyramid and they're saying um pre-val, do you ever have them say it like it's spelled and then go back and try to flex? Like for example, wednesday is the right, the quintessential example. We all still say wedness day in our heads when I don't know, I do. I don't speak for myself. Um, you know, so it is that ever because I know that that can be an effective strategy to help them say every sound, you know. For I'm I'm thinking about the word like suspicious. I was reading that with my uh my kiddo the other night, and I was like, she's not saying the sh, you know, sound for the and so I'm thinking, okay, just just try to say it like it's spelled. And then it ended up, I said, now can you say that any other way? And we ended up working through it very much like you described in this pyramid format, but I just wanted to throw it out there for you.

Faith Howard

Yes, that's absolutely what we're doing. So the first attempt is like, I'm not correcting them in the moment. I want to see if they can flex that vowel. And so when they get to the end, right? Or when they get even sometimes they can do it in the next syllable. I'm seeing and I'm listening for are they pronouncing that? Are they modifying and adjusting? And I even give them some coaching tips on that, where I might say, hmm, does that sound right? Let's go ahead and flex that vowel, right? Try it a different way. What does that sound like? And then usually it'll dawn on like one or two kids and they'll kind of get louder about it. And then the others are like, oh yeah. And so then we try that out. Um, and if everyone, which has rarely happened, but where that we get to the end and nobody has has kind of made that connection, then we might go back and then I do the modeling for that word where I'd say, say prev, say ul, say ents. Um, and ent's, they know that suffix, so they're able to get that one. The A-L, right? That ol, schwa, they know what a schwa is now. And so are they always able to correctly identify the schwa? Not necessarily. We're still working on the stressed and unstressed syllable, right? That's a really hard concept for students. And we're saying those out loud and we're clapping, and it's like, where are you hearing the emphasis, that part of the word? Um, and it's always in the unstressed or unaccented syllable where you're hearing those schways. But in general, if I give a quick, okay, try a schwa, they know exactly what that means and then they'll adjust. Um, so we're getting there, right? And this is with my middle school class in particular. My high schoolers pick up on that a lot quicker. Um, but yeah, um, it's it's been such a such a journey for me, with my background being as a high school English teacher, to have to learn all of this because this is like nothing that you learn in your teacher prep program or work on, even as a teacher with uh the upper grades. But it's been so valuable for these students and the confidence that they're gaining and the growth that we're seeing on their um on like their Dibbles progress monitoring uh is is really, really strong. Um I've got some kids that have gone up, you know, 30 or 40 words per minute since working with them, um, either from the beginning of the school year or the beginning of the semester in January.

Melissa

Yeah, and Faith, that makes so much sense. It's you reminded me of I I told Lori this story several times already, but my son um pronounced the word pirate, but he pronounced it pie rate. And I actually was like proud of him because I was like, he, I mean, that is how you should pronounce that word, you know? So he was really like using what he learned to pronounce it. And I think that's what you're saying about your, you know, you don't stop them right away because they said pre instead of pre, because why would they know that, right? They're they're pronouncing it the way it technically like should be pronounced. Um, then you let them work with it after. And that's exactly what my son did too. He's like, pirate is I've never heard of that, but like there's a picture of a pirate right here, and that's pretty close. So, you know, that that's what we we want them to do.

Faith Howard

Yeah, and I think that's what good readers do. That's what we do when we come across a word. We're testing it out. If we don't, if we haven't orthographically mapped that word already, that's 100% what we're doing. We're kind of systematically working through the word, and then we're saying in our heads, right? We're just it's just more automatic for skilled readers. So, really, this is just about like providing those at-bats for struggling readers. One, so they can crack the code and start to realize this, but also it gives them that word attack strategy. So obviously the word pyramids, it's structured for them, it's split up. But then what we're doing in real time, so we do a lot of phase reading while we're reading aloud in class with our novel. And so um we might stop, right? If a student's like trying to sound out a word, I mean, our non-negotiables are like we read every word, we don't skip over or mumble through words. And so if a student is on stage and they're the one that's reading and they're having a hard time with a word, I'm not just gonna give it to them. A lot of kids will be like, what's that word mean? And ask the teacher, and then the teacher will say it and they'll repeat it back. I only will do that after multiple failed attempts. So, really, I'm asking them, like, put your finger over that word. And we're literally doing the exact same thing we're doing with word pyramids, right? Put your finger over that word, except for like the very first part of it. See if you can find the first syllable and just say that sound. Now say the next, now say the next. And I think also worth acknowledging is like a lot of a lot of the students I work with in the secondary space um struggle with some attention issues, right? And so for them, they want to rush through and speed everything up because along the way, they have been told that reading fast means that you're good at reading and that you're smart. So they're embarrassed by the slower rate of their reading. And so that's why they're just like rushing through. And it forces them to have to slow down and pay attention to each part of the word. Um, and so it's really about like breaking those old habits. And um, when they do that, right, I had a student admit to me saying, you know, not. Different student. This is a male student that I started working with this year in the middle school, a sixth grader. And he said, Wow, yeah, before I would just kind of like guess and make up stuff, but um, now I'm actually like reading the words. And he was so excited about that that he feels like he's actually reading now.

Melissa

All

A Spelling Routine That Sticks

Melissa

right. So we've mentioned spelling a few times. And I have to say, like, I was a secondary teacher as well. I was not trained to teach spelling at all. And I actually, my first few years of teaching, I had a principal who's like, Why aren't you teaching spelling? And I was like, Why would I teach spelling? I don't understand why you're even asking me that question. Um, and now I look back and I'm like, well, yeah, that actually spelling is like really powerful to teach students to help their reading even. Um, so let's talk about spelling. What do you do? Um, do you have a routine for teaching spelling with these older students as well?

Faith Howard

Yes. Um, and and I didn't before. Uh, and I think it just kept looming in the background and it became more and more obvious that they needed this, right? And I think in general, if you talk to secondary educators, they're just so frustrated by um students' lack of ability in spelling. And it just kind of seems to be getting worse and worse. And so um, I started doing some digging around and was trying to figure out what's like a routine or something that's fairly quick and replicable that I can do with my students to reinforce, again, multisyllabic words, tier two vocabulary, words that are rich with morphemes, and that are going to come up in the novel that we're reading. Um, and so, you know, just kind of integrating all of those skills together. And I watched a teachers teach teachers webinar earlier in the fall that Virginia Quinn Mooney, she's a first grade teacher, I think out of Louisiana. Correct me if I'm wrong on that. And um, she's amazing. Is it it's yeah, I think you're right, it's Connecticut. I don't know why it's Louisiana, but she is amazing. And she she she was doing these small groups during centers, right? These small group rotations, and she was working on spelling with students. And she had this like say it, clap it, spell it routine with them. And they were using, you know, they were using like all of these fun kind of tactile things. And I just had this light bulb click where I was like, there's a way you can take that and modify it. I'm probably not gonna do like drawing letters in the sand with um upper grades, but like the core root of it is systematically working through each syllable and sound in the word and then writing those out and prioritizing that methodology. And so I thought that would pair so beautifully with the word pyramids, and so started testing that out. So the way that that um routine works is that um after we've done word pyramids and they've been exposed to this list of, you know, roughly five to 10 words um for the week, then I dictate a word, they repeat it back out loud to me as a class. Then instead of clap it, I changed it to tap it because they're all holding mini whiteboard markers and they have a mini whiteboard. So they tap as they repeat the word back to identify the number of syllables. And then they have to show it. So that's the next step. So on their mini whiteboard, they draw a dotted, like a like a longer dotted line for each syllable that they hear in the word. This is the moment where I'm able to give corrective feedback if they're not actually repeating the word back correctly to me. So it's not even about the syllables at this point, it's are they actually hearing all the sounds in the word? And I've got some students, particularly in my middle school lit labs, who really struggle with phonemic awareness. So they're not necessarily hearing all the sounds in those words. So they need a little more coaching there. So I might catch that and then have them repeat again. But then they do that and they the the lines to show me how many syllables they heard in the word. They hold up their whiteboards and then I do a quick check and I'm like, yep, yep, yep. And then I ask them, how many syllables did you hear in that word? And they might say, four. And then it's so it's say it, show it is the lines, then it's spell it, sound it. So as they spell each syllable, they have to say out loud each letter, each sound, and write those out. And they're working their way through the word. Then they hold up their board for me, and as I'm circulating around the room, I'm giving them feedback. And so I might say, first and last syllable look good. I want you to try again, flex that vowel sound. So it's again that vowel variability conversation. Flex that vowel sound. Or I might say, I might actually read the word to them and say, the way that you have written this word, let's use prevalence as an example, is uh preva, prevalent, prevalence, right? Or prevalent or something like maybe where they've like, you know, they've they've changed the N C E to something else or they have an A N C E instead of an E N C E. And so um just coaching them on like hearing the difference in sound and then repeating those syllables, and then they try again. So I make my way around the room, and then after I've checked everybody and they've been able to get that corrective feedback, then we do a final round, which is say it, spell it, write it. And so as a class, then we say the word out loud one last time, and then we systematically write it and spell it aloud together. So that's the encoding routine.

Melissa

I love that. And I love that there's like these this overlap of some strategies between the two. It's not exactly the same, of course. You're doing two different things, but you know, it's also not like, oh gosh, I have this whole different strategy for when I read a word, and it's completely different when I am spelling a word. A lot of the things are the same, right? You're listening for those syllables, you're listening for the sounds, you're flexing it if you need to, right? So I love that they can use the same kind of mindset and strategies for both. Because I think, I mean, again, that makes it easier, but it also is what we do as readers and spellers.

Faith Howard

Yeah, yeah. And I think I I'm trying to, you know, what I'm doing, I don't think is anything brand new. What it is is sort of like an adaptation for older students. It's a rebrand of what the science of reading has said worked with works with younger readers. Why can't we adapt that and find a way to use these same strategies? But you just have to like adjust them so that they feel more honoring for for teenagers and preteens, because you know, some of it they're they would laugh at or they'd be like, this is, you know, this feels like baby stuff. Um, I recently with certain students of mine who are indicating, right, through diagnostics, that they still really struggle even farther down, if you if you go farther down with its phonemic awareness, um, where instead of the syllable lines below those, we've added an extra step. So I just thought it's worth sharing this for anybody that's working with with students in this bucket, is they draw the syllable line, and then below that, they're gonna draw mini lines for each sound. Right. And so if it is prev, right, it's p, er, eh, v. So they'd have four separate lines and they're gonna write right one letter for each line.

Melissa

That's funny. As I was taking notes, Faith, I actually I was like, were the lines for syllables or for sounds? And then you said it again. I was like, oh, syllables. Okay, great. Um, but that makes sense. You might, you might add the sounds if they need that.

Faith Howard

It depends on the students and and where they're at. And you really do have to kind of adjust that pace depending on which kiddos. And I think the thing I've tried to get smarter at also, you know, I already am integrating this with words that come out of the novel that they're going to be seeing in text as they read that week. But I I had been selecting words that were kind of like a mix of everything. It wasn't any particular sound that I was trying to isolate or spelling pattern or phonics rule. And for me, I just realized that it, this, there's a missed opportunity here for them to like catch more patterns and and crack more of the code. Um, if I if I'm able to pull words that that all are focusing on one specific area. And so I give the letters advanced spelling screener with my students, and then I, you know, put it in a spreadsheet and I'm able to determine like the these are the ones that are the heavy hitters that all of my kids are really struggling with. And so now I'm systematically working through those. And so each week when we're looking at that list of words and we're doing the practice throughout the week on them, the list of words all have that same sound, but they're still coming out of the text we're reading. Um, and so yeah, that's a that's a newer shift as well. But I think the point there is just that it's like, it's okay to reinvent, it's okay to press pause and say, how can I be smarter about this as a teacher and really get more bang for my buck with trying to um accelerate learning, right? The end goal is that they're doing all of this independently and that they're successful so that they're not needing like any kind of intervention anymore. Um, and so it's worth trying.

Melissa

And I love that you're using, you know, the same words and the same patterns for both. So again, it's not like two totally different things. They're seeing the connection there. And I'm just wondering, like, because you're saying, you know, you might go through your book to look for that certain pattern and pull them out. So those are the ones you're doing these very specific routines with the word pyramids and the spelling routine. But then you said there's, you know, as they get to other words in the book that are just tough, you're kind of using very similar routines for that too. And I'm assuming maybe even in writing when they're spelling that you might have a similar, you know, just flex that again, like let's try that syllable again kind of thing going on. Is that yeah,

Building Independence During Real Reading

Melissa

yeah.

Faith Howard

It's uh it's been really empowering for my students and for me because I'm sure educators can identify with the kid that you have them doing a writing assignment and every 30 seconds they're like, wait, how do you spell this word? How do you spell this word? How do you spell this word? Faith, tell tell me about it. And so now I I have the the tools to sort of say, I'm not gonna spell that for you. I actually want you to like work through that. I want you to repeat the sounds, I want you to isolate the sounds. And I'll have kids that as they're writing words now, they're doing the, they're doing the lines, right? That and and I'm like, I'm good with that. And that is something that you can do for yourself and then take away when you're ready. Um, but it it I really am starting to see the transfer and um and calling attention to it when they're using it, like when we're doing um reading reading aloud in class, when a student does that, calling attention to how they worked through the sounds in the word and we all heard them do it so that they're seeing the success of themselves and others and realizing that those strategies in isolation don't work if you don't transfer them into sort of the real time real text.

Lori

I love that you're giving us this like bit about normalizing this, right? Like they're hearing their peers say it, work through the word. Do you ever model the same thing? Do you ever model mispronouncing and then, or maybe coming to a word and saying, oh, I don't really know this word, not quite sure what to do here. And then work through it yourself. Like, do you do you ever stage that so that you model it for your students?

Faith Howard

Yeah, yeah. That's the beauty of like the phase reading and um also in our fluence weekly fluency routine. We do choral reading and I do echo reading and reciprocal reading with them. Like each day we focus on sort of a different model reading. So it really gives me the opportunity. Sometimes those are not even selected ahead of time as models. Like this is an actual, maybe I trip up on something. Um, and it's often in um proper nouns where there's really a challenge of like, wait a minute, how am I gonna say this person's name? Because this is, you know, from a from a different culture and the spelling pattern is atypical. Um, and really having to work through that. So yeah, I think like that's a part of the normalizing too. Like I'm the first one to tell my students that I'm not perfect and I mess up too. And it's kind of uh an opportunity for them to see that in real time, that working through words.

Weekly Fluency Routine That Transfers

Lori

Yeah. Uh can we get into your fluency routine a bit? Sure. Yeah. All right. So I feel like this is an area where teachers are gonna be like, okay, so the two things we just talked about, right? This multisyllabic word routine through word pyramids and spelling really are going to come together and culminate here through application in your in your fluency routine, right? Because you're gonna see their automaticity improve. You're gonna see their expression improve, you're gonna see it just kind of come together. So can you share what your fluency routine looks like across the week in your classroom? And then, like just maybe a little nugget into each day, what your students are doing?

Faith Howard

Yeah, I'm really excited to share about this because this has been my brainchild over the last two years and something that I've tweaked and grown. So um I select an informational text and then I plug it into this free website, um, Intervention Central, um, that will format it into an oral reading fluency passage, you know, with the word, you know, word count and everything. Um then, and it's building background knowledge on whatever's gonna come up in the text we're reading that week. And so it's all about knowledge building and exposing them to more grade level, high-level vocabulary, uh, multisyllabic words in informational texts. So um, each day has a theme. And so we do repeated reading, partner repeated reading every single day, and they read in time and give feedback to their partner for one minute, and then they chart it. So they're monitoring over the course of the week their growth. Um, and are they able to increase their rate or improve their accuracy? Um, and it's really good for them to have to coach each other and give that feedback as well. And we hit that really hard at the start of the year. Um, Mondays are multi-syllabic Monday. And so prior to reading the text, prior to me modeling, they do a quick skim of the text. And these texts are 100 to 200 words max. And they pull out, they identify one multisyllabic word that they're not sure how to pronounce it. And then there's a box on the sheet, and I'm happy to include um, you know, a copy, a digital copy of these in the notes so that folks can see what this looks like and use that template. Um, but there's a little box and they write down the word. They have to copy it down, and then the steps are right next to it. And um, the first step is to break the word down, they underline the vowels in order to figure out how many syllables are in the word. Then they circle any known morphemes. Then they divide up the syllables, um, and then they work systematically to try to sound out each word uh or each syllable, excuse me. And then their last step, they have to call me over and they segment and blend and then show me that they can correctly pronounce the word. Um, and then I have them read the sentence that the word appears in out loud to their partner before we do our timed reading. Um, so that's roughly multi-syllabic Monday. Tuesday is transfer Tuesday. So we're focusing on morphology and morphemes. So I noticed when teaching morphology that um you have to have places for them to like use that and flex that in, you know, in context of reading, or else it sort of stays in this like memorizing morpheme space. And so um, on transfer Tuesday, they identify a multisyllabic word and it could be the one they decoded, it could be a different word, and they have to create a word sum by breaking down the sound parts of the word and then identifying the known parts and what those mean. And then I uh, you know, they have a way to look up the other morphemes that they don't know, and then they write a def a working definition of the word. And then writing Wednesday after we do. So each day I also do a model read. So Monday we do reciprocal reading, Tuesday is echo reading, Wednesday is uh choral reading, and then they do their partner reading. But the follow-up activity afterwards is really trying to build these skills with a higher level text. So on writing Wednesday, we do sentence level writing. We've been doing a lot of writing revolution, sentence expansion work. So initially at the beginning of the year, we were working on because but so statements. Then we moved into uh positive phrases. And then lately we've been working on um introductory subordinating clauses. And so it's been really useful. And they write it, they have to write a sentence. I give them a model, and then they have to write a sentence demonstrating their comprehension of the text. Um, and it's about what they're reading about. Thursday is thinking Thursday. And so on Thursday they do partner reading paragraph shrinking. So we're really working on identifying the gist of each paragraph in order to correctly summarize it. And then um, or any other kind of annotation prompt works really well. And then on Friday, um, it's phonics Friday. So that's where we we do a spelling routine, same idea, pulling out words from that passage and reinforcing can they correctly go through and spell those words after being exposed to them, but also in hearing the sounds.

Lori

Okay, Faith, I I love this routine. I want to just kind of double click, stamp whatever you want to say. Are you doing this from week to week with different texts? Are you pulling different texts? Are you I heard you say novel earlier? So could you just quickly snapshot for us what texts you're reading, just so that we're all on the same playing field here?

Faith Howard

Yeah.

Using Knowledge Building To Comprehend

Faith Howard

Yeah. So the ones we're doing for fluency are not the novel. We're reading a novel, right? Grade level complex text, but then the fluency passage is an informational text that I select based on what's going to be coming up that I want to build background knowledge on and build some content vocabulary for them. So, for example, um if we're reading in my high school lit lab right now, we're reading The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lax, it's a really challenging novel, but amazing. And so I might have them read an article about like cell cultures and cell growth, right? It's more scientific-based that then is going to help them to better understand the chapter we're reading, where it talks about actually how Henrietta's the Gila cells were able to multiply in cell culture and like how that process came about. Um, or in my middle school lab, we're reading The Giver. And so even though that's a fictional novel instead of a nonfiction, like Henrietta Lax, I might pull an article that talks about the age of choice or about the historical significance throughout history of cultures that um allow and limit knowledge. And then we we connect it to the novel. And so what's been really great is they now realize, right, that there's always a connection. And so at the beginning of the week, they're like making predictions about what's gonna happen in the novel based on the fluency passage. They're like, oh, this is talking about um, I mean, we had to read about euthanasia, right? At the start, they read an entire article about what euthanasia is to read the giver. And so then they're like, wait, are there gonna be people like killing people by choice or lethal injections? Like, what's gonna happen there? Um, so I think it it sort of lends itself to a lot of curiosity, but then it also helps them, gives them greater access to um to the text when we get there.

Lori

Well, it helps them understand sooner, right? I mean, if you if you've never conceptualized any of that even fathomed, that those things would happen, you're not gonna think about that. That's what's going on. You're actually gonna be a little confused. So I feel like you're like helping them connect the dots a little bit faster.

Faith Howard

Yeah, really trying to. I mean, when I when you think about reading comprehension, is this whole other piece? I mean, all of this decoding and fluency work is in service to supporting their ability to be able to comprehend and understand what they read. And so when we think about that, it's like we have to build their vocabulary, we have to build their knowledge base as well, because those are limiting factors that are gonna impact their comprehension just as much as their inability to decode words. So we have to do it in tandem. And that's maybe a difference in secondary is that these things work really well when they're integrated. It's not, oh, this right now, all we're gonna work on is decoding words. And we're just gonna do word lists and individual words, and we're just gonna read those words. It's like, no, we're full-blown gonna read in text, in context. And I think about it like as this analogy, but so I played college basketball and you do tons of shooting drills and and like by yourself and with a shooting machine and in practice. But if you never take it live and you can't ever translate to actually making a shot in a game, you could be the best shooter on the block, you know, out on your basketball goal in front of your house, but it's gotta translate in into like the game time, right? And for them, game time is in their classes. Like they're gonna go, they're gonna be exposed to high level challenging assignments and texts. And they have to be able to use it in those places, or else it doesn't, it's not gonna mean. Anything for them.

Melissa

Yeah. And you're helping them see that there is a connection here. That's why we're doing these things. It's not because, you know, they're they're for little kids. And I just want to bring this to you, right? Like we're doing it for a purpose and it's going to really help you with these tough texts.

Faith Howard

Yeah. And you just have to name that, right? Like, um, the the age of the science of learning is everything is like, just tell them, be explicit. It's okay to say that. Like, hey, we're doing this because of this. And now I want you to use it here. And I want you to try that and then tell me how that went for you. Um, so, and and I think that honors them, honestly, like the older students that as like a partner in the learning process. Um, and then I'll add one other thing about fluency that I've I've been exploring, and and I was really, I listened to your guys' episode um on Read Like Us, right? With Jake Downs and um Chase Young. I have to make sure I get the names right. And um, you know, it was like fascinating to me because I see these core ideas that they were testing and researching around the fluency piece. Um, but one of the things that they indicated is like, but their focus was on the word reading and on rate and fluency, not necessarily on the comprehension. And then, so, but I'm pull, I, you know, I've got parts from their fluency routine embedded into mine. And then there's a newer fluency routine that Kate Christ and Allie Wilson are using called the type 10. And so I've been, you know, just very early stages trying this out in my classroom. And that one, you're not, students aren't timing themselves. There's no like the fluency is really in service of comprehension. And that routine also is really strong in building comprehension because essentially each time that they read it, you're you're modeling a different type of reading, and then they're working on um summarizing the gist and kind of working through the text and then revising their gist statements based on multiple readings. So they're getting a better understanding as they read it more times and hear other students' gist statements. So, what I feel like I'm working on, my routine is sort of like a combination where I'm really trying to do both the can we work on our accuracy and rate while also uplifting and elevating these key like skills that are kind of the underpinnings of comprehension, so that by the end of it, the comprehension is really strong and the rate and rate and expression, right? Um, all of those pieces. So yeah, those those are really wonderful resources and great routines as well that I just would highly recommend to educators.

Lori

Yeah, and I'm actively linking them all in the show notes. So if you're excited to hear more, linking everything that Faith talked about today in the show notes.

Faith Howard

I'm giving you lots of uh homework for for having to put things in the show notes. I'm sorry about

Adapting K2 Tools For Teens

Faith Howard

that.

Melissa

We don't mind. Um, one thing I've just been thinking about throughout this faith is, you know, you keep saying, like, I learned this from a first grade teacher, I've learned this from an elementary teacher. And I I feel like I'm allowed to say this because I was a secondary teacher. But a lot of times we as secondary teachers would come across something from elementary and just be like, that does not apply to us. No, thank you. Um, and I love how you are just like, wait a second, okay, it's not gonna work that same way. I know that, but there are pieces here that I know my students need. So I know that I need to take those and make them work for my students. And I just I love the way that you're you're doing that. I'm wondering if you have any advice for teachers listening that like, I mean, how do you that's that's really admirable that you that you do that. But do you have any advice on like how you might you know what what can they do when they get all these tons of strategies on the science of reading that are all for K2? And you know, what can they do to make it work for their students? Because I think these could work for, I mean, definitely upper elementary, definitely middle and high, you're doing it with those grade levels. Um, so how can they make it work for their students?

Faith Howard

Yeah, I'm I'm really glad you brought that up because I I think um it it's something that I am I've figured out about myself, maybe, but really it's out, it was uh from a place of desperation. So I think any teacher listening who's like starting their journey with working with students in the secondary space, and and you know, you're kind of feeling overwhelmed or like, what do I even do? Because really um four years ago when I shifted from being a high school English teacher to literacy specialist, the learning curve was so, so steep. And there's just not a lot out there. And it's it's happening, like there's more starting to um come about now for secondary, and there's some really great books out there, right, that are sort of telling you how to do it, but not necessarily like provided materials in order to do all of it. Or there are really great um programs or curricular resources out there, but they're like pieces of the reading rope, they're not all of it integrated. And so I've I created my own literacy lab curriculum from scratch and all of these pieces because I couldn't find it elsewhere. But to go back to your point, when I started down this journey and I was like, where do I even begin? The only thing I knew how to do was to start listening to other teachers who had been doing this for a long time. And it's really easy in the secondary space to sort of write off the elementary and think that we're completely disconnected. Um, but these are evidence-based, like if what they're doing is evidence-based, there's the the piece of that, there's something in that that also then science would say works for older kids if it's adapted, if it's adjusted. And so you have to uh for me, it's like I became obsessed with with reading books, attending webinars, joining like literacy communities of practice and cohorts and just anything I could get my hands on, where and it was mostly with elementary teachers, and then I would just always be thinking through, and I call this teacher as tinkerer, but it's beg, borrow, and steal. But then it's like you've got to make it your own. And so I'm just looking, I'm always looking for like, what could I picture my students doing? And then what would it look like for them? Like, what would I need to adjust or change? And so that's my recommendation to teachers is just, I mean, it makes it kind of fun because it's really like action research. You are in real time learning, and then you're like, let me incorporate this into my classroom and tweak and see how it goes, and then reflect and then try it again. Um, and certain things you're gonna realize like are maybe not worth the time and energy and and that you, you know, pivot and do something else. And then others, you'll strike gold and be like, oh my word, this is awesome. And my kids love it, and I love it. And I feel like it's really gonna move the needle for them with literacy. So it it's just about it's just about being open and willing um and and collaboration with other other people as well.

Melissa

And those middle school students will not, they'll tell you if they don't like it. They don't hold back. No, that's that's great advice, Faith. I mean, I think I love the idea of like teacher as tinkerer, you know, just you have you have to try it and see see what works. But, you know, and I think what you said is so great because if the science says it works for those students who are learning to read, if my students are still having some struggles in reading, it's going to work for them too. I just need to find how to make it work for them.

Faith Howard

Yeah. And I know some of the things we're talking about are so specific to like literacy interventions in the upper grades, but some of these are very transferable and practical potentially to use in tier one. I'll just make a plug there as a former high school, and and I currently teach middle school English as well, um, not just interventions. But like there, there's a need that there is an opportunity here for fluency work in tier one classrooms, not even English classrooms, or not only English classrooms, um, and and even for word work, word consciousness, morphology, um, and potentially spelling. Um, so I just think like we can't ignore that reality in this day and age. If we look at nape scores, if we look at where our kids are coming to us now versus 20 years ago. Um, if you've ridden that out in education, you know that like we have to adapt and change the way we're teaching, because if we keep doing things the way that we've been doing, we're just gonna miss this entire generation of kids.

Lori

I am so glad that you came on the podcast to talk about this today, Faith. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you for leaving us with that message, too.

Faith Howard

Thank you. Yeah, it's a pleasure to be here. I appreciate you guys and all the work you do so much. And um, yeah, hope people reach out to me if they have questions or want to continue the conversation.

How To Stay Connected

Melissa

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Lori

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Melissa

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Lori

We appreciate you so much, and we're so glad you're here to learn with us.