Hi, all,
I am looking for some suggestions on teaching phonemic awareness and segmentation to older students (3rd and 4th grade). I have several students who just don't get it, and they can read lots of words, but they are limited to the words they know and don't know how to apply decoding strategies to the ones they don't, and they can't spell worth beans! If I give them just a single word, they are usually okay, but in text they are lost. They also can't handle words with more than one syllable. They tend to jumble up the sounds in the middle. I have used the boxes to write each sound that we hear when we say a word, and I've given them words to attempt to do the same, but they just don't get it. And sometimes they are way off - they will insert completely random sounds (/r/ seems to be a favorite). They do this more often when orally trying to break down the sounds, but also when writing. They have such poor comprehension that they aren't able to use the context to help with decoding. Sometimes it seems as though the only way they can use context is if I read it to them. They may read a sentence and substitute a random word (usually begins with the same letter, but that's all), and not even realize that it doesn't make sense. When I try to focus their attention on the word, they just can't figure out anything that would make sense that begins like that word, and we spend so much time on this level of reading that it's hard to get to the deeper meaning and enjoyment of reading. I have one more really difficult student and I would love to hear suggestions on this. The little guy will be entering first grade next year and did "double duty" in our half-day kindergarten this year (attending both sessions). He is unable to remember what any letters are. He still doesn't recognize his own name, he can't get all the way through the alphabet orally, he only gets to about "g", but he can't match letters to the alphabet song as he sings, he can't distinguish between letters and numbers. We have tried every style of learning we can think of with him. After tracing his own name for the entire school year he still can't write it himself. (And that's just his first name, with only 4 letters.) He was tested for SPED and didn't qualify, supposedly because his IQ was too high (70's). What's a reading teacher to do?????? He's a sweet boy and I am very concerned for him. His older brother is one of the kiddos described in the above paragraph, and I believe he is on the autism spectrum(our autism specialist and I have done many observations). Family support is minimal. Any suggestions would be appreciated! Thanks, Debbie Smith _______________________________________________ Mosaic mailing list [email protected] To unsubscribe or modify your membership please go to http://literacyworkshop.org/mailman/options/mosaic_literacyworkshop.org. Search the MOSAIC archives at http://snipurl.com/MosaicArchive.
