Oxford Reading Tree words

[schmee]

My twins are supposedly learning to read with phonics and are just doing phonics at school (learning the letter sounds) but they are coming home with books with lots of sight words in them. I think they are say and see books?? Apologies this is all very new to me. One is using the Oxford reading tree (they are in different classes).

Should I be doing something to reinforce the words they don't know? At the moment it seems quite random. Also, I've lost track of the new sight words or tricky words (e.g. ones with sounds like "ay" and "ow" that they haven't learnt yet). Does anyone know if a list exists that gives the words in the order they appear in the ORT?

As they are using different books in the different classes, I find it really hard to remember whether each child has encountered the word before!

[mrz]

"MRZ, Well I have no way of knowing that." true Benjamintheblue ... my son has SEN and something called hyperlexia

"Hyperlexia is characterised by an intense fascination with letters or numbers or, in younger people, an ability to read far beyond their age. People with hyperlexia may, nevertheless, have difficulty understanding verbal language and interacting and socialising with others."

[mrz]

tiredbutnotweary I'm shamed to confess I played no alphabet games and knew nothing about phonics when my son was a small child... shockingly we didn't even have fridge magnets . He obviously had stories read to him but rarely stayed still long enough to look at books, everything was done on the move or so it seemed. As he didn't sleep most of the things we did with him were an attempt to physically tire him out in the hope he might stop for a few hours rather than thinking about letter at such a young age. He first picked up one of his books and "read" it around 18 months (I believed he had memorised it) and quite soon afterwards started to read anything and everything. He could also answer difficult calculations in his head and with that he says he just sees the answer.
I don't know why his brain is different I just know it is and it makes him sad.

[mrz]

You are happy to go with a 40 year old study that has been discredited by current research using brain imaging

[maizieD]

Benjamintheblue

Two illustrations of why you might be completely wrong in your approach:

www.wce.wwu.edu/Depts/SPED/Forms/Kens%20Readings/reading/Readings/Ehri%20Word%20Learning.pdf

www.improve-education.org/id58.html

[Onetwo34]

This is interesting. DD is in reception and doing well at phonics, one of the best apparently, but is really struggling with the Biff Chip and Kipper books, the worst in the class apparently!

Perhaps I won't worry myself about the reading books and tricky words, despite school's parents evening concerns. They wanted all children to be at a particular colour by the end of the year.

[Benjamintheblue]

The 1st article makes sense. It seems to be saying an understanding of the alphabetic system will encourage you to learn more words by sight (which is the aim to be a good reader). It says any word read often enough becomes a sight word, but the way we make the connections to recognise that sight word are different. If it were just shapes, many more words would be read wrongly (makes sense). If children do not know that ph symbolizes /f/, then when they encounter these letters in particular words, the letters will not become bonded to their phonemes in memory (makes sense).

Thank-you for that article. So I am wrong to make up my own silly stories, to get her to remember the shape of the word, but the aim for her is still remembering sight words. Its just how she remembers them. Thinking of 'LOOK' as 2 eyeballs looking at you is a bad idea, but learning that two 'OO' make a certain sound is correct. So by reading as we are, yes Caitlin is going to take a fall, in that when I stop testing her, she will be slower to learn new words on her own.

The 2nd article seems like a sales pitch. The guy goes over the top to prove his point. Comparing phone numbers to words is silly. Of course phone numbers are harder, as they are simply longer and would relate to people. People and numbers would be very easy to get mixed up. Quote - 'In fact, few students can memorize even 300 words per year' Again over the top. This article is different than the 1st, as it is saying the better readers don't read by sight words. The 1st article says they do and that that is the aim. The 1st article seems the most believable.

Conclusion - Don't put all the eggs in one basket. Teach my child phonics, but don't be scared of getting my child to remember words by sight. If they learn correctly, then excel worksheets with lists of words will still help her. Sight words are still the aim and the reason she seems to be doing well with me constantly testing her. She just will go on to more sight words if she makes the connections to remember them through the alphabet and has the ability to decode them when she needs to. - Done and dusted, I have learned a lot since I come here. I am embarrassed of my 1st post now lol

[maizieD]

The first article is by a highly respected cognitive scientist who has been researching the process of reading and the acquisition of reading skills for many years. What she is saying is that words go into long term memory (are 'learned') through the application of knowledge of the alphabetic code (phoneme/grapheme correspondences) to decode and blend words. I think you'll find that she says that even 'sight' reading of words once they are in long term memory is achieved through application of graphemeic and phonological knowledge.

Where you are going overboard is on the 'learning'. Most children don't need to consciously 'learn' individual words because a number of repetitions of sounding out and blending will get them into long term memory without any particular effort on their part. Basically, you are wasting your, and your daughter's time by using elaborate techniques to get her to 'learn' words. She would 'learn' them anyway as her phonic knnowledge grows and she automatically applies it to new words. All you are really doing is teaching her party tricks, 'knowing' words before she reaches that particular stage in her phonic knowledge. It won't give her any advantage in the long run and may well interfere with her secure acquisition of phonics.

As far as I am concerned the second article was not a sales pitch. It set out clearly the disadvantages (indeed, the downright idiocy) of whole word teaching. Prof. Ehri also touches on some in her article. There's plenty of stuff out on the web which says much the same things.

[tiredbutnotweary]

mrz - thank you for explaining some more about your son's learning to read process, it is very interesting that you hadn't taught him the alphabet code, do you think he saw words as wholes initially, or did he just understand the code too (I mean did you ever hear him sound words out)?

I'm sorry to hear he feels sad. I have some understanding with DD1 (and possibly DD2) being ASD (not to mention how much more I understood myself once DD1 was diagnosed). If the world was more accepting and valued difference a little more, it would help a little perhaps ...

Benjamintheblue - to you for taking the time to read the articles and be open minded enough to consider changing your approach. I've been lurking on these types of threads for a good while and a conversion (not sure if it's the right word) is fairly rare .

Whilst I'm convinced about the phonics approach I am still struggling myself due to the inconsistent spellings of the English language. DD is reading at a level where the words are multi or is it polysyllabic and use alternative spellings for the phonic sounds. So, for example, where ch, is representing 3 different sounds, obviously /ch/ as in cheese, then /sh/ as in machine or /c/ as in architect. It's making her more nervous when sounding out new words and because I don't really know how rare a correspondence is I'm struggling to help. For example how often does an i represent the sound /ee/ as in names like Gloria, or words like studio, or indeed machine??? Where is the book or phonics programme to help me with that?!? Obviously this is a rhetorical question - though if anyone has the answer please let me know!!!

[mrz]

He doesn't understand the code tiredbutnotweary which was the big problem when it came to writing even the simplest words. His school and all the professionals kept saying "don't worry it will click eventually" it didn't

[mrz]

beckclasswiki.wikispaces.com/file/view/SpellRead+Lexicon.pdf

[maizieD]

So, for example, where ch, is representing 3 different sounds, obviously /ch/ as in cheese, then /sh/ as in machine or /c/ as in architect. It's making her more nervous when sounding out new words

She needs to be prepared to try all the 'variations' that she knows. Once she's got the correct 'sound' the word will, in most cases, become obvious as the word will most likely be in her spoken or heard vocabulary (children have thousands of words that they have never read in their receptive/expressive vocabularies). If it isn't, a good dictionary with a pronunciation guide will provide the correct sound and the meaning. There's no shame in using a dictionary when baffled

[HomageToCannelloni]

So if the biff, chip, kipper books are rubbish to use in conjunction with phonics, which ones are the best to enhance his learning and understanding of the phonics he is being taught. (Jolly phonics at their school)

[tiredbutnotweary]

mrz - that's exactly what I was looking for - literally, I found it referred to online but couldn't find it to download!!! Yes, I remember you mentioning his difficulties with writing on another thread - it all makes sense now - again thank you so much for taking the time to explain.

maize, the problem for DD is now that the words are so long, she's at the limits of her working memory for sounding out. She likes reading fluently, using expression etc. and can read in her head for pleasure (on the loo usually ) but she get's frustrated when she doesn't instantly know a word. She's only just 5 though and, I think, has definite tracking problems. So for example finds words that have the same letters in a different order tricky, e.g. left and felt - she will even start to sound out left as f.e.l.t. She could do simple anagrams at 3 (a benefit of this problem ) and has even tried to read sentences from left to right as well as skipping lines (the white card helps with that). So a word like architecture seems like a bit of a mountain to climb and she just wants to get on with the story iyswim?

[simpson]

Tired - DD taught herself to read at three, yes I read to her a lot and she learnt the alphabet song at playgroup (not phonetic) but I honestly don't have a clue how she did it. I was a lax mum who did not even teach her the alphabet myself (nor did I want to tbh).

At a guess, I have fridge magnets (left on there from when her older brother used them) and she used them to twig the sounds (she reads phonetically) ie c a t etc...

Benjamin - I personally think you would be better to go over phonetic sounds with your DD than long lists of words. Also how can your DD be the best reader if she is not in the top group?

[mrz]

One of the many things I like about the books published by phonicbooks is that "long" polysyllabic words in the text are presented at the foot of the page broken into syllables.

[tiredbutnotweary]

simpson - thank you - also very interesting, did you never need to help your daughter if she was working out a word on the fridge for example, did she just seem to know it without any input or guidance from you? Did she hear her DB learning to read or sound out words? Also when you read to her did she / does she want you to run your finger under the words?

Regarding Benjamin's DD's group, it's a phonic group, and it's definitely feasible to be in a lower phonics group but be taking home books from higher book bands than the children in the higher phonics group ... well especially when the take home reading books are look and say!!!

mrz - wow the totem series covering phase 6 are exactly what DD needs, and the breakdown really superb ... unfortunately they are not at all suitable being aimed at much older readers, poor DD would run a mile from those pictures!

[simpson]

I suspect that she has heard her brother do them and remembered or worked out the sounds from what he said.

I also suspect that she was "tracking" the words when I was reading to her.

Once I twigged that she could blend I did then get phonics type books from the library. I remember her saying that a y at the end of a word made an ee sound because its in her name (she was reading the word sadly for the first time when she told me this).