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The Science of Reading at IST
The reading program at IST is based on current research in the Science of Reading. Reading instruction involves explicit teaching in the Big Six of Reading – Oral Language, Phonological and Phonemic Awareness, Phonics, Fluency, Vocabulary and Comprehension.
Oral Language
Oral language is the system through which we use spoken words to express knowledge, ideas, and feelings. Oral language is often associated with vocabulary as the main component. However, oral language is comprised of much more. In the broadest definition, oral language consists of six areas: phonology, grammar, morphology, vocabulary, discourse, and pragmatics.
Phonological and Phonemic Awareness
Phonological awareness is a critical skill for all students’ literacy development and a predictor of later reading and spelling success. Phonological awareness refers to oral language and is the understanding of the different ways that language can be broken down into smaller parts. Phonological awareness is the ability to perceive and manipulate the following word parts – syllables, onsets, rimes and phonemes. Phonemic awareness is a subset of phonological awareness that involves the specific skill of identifying and manipulating individual speech sounds within words (phonemes).
Phonics
Phonics is concerned with sound-letter relationships in written words and builds upon a foundation of language and phonological awareness. Phonics instruction helps children learn the relationship between letters of the written language and the sounds of the spoken language. Synthetic phonics is essential for instructior.
Fluency
Reading fluency refers to the reader’s ability to read texts accurately, at an appropriate pace and with
appropriate expression. Fluent reading acts as a bridge between automatic word reading and comprehension. Reading fluency can be considered using three dimensions – accuracy, automaticity and prosody. Vocabulary – Vocabulary refers to the words we know, understand and use to communicate effectively. Vocabulary is critical to reading comprehension. Reading requires more complex, and often more abstract, vocabulary than that used in everyday oral interactions. Readers cannot understand what they are reading without knowing what most of the words mean.
Comprehension
Comprehension is an active process that involves the reader understanding and interpreting
what is read. Scarborough’s reading rope represents the essential components of skilled reading – language comprehension, which must become increasingly strategic over time, and word recognition, which should become increasingly automatic over time. The lower part of the reading rope focuses on word recognition and includes three critical skills: phonological awareness, decoding and sight recognition. The upper part of the reading rope focuses on language comprehension and includes background knowledge, vocabulary, language structures, verbal reasoning and literacy knowledge.
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