when do you introduce sight words?

When you twicw say STILL learning to read, I worry about your expectations and our culture’s expectations. 5 and for some children even 6 is early to learn to read.
I’d say begin in first grade.

Take your five most high frequency (a, the, is, of, on) and do the flash cards in class one or two at a time. He’ll get faster but don’t push him for now if he cannot do it. Keep doing LiPS if he’s making progress. Don’t rush him too much—awfully young.

I suggest some decodable text (SPIRE is excellent for K-6 readers). That way they get practice reading materials fairly soon.

Keep us posted on how he’s doing!

I have been looking for decodable texts. I’m using MULTILIT from Australia, but I am looking for something better. The PM levelled guided reading books that the school uses don’t teach decoding.

I searched SPIRE, but I couldn’t find any info on decodable text. Do you know the website?

By the way, I made a mistake. My kids are 6 and 7 year olds. Kindergarten and Grade 1, not 5 and 6; sorry.

I have posted SPIRE’S website before but now I cannot find it to save myself. I’ll keep looking.

Wilson Language also has a program for little kids but I’ve not looked at the scope/sequence. I’m hoping it is different than the older kids version. (I like SPIRE’S sequence better.)

I do really like SPIRE, especially since it has a phonemic-awareness component resembling Lindamood (fits nicely with that method.) It isn’t the only thing I use, but I do like to use SPIRE reading materials in my lesson plan.

Now about those tikes. If the literature is right, sustained attention is a critical readiness skill. If it is not there, do what you can do to build readiness skills. No matter if kids are 5-6-7, if they’re not ready to sit still, they’re not ready. Meet them where they are in the learning sequence and proceed forward at whatever rate you are able: as fast as you can and as slow as you must.

Since you said that you’ve posted it before I searched for it here and I found it. www.spire.org. Thanks!

On another note, you said before that you can share your LIPS O-G combined program or was it lesson plan? I’d like to take you up on that offer. However, I’m not trained OG although I bought the book. Is that a good training to have? I’m trained in Slingerland and LIPS. I’d like to take Seeing Stars next.

Susan, did you get the student readers? I quoted below:
“Readers are 8 ½” X 11” spiral bound format creating the image of a notebook with sophisticated materials even in the beginning when the text is relatively simple. Text is picture free. Best meaning driven decodable text available. Ten Readers of 100 + pages each.”

The website doesn’t have any sample materials nor pictures. The readers are just texts then? No pictures at all? Printed on 81/2 x 11 sheets? What does the “ten readers of 100+ pages each” mean?

Many thanks for your help!

The readers, from book 1 and moving forward, take sounds that you have introduced in an orderly sequence of instruction and provide words, sentences, and passages using those sounds. Book 1 is all CVC stuff and the first few basic sight words.

The thing that is different about SPIRE than Wilson is its sequence of instruction. SPIRE doesn’t do all the vowel teams in one book at the end of the program. They are interspersed throughout in a similar order to what a basal would provide (based more on frequence): ay first, ai, long oo, etc. She introduces letter pattern (short a; easy open like he, no, my; ay; tch; etc.) and then gives a page or two of word lists using that sound. This is followed by a many pages of words, sentences, and passages/stories using words from the letter pattern introduces plus previously studied patterns.

I’ll try to post my lesson plan format (It is a little different that the one given in the SPIRE manual but not a lot.) And I’ll post the scope & sequence—or at least the first few books of it. If you have had Lindamood training, you can do SPIRE without Orton training. It will just be a matter of using materials a little differently.

I have several private tutoring clients on Sat., but will post later tonight.

Hi Barb,

Thought I’d tell you a little about Sheila, SPIRE creator. She is an x-special education teacher and Director of Sped for her district in Maine. She originally made these materials to complement her own instruction using Lindamood-OG methods. So many other people wanted to use them that she put them on a limited market and expanded them. She then decided to just go into publishing/consulting full time. She doesn’t have a lot of hoop-la like the big publishers—and you can talk to her personally if you have questions. She’s still small enough for that. (Check her out at LDA national—I’m sure she’ll be there.)

I like her scope & sequence (I’ll post separately in a bit), her mixture of genres, and her nice high vocabulary with the right concept load for younger students. I do, as I said, like her sequence. However, if I’m working with 5th/6th graders, I use some of Wilson, too. For some older groups, I may use all Wilson. Depends on their skills and what holes I’m filling.

My sequence is pretty set. This is brief, but if student is reading (as measured on a reading inventory and a coding-skills test):

PP/P - Lindamood to connect sound-symbol is where I begin and I use SPIRE materials.

Gr 1/2 - Begin short/long vowel sounds, then initial and final blends/ng,; however, I fill any sounds that are improperly memorized or weak (consonant y, x, reinforce main sound for c/g, etc.) For younger students, I use SPIRE—older possibly SPIRE/Wilson combo, or just Wilson.

Gr 3/4 - Fill all missing skills above including knowledge of open/closed syllable. Begin with irregular vowels (r-control, c-le final pattern, soft c/g, and vowel team syllables such as ea, ou, au etc) and then work is mainly structure syllables—using all these sounds in multi-syllable words. Roots/affixes.

Gr 5/6 - Review irregular vowels and structural syllable analysis skills. Fill any holes from prior levels. Roots/affixes.

Gr 7-8 - Extensive Reading/Vocabulary work.

This was probably more than anyone out there ever wanted to know.

Here are the first 50 or so skills in SPIRE. I’m not sure you’ll ever get past this level with kids 6/7 years of age. This will be tedious, so hold on to your hat.

SKILL/Book-Reader
Introduction of Consonants/Primary 1-20
Short a/Closed Syllable/1.1
Short i/Closed Syllable/1.2
Short o/Closed Syllable/1.3
Short u/Closed Syllable/1.4
Short e/Closed Syllable/1.5
Consonant Digraph sh/2.1
Consonant Digraph ch/2.2
Consonant Digraph th/2.3
Consonant Digraph wh/2.4
Welded ng sounds/2.5
Welded nk sounds/2.6
Double Consonant ff, ll, ss/3.1
al/all/3.2
wa (wasp)/3.3
Consonant Digraph qu/3.4
Consonant Digraph ck/3.5
Consonant Trigraph tch/3.6
Vowel-Consonant e (or silent e)/4.1
Open Syllable (Frequent Pronouns he, no, my)/5.1
Closed Syllable Exceptions (ild, old, ind, ost)/5.2
Vowel Diphthong ay/5.3
Suffix ed without base change/5.4
Anglo Suffixes without base word change/6.1
Twin Syllable Division/6.2
Closed Syllable Division/6.3
Dipthong ou/7.1
Dipthong ea/7.2
Consonant-le/7.3
Diphthong oa/7.4
Diphthong ai/8.2
Diphthong ee/8.3
Diphthong oo/9.1
Vowel trigraph igh/9.2
Dipthong ie, igh/9.3
Hard/Soft c and g/9.4
Er, Ir, Ur, Ear, Wor/10.1
Consonant trigraph dge/10.2
S-Z(i.e. nose)/10.3

Now a bit of an explanation of how things are ordered. Each section has some new sight words or high frequency words that are exceptions to the pattern being introduced. (The first sight words in Books 1-3 are: the, is, has, I was, said, of, to do, into, who, you, full, pull, put, want, what) She also suggests through, you, pour in the first book or two but I don’t always do them.

I use lots of air writing and table-tracing for sight words. Flash cards every day-just two or three words. Even my slower processors get them because I don’t over load them. Just a few at a time.

Each section has words in the new pattern in isolation, in sentences, and in passages. Old patterns studied are constantly spiraled back in for review. There are several stories and/or poems for students to read. There are nice things for choral reading and my old principal could almost recite some of them because kids would go read to her to ‘show off’ a bit.

Like SPIRE, Wilson presents words in patterns—in isolation and within sentences/passages. Now I’ll just tell you how Wilson is different. (First, fictional narratives are all about adults or college students where SPIRE includes many characters that are children.) Wilson has twelve books. Book 1-3 are closed syllables, initial and final blends, ng/nk patterns, ll/ss/zz final patterns, and then 3-4 closed syllable words at the end of Book 3. Book 4 teaches silent e and then has multisyllable words w/closed and silent e. Book 5 focus is open syllables and schwa. It takes till book 9 to get any vowel teams. For adults, that is okay—but not for young children, IMO. Younger children will be reading trade books faster at their own interest level with the SPIRE sequence.

Finally, so as not to do Wilson a disservice, they do have a new program out for children, I think it is called FUNdamentals. I haven’t seen it. Hope to do that at some conference. Wish I could have gone to Atlanta. Maybe I’ll get to Chicago in Feb. Maybe not.

Thank you so much Susan, for taking the time to type out everything! Bless your heart. I’ll keep you posted on their progress.

I didn’t slave more than a few seconds to copy - paste from a Word document…wish I could take the credit, though. I use a sequence like this to write IEP objectives and I use it to compare to other programs. I have a Word Doc with both Wilson and SPIRE sequence.

Yes, I realize that I need a life. Thanks for your kind words anyway… :-)