I read that teaching reading through word families is very limiting because it does not teach decoding. However, I’m thinking of teaching the word families to a 7 year old who has very low cognitive ability. He just can’t decode. He can’t blend either. He has serious memory problems. He just learned the alphabet after 5 months. He started without any letter at all. Would it make sense to teach the word families? I can’t use LiPS because of his poor language development.
Re: Do you teach word families?
You can do both; I do. I use a combination of Orton-Gillingham and the Merrill Linguistics basal with very beginner readers. Check out Phyllis Bertin’s program available from Educator’s Publishing Service: Preventing Academic Failure. She does so, also.
Re: Do you teach word families?
Hi Barbara,
The memory capacity to learn specific word families is significantly greater than the memory load required to learn all of the components sounds and their associated spellings, so if he’s got low cognitive ability, he’s better off being taught the basic skills of blending and segmenting along with the individual spellings of the sounds, in my opinion.
I’m working with a first grader now who four weeks ago couldn’t blend hardly at all, but knew a few word families and most of the initial blends, and 30 to 50 sight words. But, she couldn’t use that information to read, and she was very confused as to what exactly constituted a sound.
With less than a month of the kind of basic instruction I’m referring to (2 hours a week,) she’s not only starting to blend much more accurately, but she’s starting to deal with vowel digraphs like “oa,” “ow” and “ou.” She’s still a very poor reader, but she’s now making good progress.
I would stay away from teaching initial blends as single entities and word endings as entities. It seems to me that these teaching strategies, which are generally geared at making things “clearer” for the poorer readers, just confuse them more than anything, and they take up a ton of valuable instruction time…..Rod
Re: Do you teach word families?
In general, you use a good basic program like LiPs and/or OG BECAUSE the child doesn’t know the material — the idea is to teach him what he doesn’t already know. Yes, it will take some time and patience, but he will learn skills that will be useful and will hopefully inmorve his functioning.
what does his speech and language evaluation say?
I disagree on not using LIPS. LiPS may be just what he needs as it addresses the possible phonological deficits he may have…has he had an articulation test?has…the LiPS program will help him feel how the sounds are made in his mouth…give him a tactile and visual reminder of sounds…
I would consult with the SLP because from what little you have said…he sounds like he has a phonological processing disorder besides a low cognition…which could be a result of underlying language deficits.
Re: what does his speech and language evaluation say?
He is seeing the SLP for expressive and receptive language skills. The SLP is working with him mostly on vocabulary because that’s the greatest need. Hence, LiPS would be hard for him because he wouldn’t know what the tip of the tongue or popping etc… means.
Tomorrow, he will be assessed using the WISC III. I pushed for this assessment because I want to find out what method would help him read.
He knows his letter sounds now. We’re working on blending the sounds together. He prefers memorizing the word families, but that’s not going to help him in the long run.
I think his learning style is global because he can recognize a few sight words.
Re: what does his speech and language evaluation say?
Well, I *show* the student the tip of my tongue and have him point to his; I make the popping sound and have him imitate it. You get reading and vocabulary and speech and concepts all rolled into one package. Yes, it takes time. A lot better than using that time on memorize and forget.
you don't need to use the labels..
You could use the positions of the mouth, with the pictures and he can visually see where they are placed in his mouth and feel them to understand that the phonemes are made in certain ways and represent certain sounds…
amen..
when I met Phyllis Lindamood and she trained me in LiPS…I told her…I learned this way as a child but I don’t remember these labels…We talked about it and we concurred that I probably learned to read from an SLP who taught me how to read lips and articulate phonetic sounds at the same time…
You want to know something else…At the time I was in an SDC class with profoundly deaf students and the rest of the regular ed classes were learning to read by sight…Guess who learned to read quicker than they did..Me…because I had the foundation or understanding the phonemes and articulation that the kids who learned by sight didn’t have..
What’s Lips? Your student sounds like several I’ve had.