Reading Clinic in NW Arkansas

Eileen,

I asked you this on another thread and it may get buried, so I’ll ask again here. I am in the process of learning and implementing Phono-Graphix and Lindamood Bell programs.

I am very interested in fluency as there is much less information abotu it as opposed to decoding. About all I know is repeated oral reading. I have Great Leaps. Do you have any particular pointers? Both my child and many of the children I teach have serious fluency issues.

Thanks,
Janis

Dear Janis,
You were right in deciding to ask me again. If I could just do without sleep, maybe I could get everything that I start completed.

I think that the reason that you are having so much difficulty finding information on fluency is because it is just now getting the attention it deserves. It took a long time and was a huge fight to give phoneme awareness recognition and credibility in the role of reading. So much, that it took some attention away from fluency instruction. Now, maybe BECAUSE of the success of phoneme awareness instruction, and the information that was gleaned from that - information being that often many of our students can now read but still aren’t fluent- helps the focus go to fluency.

Before blasting you with more info than you probably want , I need to tell you that I recently scolded someone for sounding off without maybe being educated enough to give opinions so let me tell you that I am not a PhD and do not know everything about reading but since you asked for my input, here goes:
To be fluent, an individual needs to (have phoneme awareness and orthographic awareness skills) be able to see a symbol or a group or letters (syllable or whole word), recognize it and turn it into a phonological bit, sound chunk, syllable, or word and spit it back out. In order to do this fluently, it must be an automatic response. This is where the
RAN tests come in handy and of course the GORT. These tests often let me know if someone is going to have fluency problems where if I had just given them a Woodcock Reading Mastery Test, their reading scores might look just fine. Also, poor spelling in written work (I’m not talking about weekly spelling tests) - esp. misspelled common sight words is another red flag that the student will have fluency problems.
What to do about it? Always a good question. Not sure I have a brilliant answer but I will tell you do what we do at my clinic. Some I am inventing as we go along (maybe I will publish it) but all is based on what the National Reading Panel suggested. Great Leaps is a good start The boys seem to like the timing of it better than the girls. I think it is important that they do their own graphing because it helps them become more involved in their own learning. It is also important to note that, if the student has a slow rate of speech, do not expect them to read as quickly as the Great Leaps program suggests. I also use repeated reading from books that we are using like the Scholastic Phonic Chapter books. If they are having a particularly hard time with a sight word, I make up a drill that contains that word several times. Choral reading with silly accents is a fun way to do repeated reading. I also write plays using a controlled vocabulary that uses my students’ names and interests and we practice them over and over. They don’t even realize that they are doing repeated reading. If you don’t like writing plays, you can buy books called Readers’ Theatre books. Nanci Bell’s Seeing Stars exercises pairs up well with fluency. She suggests that with enough of the Seeing Stars program that it will address fluency completely (at least that is what I THINK she means). I don’t agree but I do think that her research and her program have made a very important contribution to fluency. Dr. Joseph Torgesen (one of my heroes) thinks that if Phoneme Awareness is fully developed than fluency will follow. Again, I don’t mean to speak for him but that is my understanding of what he had to say to some of my questions. Again, I do not wholly agree with this, which is a kind of scary thing to say because I think he and Reid Lyon “rule” when it comes to reading. As in anything, which I think you already know, there is no one magic bullet. If you are using Great Leaps, than it is obvious you understand the importance of repeated reading. In addition to what I have already suggested, I use the Wilson Language books that are leveled. That way, if I am teaching the effects of i,e, or y on the letter c, I can choose a Wilson story that has those words in it as my repeated reading exercise. I use Nanci Bell’s Seeing Stars decks to increase fluency also. One of her main principles is developing orthographic awareness (she calls it symbol imagery). Often I will “flash” a syllable from one of her decks and than have the student quickly identify just the vowel sound or isolate the middle syllable….. etc. When we do this kind of work, we will sometimes use a game board. I don’t know what kind of Lindamood-Bell training you rec’d - so often the trainer makes or breaks what you learn. The questioning part of their program is so important. Nanci Bell says it so brilliantly, “You, the teacher, are driving the “sensory bus”” - Meaning that when you are doing sound tracking and they are at a level where you are encouraging them to “feel” that sound, you will emphasize that by always phrasing your question as, “What do you feel: here, there, after the popper, last, etc…… After or when they are beginning to get the “feel” of that process than you start feathering in questions such as: When you felt that scraper (or what ever), what letter can you “see” for that? In strictly symbol imagery exercises, after they “air write” you can ask, “What letter do you see before the__________, or after the ____________. Do you “see” any letters with curves, etc, etc.

So basically to develop fluency: making sure Phoneme Awareness is intact or at least developing, developing orthographic awareness, repeated reading, guided reading, neurological impress, symbol imagery exercises, readers theatre, and personal word banks all have a role.
When you are quietly correcting them when they substitute or omit, etc., it is important that you do it in a fashion where they know you are on their team. It is not a criticism. Don’t let your principal or a salesman fool you into thinking that the “Star Reading Program” will increase fluency. Maybe in a good reader, silent reading may help fluency but not our kind of student.

Sorry this is so lengthy and I am sure I have left something out, my kids keep coming in and asking me to feed them – such demanding children!

My favor to you is to ask you how you integrate Phono Graphix with Lindamood-Bell. I am not trained in PG, yet. I am quite interested.
Eileen

Eileen,

I deeply appreciate your time in answering my question. I, too, am rather obsessed with reading, and I spend far too much time on it! I am very much on the same wavelength as you are but probably a few steps behind.

Just to give you a little background, I have a master’s in special ed. and teach hearing impaired and LD. I have a special interest in APD as our youngest child (incidentally, adopted from China) is diagnosed with APD. I recognized it very early because of my background. My search into reading methods began when I knew she might have trouble. What I found was that I had largely been in the dark for years when it came to sound reading methods. Since then, it has been a constant learning process…my work, my hobby, my mission. Your heros are my heros…just add in Louisa Moats who I had the pleasure of hearing at our state IDA conference this spring! I was so excited to meet her that you would have thought it was a movie star! LOL!

I trained in PG in the spring of 2002. I had LMB V/V and On Cloud Nine this summer. I should have gone ahead and taken Seeing Stars, but I thought I’d take that and LiPS next summer. So I am basically telling you my plan based on what I THINK will work and not what I have actually done. PG is a program that is lean and fast. It has some minor flaws, but overall it is excellent and works for most kids. I can see that some very severe PA kids might need more time in LiPS, but most can get the decoding part from PG. Then I’d go into Seeing Stars to get the orthographic associations down and build fluency.

In relation to what you said on fluency, I think I’m on the right track. I have plenty of decodable readers inclusing the Scholastic Phonics Chapter books you mentioned as well as several others. Instead of Wilson readers, I have Language! readers. (I took Language! training this summer, also, but decided to focus on LMB and PG. I plan to go into private therapy business in the future).

I would like to post some of my child’s scores if you would not mind looking at them. I’ll go to a new post, though, so it’ll be easier to look at them.

Thanks!
Janis

Eileen,

I had my child (age 7 1/2, repeating first grade last year) tested by an SLP/reading specialist in April. (Nonverbal IQ is 111). She was given the CTOPP and TOWRE:

CTOPP
Phonological Awareness 94
Phonological Memory 73
Rapid Naming 94
(significant deficit in memory, low average pa and rn)

TOWRE (age norms)
sight word efficiency 102
phonemic decoding efficiency 84
total word reading eff. 92

Then, she was tested at LMB this summer (many tests and subtests, but I’ll just give a few:

PPVT-III 84

Gray Oral Reading Test-4
Rate 6
accuracy 7
fluency 6
comprehension 9

LAC test 75/100
WRMT word attack 105

Symbol Imagery Test +15/50 (not yet normed, so no interpretation)

They recommended Seeing Stars and V/V, which I fully expected. I really wanted the testing to round out what I had already done and to help me decide whether to place her as LD in school. She already has an IEP for speech/language and the principal is willing to have reading goals on that IEP without changing her label. The school resource teacher is trained in OG and V/V and will take LiPS and SS next summer. I am considering going ahead and buying the Seeing Stars kit and starting with her once she goes through the advanced code section of PG.

Let me know if you have any thoughts! I’d love to have your opinion!
Thanks!
Janis

There’s absolutely no problem placing a SLI or SL qualified student into reading instruction with RSP. If SLI is the cause of her reading difficulites, then she already qualifies. Why is she SLI - artic or language?

You don’t list her actual reading level. WRMT word attack didn’t look too bad. I hope you’re not getting carried away…

I was only somewhat concerned until her classroom achievement testing came back in July. This is the Terra Nova CTBS and scores are in percentiles:

Reading 4
Language 74
Math 81

This is after two years in first grade (last year she scored 8%ile in reading). The part of the reading test that she did most poorly on was oral comprehension. Obviously her listening comprehension is not great. So this is not a pure reading measure, but listening comprehension is supposedly a predictor of reading comprehension. So when you ask what is her reading level, I guess I’d have to say, which test do you want?

We have state testing here beginning in third grade. So it matters that she is scoring low on this kind of test. No, I do not think she reads this low. But the fact that she scores well above average in language and math shows that she is not just not trying or low in general.

She is SLI because of some artic (/r/ mostly ) and language in vocabulary, auditory memory, listening comprehension.

And of course, lack of fluency is a big influence on reading comprehension.

Lindamood Bell recommended Seeing Stars and V/V for her.

Gee, I can’t possibly relate :)

It’s been my experience that getting the phonological awareness and basic skills to real automaticity is the key to fluency — but I also think there are elements of it we haven’t tapped yet.
For instance, my godchild who is severely learning disabled is suddenly much more fluent with language when she is singing. Words flow off her tongue which I swear she couldn’t pronounce if spoken.
Phrasing is something we work a lot with — it helps both fluency and comprehension. (I also think comprehension is an important facet of fluency and that this has a lot to do with the automaticity factor. If you’re automatic at the basic recognition stuff, you can also do the comprehension of the words, which means all those subtle predictions of the next word while you peek ahead wiht the other eye can happen.)
http://www.resourceroom.net/beyond_decoding/phrasing_dec2001.asp has some phrasing info and exercises.
If you haven’t seen int yet, http://www.resourceroom.net/Sharestrats/2002automaticity.asp has tucked inside it lots of great ideas for increasing fluency and automaticity.
And I hate to admit it but I like that the “number of posts” is now under the names when we’re logged in. On my cycling forum you even get ranked (“newbie, junior member…”) which is a little silly… but it’s nice to know who’s a regular.

Hi, Sue,

Thanks for your input! I love your site and have referenced it many times and recommended it to others. But I definitely need to go and read the specific articles you are mentioning. It’s funny, but I have learned so much about PA and decoding, but that is really not where my child’s deficits lie! So I am learning as I go with her! And for some reason, I can look at other children at school and make recommendations so much more easily for them than I can with my own child! I have this feeling of responsibility that I should KNOW how to fix my own child’s issues.

As far as the number of posts go, my number scares me a bit! :shock:

Janis

Okay, what does that “Reading” measure? Listening comprehension? Andwhat does the “language” test measure?

It is striking to have that kind of yawning gap!

Individual tests tell a lot more, though — I assume they show she’s okay at the detail level, but has more trouble making connections and putting the pieces together without having to spend all her energy doing that?

Sue, I was just reading the articles..they’re great! Thanks!

The three components of that CTBS reading test are oral comprehension, basic understanding, and analyze text…whatever that means! It said she had mastery of the basic understanding part.

I think you have a good grasp regarding getting parts and not the whole. My theory is that the phonological memory deficit keeps her from rapidly remembering all the phonemes in a word to get the whole word out. The APD specialist also diagnosed her as having an integration deficit in relation to not getting parts into a whole, and he had access to APD and language testing. That was before the CTOPP, though, so I think all of this fits together. It’s just that this is not the classic dyslexic profile, so it’s not as clear what to do about it!

But I think we will go through the advanced code part of Phono-Graphix and then do Seeing Stars. I have Great Leaps for fluency and will probably get some of Phyllis Fischer’s Speed Drills. She also is low in vocabulary, so we have to do something about that, too.

Janis

Janis,
I will try to give you an answer worthy of the question you asked me concerning your child but I have to wait a few days. My clinic has been closed for 2 weeks; we open tomorrow. In addition to that , I am on the board for the children’s theatre in town and we are busy with a fund raiser. To compound everything, the school where my children attend wants me to help them develop a spelling program for K-7 - preferably by yesterday!
For some sister bonding, I went to Sante Fe for a week with my big sister. My husband watched the kids but now the laundry is a mile high. Needless to say, I am stretched a bit thin; this tends to happen often, but I truly am happy! Really! By the end of next week things will have settled down a bit.
Sincerely, Life is Crazy; live is good! Eileen

Janis, forget the CTBS - it’s a group administered test. There are too many variables involved to consider it valid on the individual level.

On the individual level, look at an IRI (Informal Reading Inventory) given by a non-partial specialist or the WJIII. Also, what level of text does she read? Or if you don’t know that, what types of words does she stumble on and what types has she mastered?

I don’t know where you live, therefore I don’t know what programs are typically in place in your area. What have they used to instruct? What has worked and what hasn’t?

Checking in sporatically, but I’ll be back. Do not attribute that to our gubernatorial candidate, pleeeeasssse!
LD

Oh, you are toooo funny!!!
:lol:

Oh, I know the CTBS is group administered, but it is not too unlike our wonderful state tests. I know her true score is not that low, but you have to pass the state tests whether they are meaningful or not!

I think I posted a good many scores on this thread already. She was given the CTOPP and TOWRE by an SLP/reading specialist and was given the full testing battery at Lindamood Bell. She had a few WJ-III subtests given to her a few months ago and those scores were higher than any of the other current standardized tests. The WJ-III would have never identified the phonological memory deficit and the fluency test must not be very meaningful either because the scores did not match any of the other testing. So I won’t let them test her with that test again. But the Gray Oral Reading Test-4 has to be as good or better than an IRI, doesn’t it?

She had Saxon phonics in the regular classroom. It was very successful with most of the kids. It was successful with mine as far as word attack goes! Her word attack scores are high. I think she needs review of the vowel digraphs as she often misses those. But she misreads small words, too (like ‘that’ for ‘what’, ‘and’ for ‘said’, etc.). The GORT has her reading with fluency at <1st grade level, accuracy at 1.2 grade level (I already listed the standard scores). She can read little books like Mouse Tales and Little Bear well. But she is stumbling a lot on the Open Court decodable review books that are coming home now in second grade.

At her school, there are newly trained people in Phono-Graphix, and the LD teacher has also had LMB V/V and probably will take Seeing Stars next summer. Basically, I’m in the same boat. I may order Seeing Stars and try it before I get the training as I don’t want to delay it for a year.

I should also mention that she has some of the typical speech habits of kids with this profile. We were studying her geography lesson tonight and she can’t say Pacific correctly…gets the syllables mixed up. Her memory for multi-syllable words is poor.

Janis