Ready4Reading Evidence Portfolio
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content. For informational texts, these “Extra! Extra!” features include explanations and facts aimed at deepening children’s knowledge. For fiction texts, “Extra! Extra!” offers ideas for exploring literary elements. • Vocabulary: Ready4Reading aims to build academic vocabulary and content-specific knowledge throughout lessons and multiple reads of program texts. The program is intended to capitalize on rich, interactive multimedia using different modalities (audio, music, and pictures) to teach students vocabulary. Students receive repeated word exposure across the program’s three modules and within decodable texts. The program features vocabulary routines, visuals, student-friendly definitions, modeling strategies, and teacher-led discussions to help students grasp word meanings. Other vocabulary-oriented strategies include: o In Wiley Blevins ’ s Teaching Phonics, teachers are provided resources to help frontload Tier 2 academic vocabulary before students read a decodable text. The teacher then uses a Define-Example- Ask routine to help build students’ vocabulary. o In Read to Know Text Sets, teachers are directed to guide students to understand word meanings and build familiarity with their spellings before they read the texts. As part of these procedures, teachers display a word from the “ Watch & Learn video, ” say it aloud, and then have children repeat it, before defining and discussing the word. Teachers are also given resources to provide students with tips for reading and recognizing the word and refer to images from the related video. o Read to Know Text Sets call attention to “challenge words” or words that are necessary for the text but are not yet decodable according to the program scope and sequence, so that educators can provide extra support for students as appropriate. Program lessons are also designed to teach students to use morphology (roots, prefixes, suffixes) and other word analysis skills to uncover word meaning and improve reading comprehension. Here, students are provided the opportunity to learn the meaning of common prefixes (e.g., pre -), suffixes (e.g., - ful, -s, -ed, -ing, -ly , and -ion ), and roots ( graph, photo, tele, auto ). Morphology lessons first occur in isolation, then, students are provided opportunities to apply their knowledge with decodable texts. Accordingly, the vocabulary incorporated in Ready4Reading texts becomes gradually more complex as students progress through the program. • Writing: The Ready4Reading program design integrates writing opportunities throughout each phonics and decodable text lesson. For example, when students engage in phonemic awareness activities, they do not just manipulate sounds orally; they encode each letter-sound relationship while practicing letter formation. Dictation practice is intended to offer students an engaging way to build critical writing and spelling skills with teacher guidance and corrective feedback. For example, students write from dictation after reading a Short Reads Decodable card. The teacher dictates a series of words, phrases, or sentences from the content known and studied by students, and the teacher and students collaboratively write and correct mistakes.
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