Research-Based, Multisensory

Reading Instruction

History, Concepts, and Practical Applications

Lindsay W. Self

Special Education Teacher

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Objective

By the end of this presentation, you will:

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1. Know that Dyslexia is a neurological challenge
2. Understand that teaching students with Dyslexia requires repetition and activation of many sensory modalities
3. Have access to explanations of practical strategies for teaching the five components of reading in multisensory ways

Interaction Institute for Social Change

National Reading Panel

In 1997, Congress asked for the convention of a national panel to assess current knowledge of scientific reading instruction.

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Their full report can be found at the following link: https://www.nichd.nih.gov/publications/pubs/nrp/documents/report.pdf

National Reading Panel

The Panel found that five components must be taught for a comprehensive reading program to be effective.

• Phonemic Awareness
• Phonics
• Fluency
• Vocabulary
• Comprehension

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Birsh

Orton-Gillingham

The first reading program written for students with Dyslexia was published in 1935 by Anna Gillingham referring to the teaching methods of Samuel Orton.

• VAKT: Visual, Auditory, Kinesthetic and Tactile
• Activating different parts of the brain in connection trains the brain to learn letter-sound relationships.
• Repetition
• A typical person needs 10-15 accurate pairings to permanently store a letter-sound relationship. A person with Dyslexia needs up to 500-1,500.

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MSLE: Multisensory Structured Language Education

Take Flight is one of the most recent in a long chain of programs written for students with Dyslexia, a chain that began with Orton-Gillingham.

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This presentation uses elements of MSLE, as well as pieces of other multisensory programs, to show you how to teach all students in a multisensory way.

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Phonemic Awareness

Phonemic Awareness (PA) refers to the ability to recognize and manipulate individual sounds within words.

• Encourage students to analyze the positions of their lips, tongues, and teeth when producing different sounds.
• Vowel sounds are open and voiced.

Phonemic Awareness

Materials:

• Multicolored Items
• Word List With Word Chains

Procedure:

1. Repeat
2. Unblend
3. Touch and Sound
4. Add, Take Away, Trade, or Switch
5. Repeat

(K) (A) (T)

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(K) (O) (T)

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(K) (O) (P)

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(SH) (O) (P)

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Phonemic Awareness

Phonemic Awareness

Auditory Discrimination Tasks

• Which of these doesn’t rhyme?
• Which word has a different beginning sound?
• Each of these words begins with (SH) or (SK). Make a list of the beginning sounds as we go.
• I will list words. Tell me “yes” if you hear (n) at the end. Tell me “no” if you do not.

Borrow book from Lindsay Wiseman for lots of examples.

Phonics

Phonics refers to the Alphabetic Principle-the understanding that one sound, or phoneme is represented by one grapheme. The inverse is also true. That is, one grapheme represents one phoneme.

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National Institute of Child Health and Human Development

Phonics

1. Grapheme Only reading deck
1. Students give the names of the graphemes: letters, digraphs, trigraphs, combinations, and diphthongs.
2. Illustrated Reading Deck
1. Students give the keyword and sound. Eventually, students will give this response when looking at the deck with only graphemes.
3. Spelling Deck
1. The teacher gives the sound. Students give all graphemes.

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Use these often. Repetition is key for students with characteristics of Dyslexia!

Phonics

Phonics

Phonics

Coding

Coding refers to using symbols to analyze words based on their parts. It looks complicated, but it appeals to a Dyslexic student’s intelligence. It makes reading more predictable and formulaic.

A vowel in a closed syllable is short. Code it with a breve.

A vowel in an open, accented syllable is long. Code it with a macron.

A vowel followed by a consonant then E is long. Code it with a macron and cross out the E.

An R-controlled vowel combination is surprising. Code it with a scoop.

A digraph is two letters that make one sound. Underline it.

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A trigraph is three letters that make one sound. Underline it.

A prefix is a letter or letters added to the beginning of a base word to change the way it’s used. Box it.

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A suffix is a letter or letters added to the end of a base word to change the way it’s used. Box it.

Phonics

Phonics

Fluency

Fluency refers to oral reading with an appropriate rate, prosody, and intonation. It improves naturally with improved decoding and comprehension skills, but more specific instruction is beneficial.

The English language is 85% predictable for reading. The best analytical reader in the world would be reading at a “B” level.

What’s missing? Sight Words.

Fluency

Sight Word Boxes are groups of words sorted by reading automaticity. These can be individual to each student or made for groups of similarly leveled students.

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Materials:

• Index Card Box
• Index Cards
• Sharpies
• Sight Word List
• Four Category Cards
• Slow (Turtle)
• Medium (Bike)
• Fast (Jet)
• Graduate (Cap)

Procedure:

1. Begin with name to discuss automaticity.
2. Have students read sight words from a list. Capture any unknown or hesitant words to the box.
3. Have students read words from the box. Sort them based on speed.
4. When students read words from the fast section automatically, put a tally on the back. When there are five tallies, move it into graduates.
1. Practice regularly. Play games. Let students take copies home to practice.
2. When students have mastered all words from your chosen list, capture words from books and articles read in class.

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Fluency

Punctuation gives us a clue about how to read the sentence. We want students to have an instant verbal reaction when they see punctuation marks.

• When you see a period, stop with your voice going down.
• When you see an exclamation point, stop with your voice going up.
• When you see a question mark, stop with your voice going up and back down.
• When you see a comma, pause then continue.

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Fluency

A B C . D E F ! G ? H I

J K ? L M N . O P Q R !

S T U ! V W X ? Y Z .

Vocabulary

Vocabulary refers to understanding word meanings. Students who are strong readers are the ones who will get more exposure.

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Overcoming Dyslexia Sally Shaywitz

Vocabulary

Morphology

• In younger grades, morphology study could focus on affixes.
• Prefixes and suffixes change the ways base words are used.
• In older grades, morphology study could target affixes and roots.
• Roots help students discover the meanings of unfamiliar words.
• They make domain-specific language more accessible.

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-ed

-ing

-ness

dis-

pre-

in-

ject

phon

rupt

Comprehension

Decoding

Fluency

Comprehension

Comprehension

1. Analyze and label the questions with color-coded flags.
2. Read the text in manageable sections.
3. Move the flags onto text evidence and answer questions after each section.

Who?

Where?

When?

What?

Why?

How?

Retell

Sequence

Analyze

Compare and Contrast

Problem and Solution

Evaluate and Infer

Assistive Technology

Text-to-Speech:

1. https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/readwrite-for-google-chro/inoeonmfapjbbkmdafoankkfajkcphgd?hl=en-US
2. Click “Add to Chrome”

Voice Typing:

1. Open Google Docs
2. Click “Tools”
3. Select “Voice Typing”

Works Cited

How Does reading Work? (n.d.). Retrieved February, 2017, from

https://www.nichd.nih.gov/health/topics/reading/conditioninfo/Pages/work.aspx

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Birsh, J. R. (2011). Multisensory teaching of basic language skills. Baltimore, MD: Paul

H. Brookes.

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Shaywitz, S. E. (2012). Overcoming dyslexia: a new and complete science-based

program for reading problems at any level. New York: A. A. Knopf.