Chapter 4, Beyond Sound Out, is some of the best new information I have received in a while. The Chapter expands on this idea about finding more strategies to figure out a word than just sounding it out. The "sounding it out" method has been something that I have been told since I was younger and it's something I always hate telling students - because it doesn't always work. In fact, it barely ever works when it needs to.
The reason I found this chapter so beneficial and full of great information is because it gives me as a future teacher a better way to help students when they're struggling. Anytime I've worked with students and they look at me to find a word, I always use the "sound it out" method because it's what I've always been taught. The beginning of the chapter discusses that this method only has about 50-60% of words working in it's favor. Sure, it's got the majority on it's side but it what about the additional 40-50% of words in our language? We can't only use a method that doesn't work the way it should therefore handicapping our children. If the students can't figure out an alternative way besides sounding it out then our students will not learn the words that they cannot sound out therefore making their text sometimes totally not understandable. Which if we aren't learning to understand, then what are we doing?
The strategies that the authors find useful to help students find out a word they cannot read is by meaning, structure, and visual. So for meaning, students are using their knowledge of the text around, the pictures, or context of the story to make sense. For the structure students are using their knowledge of spoken language to know if it sounds right. The visual is by seeing the letter and sounds and seeing if the word looks right. Before I even left the first page where the authors introduces these strategies, I felt that knowing these was going to improve my reading instruction drastically.
My favorite part about the authors of this text is that they use what they've actually done in a classroom to give examples to us. This chapter had so many great examples for how to help children based on different things. The author helped show the conversation that worked with the student and alternate ways that might work. I think this is important in the text because it provides us with this knowledge of how the students might react to what we say and can help us pretend this is our scenario too.
I think that one of my favorite parts about the strategies is teaching the students structure. Students know how to talk in day to day language obviously much better than they can read (most of the time and especially earlier on). This means students know what sounds right. I think this strategy is my favorite that I use and that I can help students use too. By finding out the word (or maybe not) and seeing if it makes sense in our day to day language, students can really understand if the word can go. Even if it isn't the correct word, the making sure it sounds right can still help students.
I just really enjoyed this chapter because of it's emphasize on decoding (sounding out) not working all the time. At one point, the authors even discuss that if students do this with every word (even if they are getting the right word), it slows down there reading therefore possibly making them unable to comprehend the text because of the slow speed they are going. This chapter provides readers with excellent ways, and real examples, of how to help students figure out words beyond the sounding out. I loved it.
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