Reading Success Plan Definitions

Phonological awareness is the ability to hear, identify, and manipulate the sounds of spoken language. It involves hearing and changing word parts, syllables, and individual sounds without needing written letters. It is an auditory skill that can be done with eyes closed.

 

 

Key Skills in Phonological Awareness

• Word Awareness: Hearing separate words in a spoken sentence.
• Rhyme: Finding and making words that end with the same sound. The first letters change, but the last part sounds alike (like cat and hat).
• Alliteration: Hearing the same starting sound in a group of words. (ex: hat, hop, house)
• Syllables: Breaking words into bigger sound parts or beats. (ex: computer has 3 syllables → com-pu-ter)
• Onset and Rime: Splitting a single syllable into the starting consonant and the rest of the sound (like /c/ and /at/ in cat)
• Phonemic awareness: The ability to hear, identify, and manipulate individual speech sounds—called phonemes—in spoken words. (ex: The sounds in boat are /b/, /ō/, /t/)

 

 

Phonics is the method of teaching reading, writing and spelling by correlating sounds with symbols—specifically the relationship between sounds (phonemes) and their corresponding letters or letter combinations (graphemes). It encompasses the alphabetic principle: the understanding that letters represent sounds, forming the foundation of decoding written language.

 

 

Reading Fluency is the ability to read text accurately, at a natural speed, and with proper expression. It acts as a vital bridge between basic word decoding and true reading comprehension, allowing the brain to focus on the meaning of a text rather than sounding out individual words.

Core Parts of Reading Fluency

• Accuracy: Reading words correctly without making mistakes or needing to stop and sound them out.
• Rate (Speed): Reading at a conversational, steady pace that is neither too slow nor rushed.
• Prosody (Expression): Using correct intonation, phrasing, and pauses so that reading aloud sounds like natural speech.

 

 

Vocabulary plays a fundamental role in the reading process and is critical to reading comprehension. Children learn the meanings of most words indirectly, through everyday experiences with oral and written language. Other words are learned through carefully designed instruction. 

Vocabulary learning is all about the words we need to know to both understand what we hear and read, and to communicate clearly and with precision.

 

 

Reading comprehension is the ability to understand and gather meaning from written text.

During reading, good readers read words accurately and quickly, and simultaneously deal with the meanings of those words — as well as the meanings of the phrases and sentences into which the words are grouped. Good readers connect the meaning of one sentence to the meaning of another. If something is confusing to them, they use their background knowledge to try to clarify the meanings of words and phrases. Sometimes good readers interact with the text by asking themselves questions about its content and reflecting on its ideas.

 

 

A variety of instructional practices and groupings  are utilized during reading instruction. 

• Tier 1
  • Grade level skills and content standards
  • Evidence-based core instruction
  • Differentiated classroom instruction

 

• Tier 2  
  • Small-group intervention
  • Reteaching and practice of grade level skills or enrichment
  • Progress monitoring every two weeks

 

• Tier 3 
  • Individual Reading Success Plans
  • Intensive intervention
  • Reteaching and practice of foundational skills
  • Weekly progress monitoring