Decoding and Spelling For K-2nd Grade
Early literacy instruction has come to the forefront of public attention and has stimulated shifts in public policy. Despite our growing understanding of how children learn to read, current reading programs leave a substantial proportion of students unable to read and write independently and with ease. The failure rate is especially high for children from poor homes. Project READ Plus was developed by Distinguished Professor of Education, Robert Calfee, to address these problems.
Word Work, the decoding-spelling strand of Project READ Plus, is an integrated decoding-spelling program designed for students from kindergarten through second grade. Although WordWork is designed to mesh with Project READ Plus, it can also stand alone. The program combines strengths of the Whole Language and Basic Skills approaches, and offers advantages over either. It is not a blend of previous methods, but is new approach based on the metaphonics principle: learning to decode and spell by understanding letter-sound relations rather than by rote practice. It is based on the findings from research in cognitive psychology, linguistics, and rhetoric. From the brief but intensive training program, teachers are provided with a strong conceptual understanding of the nature of reading. The curriculum emphasizes conceptual understanding; instruction is active, social, and reflective, combining direct instruction with small-group problem solving; practice and assessment depend on actual reading and writing performance.
This research has been supported in part by grants from The Spencer Foundation and The National Science Foundation.
