Running Head: PHONICS INSTRUCTION IN THE PRIMARY CLASSROOM 1

Phonics Instruction in the Primary Classroom

Maggie J. Young

CADRE—Capstone

University of Nebraska-Omaha
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For decades researchers have recognized the importance of

strong reading skills and the primary grades as a critical time to

develop the skills necessary to read fluently. Everyone agrees on the

importance of teaching reading but there is no universally agreed upon

method for teaching this critical skill. In the late 1990’s, the National

Reading Panel (NRP) recognized five areas of an effective reading

program: phonemic awareness, phonics, reading fluency, vocabulary,

and reading comprehension (Rightmyer, McIntyre, & Petrosko, 2006;

Zugel, 2012). This provides educators with the “ingredients” they need

to teach reading but there is no designated best practice “recipe” for

how to effectively teach these five areas of reading instruction.

While there is not one best instructional practice for teaching

reading, most researchers lean one of two ways, code-based or

meaning-based approach to reading. The code-based approach

includes explicit phonics instruction with a focus on the alphabetic

code to identify words when reading and uses decodable texts. The

meaning-based approach focuses on reading for meaning and uses

whole-text/leveled texts (Murray, Munger & Hiebert, 2014). There are

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many different code-based programs and meaning-based programs

available. This study takes a look at a few specific programs but

focuses mainly on the differences and benefits of code-based and

meaning-based instruction, the instructional strategies that support

these programs, and the effects these programs have on students.

Importance of Phonics Instruction

While research agrees that all five areas of the NRP five areas of

an effective reading program (phonemic awareness, phonics, reading

fluency, vocabulary, and reading comprehension) are equally

important, phonemic awareness and phonics are the first steps to

become a fluent reader and are often the skills missing in struggling

readers. As stated by Knoepke, Rickter, Isberner, Naumann, and Neeb,

“to become skillful readers, children have to acquire the ability to

translate printed words letter by letter into phonemic representations

and the ability to recognize the written word forms holistically” (2014.)

Decoding does not come naturally to most children, it takes careful

instruction from teachers and dedicated effort from students to be

able to decode independently (O’Connor, 2014). The English language is

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made up of symbols (letters) representing speech sounds (phonemes)

so reading it requires students to “break the code” of letters to

pronounce words (Mesmer et al., 2014). Breaking the code is an

integral part of reading so phonics and decoding instruction is critical

for students learning to read.

In order to decode words, students need to be able to generate a

sound for each letter in the word, blend speech sounds together, and

segment the pronunciation they generate back to check their

decoding. Older struggling readers often attend to the first letter of

the word and guess the word based on what makes sense in the story.

This is a hard habit to break so it is important to build a strong

foundational knowledge of letter sounds and how to blend them early

on so that students rely on their decoding skills and attend to every

letter in the word. This results in increases accuracy and fluency when

reading (Rightmyer et al. 2006). Phonemic awareness is an important

prerequisite to decoding skills so this is where most phonics programs

begin their instruction.

Phonics Models
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Direct code instruction includes “explicit, isolated phonics

instruction taught separately from reading practice” (Rightmyer et al.,

2006). According to a research study done by Rightmyer et al.,

“children in the direct code classroom made better gains in word

recognition measures while those in the whole language classroom

had more positive attitudes towards reading” (2006). In an interview

with Mary Fripp, Bellevue Public Schools reading specialist of 9 years

and Nebraska Dyslexia Association board member, Fripp revealed great

successes she has had with Reading Horizons, a code-based program

for reading instruction (personal communication, December 18, 2017).

Reading Horizons teaches Five Phonetic Skills to help students

recognize short and long vowel patterns in words and syllables and

uses these five skills as a base for all coding instruction. Research

done by John Mendes found that students who received Reading

Horizons instruction scored significantly higher on all standardized

tests than students who did not receive Reading Horizons instruction.

He also found that teachers and students showed positive attitudes

about Reading Horizons use (2014).

Research done by Rightmyer et al. examined 6 different models of

supplemental reading curriculum. The study found no significant

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differences between the 6 different models, however, they did find that

students using one of the models of systematic phonics instruction

showed significantly higher growth than those students given no

systematic phonics instruction (2006). Meaning it does not matter

which model of phonics instruction educators choose to use, just that

they use some form of supplemental direct phonics instruction. While

an explicit, direct phonics instruction method has proven essential, it

is also important to have a balanced model that includes phonics,

fluency, and comprehension.

Meaning-based programs often led to higher levels of

comprehension in subsequent grades due to the reading focus being

on meaning and words that make sense and less on the individual

phonemes that make up the words. Because both code-based and

meaning-based programs have benefits, research often suggests using

a combination of both methods for instruction. Murray et al. suggests

“if leveled texts are used during classroom instruction and students

continue to struggle, it may help to add decodable texts matched to

phonics lessons” (2014). This is exactly what reading specialist Fripp

does with Reading Horizons. Fripp uses Reading Horizons to

supplement Fountas and Pinnell curriculum, a meaning-based, leveled

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text reading program (personal communication, December 18, 2017).

Fripp’s experience with these two programs supports research by

Murry et al. and Mesmer, Mesmer, and Jones, that a combination of

code-based and meaning-based programs can be the most beneficial

instructional route for struggling readers (2014; 2014).

Strategies for Teaching Phonics

There are many instructional strategies that are used in and out

of the aforementioned programs to help students practice phonics

skills. One task that proves extra difficult for struggling readings is

blending sounds together. Many students can say all of the sounds in a

word but have trouble holding all of the word’s sounds in their memory

long enough to blend them together. One strategy for practicing this

skill is called “Stretching Sounds Together without Pausing between

Sounds.” As the title says, you show children how to hold a sound then

guide them to the say the sounds in a word without stopping between

the sounds. This automatically makes the sounds blend together and is

easier for students to hear the word the sounds make together

(O’Connor, 2014). Another strategy for blending is “Take Off the

Ending.” In this strategy students are asked to cover the final

consonant, say the first two sounds, blend the sounds together twice,
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and then add the ending. The last strategy for blending is “Start with

the Vowel.” For some students, it feels more natural to start with their

mouth open in a vowel sound and then closing down to make the

consonant sound. It’s as if you can’t help but blend the sounds

together if you do it this way. The student covers the initial consonant,

says the vowel and the consonant sounds, blends them twice, and then

adds the beginning sound. While all of these blending strategies have

been proven to be effective, it is important that you choose one and

consistently use it. Students need to know exactly what to do when

they come to an unknown word and if they are taught multiple blending

strategies it can be confusing and unclear what to when they get to an

unknown word.

Another strategy to support decoding skills in struggling readers

is called “Examining Minimal Pairs.” In this strategy students make a

word and then are asked to change just one letter in the word to make

a new word (with the word pet students could be asked to change the

e to an o, then they are asked which new word they made). O’Connor

found that Minimal Pairs can help students understand that changing

just one sound changes the meaning of the word and the pronunciation

of the word (2014). This helps students to attend to all letters in the
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word and decreases guessing on unknown words. Another strategy

Mesmer et al. suggests using to practice this skill of word building is

“Vowel Stars.” In this activity students get a word frame with only the

vowel left out, for example, p__t, and then they replace the blank in the

center with different vowel sounds, pronounce the word, and then

write it. In this case students are only changing the vowel sound to

make the new word. This places the focus on the vowel which is often

where students get tripped up (2014.)

Closure

Research on best practice in reading instruction agrees with the

National Reading Panel’s (NRP) five areas of an effective reading

program: phonemic awareness, phonics, reading fluency, vocabulary,

and reading comprehension. Basal reading programs are based around

these five areas and the basal instruction is enough for most students.

But for struggling readers, additional instruction is required. This

usually starts in the form of phonemic awareness and phonics

instruction as these are the first steps to becoming a fluent reader and

they serve as building blocks for the other three NRP areas (fluency,

vocabulary, and comprehension). Supplemental phonics instruction is

usually either code-based instruction or meaning-based instruction but

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research has found that a combination of the two is most effective.

Within these phonics programs are many instructional strategies for

teaching key phonemic awareness and phonics skills. These skills

include: producing letter sounds, blending letter sounds, and word

building. A combination of basal instruction, phonics programs, and

instructional strategies for teaching phonics can help catch struggling

readers up in the primary grades while keeping attitudes about reading

positive and student effort substantial.

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Mesmer, H., Mesmer, E., & Jones, J. (2014). Reading intervention in the
primary grades : A common-sense guide to rTI(The essential library of
preK-2 literacy). New York: Guilford Press.

Murray, M., Munger, K., & Hiebert, E. (2014). An analysis of two reading
intervention programs: How do the words, texts, and programs
compare? Elementary School Journal, 114(4), 479-500.

O'Connor, R. (2014). Teaching word recognition : Effective strategies

for students with learning difficulties(2nd ed. ed., What works for
special-Needs learners). New York: Guilford Publications.

Rightmyer, E., McIntyre, E., & Petrosko, J. (2006). Instruction,

development, and achievement of struggling primary grade
readers. Reading Research and Instruction, 45(3), 209-241.

Slavin, R., Lake, C., Chambers, B., Cheung, A., & Davis, S. (2009).
Effective reading programs for the elementary grades: A best-Evidence
synthesis. Review of Educational Research, 79(4), 1391-1466.

Walpole, S., & McKenna, M. (2007). Differentiated reading instruction :

Strategies for the primary grades. New York: Guilford Press.

Zugel, K. (2012). Success for students with diverse reading abilities

through the use of supplemental reading curriculum. Tesol Quarterly: A
Journal for Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages and of
Standard English As a Second Dialect,46(1), 199-209.
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