#18 Reading Mistake: Underprioritizing Background Knowledge Imagine handing two students the same passage about glaciers. Both students decode every word accurately. Both read with appropriate rate and expression. But one…
Reading Mistake #17: Comprehension Strategies Alone Aren’t Enough For years, reading instruction has emphasized comprehension strategies such as predicting, questioning, summarizing, visualizing, and making connections. These strategies certainly have value,…
Reading Mistake #16: Teaching Vocabulary as Word Lists Have you ever watched students ace a vocabulary quiz on Friday, only to forget every word by Monday? If so, you’re not…
Reading Mistake #15: Leaving Vocabulary to Chance When we think about reading instruction, we often focus on phonics, decoding, and fluency. Those skills are essential, but they aren’t enough on…
Reading Mistake #14: Reading Like a Robot Isn’t Fluency Have you ever listened to a student read every single word correctly, yet somehow the reading still sounded robotic? The student…
#13: One Reading Is Not Enough Why Repeated Reading Is One of the Most Powerful Ways to Build Fluency Imagine asking a child to ride a bicycle once and expecting…
Reading Mistake #12: Why It’s Time to Move Beyond Round-Robin Reading For decades, round-robin reading has been a familiar classroom routine. One student reads aloud while the rest of the…
Reading Mistake #11: Fluent Does Not Mean Fast Have you ever listened to a student race through a passage only to realize they skipped words, ignored punctuation, and couldn’t tell…
Day 10: Why Guessing Words Isn’t Reading: Moving Beyond the Three-Cueing System Why is moving beyond the three-cueing system important? Well, if you’ve been teaching for a while, you’ve probably…
Day 9: Why Reading and Spelling Should Never Be Taught Separately Think back to how spelling was taught when you were in school. Every Monday, you received a list of…
Day 8: Why Waiting to Teach Morphology Is Holding Students Back Have you ever watched a student’s face light up when they suddenly realize that happy, unhappy, and happiness are…
Day 7: Why Teaching Syllable Patterns and Syllable Division Changes Everything for Struggling Readers Have you ever noticed that some students seem to do everything right when they’re reading short…
