The science of reading and Clicker’s decodable books
For many years, evidence-based research from the Science of Reading project has shown how children learn to read. This research confirms that phonics is a key part of early reading success. Decodable text has an important role to play in the teaching of phonics, and on LearningGrids we have recently published three CVC decodable Clicker Books.
What is the science of reading?
The science of reading is a collection of research from the last fifty years. It looks at effective ways to teach children how to read. The strategies are especially important for struggling readers. The research provides a framework for evidence-based teaching approaches and focuses on five main areas:
- Phonemic awareness
- Phonics
- Fluency
- Vocabulary
- Comprehension
Let’s have a closer look at phonics, in particular.
What is phonics?
Phonics involves matching the sounds (phonemes) of spoken English with the individual letters (graphemes) or groups of letters. Teaching phonics increases children’s ability to sound out, or decode, new words.
How does phonics align with the science of reading?
One of the main findings from the science of reading is that there needs to be explicit and systematic instruction. For phonics, this means teachers usually follow a plan. This plan shows what sounds they teach and the order they teach them.
There isn’t an overarching scope and sequence that all schools use. However, most schools begin by teaching short vowel sounds. This means that CVC (consonant-vowel-consonant) words are usually among the first words children can read.
With explicit and systematic phonics instruction, children need to be given lots of ways to practise the new sounds and letters that they are taught. This is why decodable books are so important.
What are decodable books?
Decodable books are texts that focus on specific phonics patterns. The books give children the opportunity to use their blending skills to decode words in context. It is important to offer children decodable books based on the sounds and letters they have already learned. The child should be able to sound out the majority of the words in the text based on their phonic knowledge.
Clicker’s CVC decodable books
In the case of our new CVC decodable Clicker Books (Tig in Mud, Bug in a Bin, and Peg and Bob), we highlight in the notes exactly which sounds/letters each book focuses on. Almost all the words in the books are CVCs, but they do include a couple of high-frequency sight words, such as “the” and “is”.
We offer two versions of each book – a Read a Book and a Read It Yourself. Since research recommends getting a child to attempt to decode the text on their own first, you may want to use the Read It Yourself book. The only difference from the Read a Book version is that the speaker button has been removed – so that children can’t just listen to the book.
While the texts are simple, we have worked hard to create stories (and illustrations) that will catch the interest and imagination of young readers. Your children will have fun reading about the different characters: a mischievous dog, a mud-loving cat, and a large bug lurking in a toy bin!
Clicker’s decodable stories – supporting resources
Here are some of the additional Clicker resources on LearningGrids that enhance the Clicker Books and reinforce children’s CVC decoding skills.
For each of the books (Tig in Mud, Bug in a Bin, and Peg and Bob), there is a series of activities related to:
- Pre-reading revision
- Text comprehension and vocabulary extension
- Decoding skills
Pre-reading revision
It is important to use decodable books that are based on letters and sounds that readers have already been taught. The Letters & Words Clicker Board can be used before any of the books to revise and reinforce the letters and sounds that will be covered in the text. The CVC words from the story are also included on the Clicker Board to practise segmenting and blending the words before they come across them in the Clicker Book.
The Key Words Matching Set also provides an opportunity to reinforce the CVC words in the text.
Text comprehension and vocabulary extension
Talking about the story and exploring the children’s understanding is an important part of using decodable books. The stories and pictures have been authored so that there are things to talk about and ways to extend vocabulary. This even starts with the cover – “Who do you think Tig is?” “What do you think will happen to Tig?”
Once children have read the stories, they can use the Tell the Story activity or the Clicker Board sequencing activity to retell the story in their own words.
Decoding skills
A Connect Set and a Sentence Set are also included. These allow children to rewrite the story while practising their decoding skills. With the Connect Set, children need to sound out the last word to choose the correct CVC word to complete the sentence.
The Sentence Set provides another opportunity to decode the text from the story. It also reinforces pupils' understanding of sentence structure. For a greater challenge, Sentence Sets can present the model sentence aurally. This way, children would need to listen carefully and decode the words to recreate the sentence.
The Key Words Talk Set can also be used for decoding practice. This could be before or after they read the Clicker Book. Initially, children may need to record themselves segmenting and blending the sounds in the words (/c/ /ă/ /t/ - cat). But with enough decoding practice, orthographic mapping (storing a word permanently in memory for instant retrieval) will allow most children to read the words from sight – without having to sound them out each time.
Click on the links below to see the CVC decodable Clicker Books and their supporting Clicker Sets in LearningGrids:
Be sure to check out the Sounds & Letters category on LearningGrids for many other phonics related activities. Here are some other resources you might find helpful:
