Empower Reading
TM
Ensuring all our readers reach their full
potential
Empower™ Reading
Spelling and Decoding
Empower™ Reading has been developed by the
Learning Disabilities Research Program from
the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, headed
by
Dr. Maureen Lovett. The research took place
over thirty years and involved over 5500
struggling readers from Canada and the United
States. The program includes only those
instructional features that their research found to
yield the best long term outcomes for struggling
Empower™ in Action!
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Gr. 2 DRA Results
Fall 2006 to Spring 2010
4
Metacognition
Goal: To enable students to become
independent, flexible readers (and spellers)
equipped with 5 decoding/spelling
strategies along with a supportive
framework (Game Plan) that guides them
through strategy selection, use and
evaluation. It is a journey that is modeled,
fostered, and supported by the teacher at
each step.
Sounding Out Strategy
Goal: To teach the phonological skills necessary
for successful application of the Sounding Out
Strategy. Phonological skills form the foundation
and are prerequisites to the strategies that
follow. Remediates a major core deficit.
Strategy Dialogue
First, I’ll Know the Sounds.
Next, I’ll Blend the Sounds (slowing without
stopping).
Last, I’ll read the Word.”
Rhyming Strategy
Goal: Teaches students to use words they
know to figure out words they do not know.
• Addresses phonemic awareness at the level of onset
and rime (both oral and print)
• Teaches word identification by analogy
space
place
masquer ade
has
her made
Strategy Dialogue
“If I know _____, then I know
________.”
Peeling Off Strategy
Goal: To teach students to decode longer, multi-syllabic
words
(e.g., empowered, embellishment, combination,
transformation,
manufacture, etc.)
– 3rd Empower™ Strategy introduced
– Teaches affixes directly (64 affixes are introduced at a rate
of one or two per day)
– Students learn to identify, pronounce and separate affixes
from the root or word part (root or word part must contain a
vowel)
– Students practice reading the beginning and endings on
the “Peeling Off Tree” and on the Peeling Off Strategy
student worksheets
Peeling Off Strategy
“Strategy Dialogue”
“I Peel Off…at the beginning/end of the
word
The root is …
The whole word is …”
Vowel Alert Strategy
Goal: Teaches students the variable sounds of
the single vowels and vowel combinations and a
flexible approach to decoding words.
Stop light analogy is introduced
Vowel Alert Strategy Dialogue
I’ll Stop.
Try both sounds. First I’ll try___ Then I’ll try___
Then, Go
Spy Strategy
Goal:
Students recognize small known words or word
parts in longer, unknown words. It is most effective when
reading compound words such as rainstorm, catfish, and
bookmark. Students are also encouraged to find
KEYWORDS within larger words (e.g. speakers).
Spy Strategy Dialogue
I SPY the word ______ I SPY the word
______
The whole word is ________.
An Empower™ Classroom
Empower™ students say…
“I got teached what I
needed to know.”
“I like it a lot because I
got better at reading.”
“I feel good about EmpowerTM reading
because I get to learn how to read. I
went from 8 to 24.”
“I like EmpowerTM because I like
Sounding Out and Rhyming. I’m a good
reader because I got used to doing the
strategies.”
“It is fun and
“I’ve learned how to use
language together.”
strategies to figure out
words.”
… and continue to say
“I like EmpowerTM… I read
bigger books with bigger
words now. I feel happy in
my class when I read, I am
the best reader maybe
now.”
“I didn’t like reading
until this came.”
“Before I only read small
books, now I can read
chapter books.”
“I feel proud of myself now I can read better and harder words
to read and learning more strategies and reading words that
other people don’t know how to read.”
“I read so much now I do it under the covers at
night and my parents don’t know. My mom
says I read better than my older sister.”
At Home
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empower was designed with no home component so that
it can work with all students
read the empower stories- when they get stuck on a word
have them use Game Play- (ie. Select a strategy, Apply
the strategy, Monitor and Evaluate- if it didn’t work have
them pick a new strategy)
finishing any empower work sheets that are incomplete
reading home reading books that are sent home- have
them use a strategy when they get stuck on the word
make sure they don’t fall back into old habbits
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Celebrate!!!