PLAIN TALK ABOUT
LITERACY AND LEARNING
MARCH 13-15, 2017
HILTON NEW ORLEANS RIVERSIDE
What EXACTLY Is the Difference
Between Balanced Literacy and Explicit,
Systematic Reading Instruction, and
Why Does It Matter?
Linda Farrell
(504) 840-9786 | [email protected] | www.cdl.org
About the Presenter
Linda Farrell
Linda Farrell, MBA, M.Ed., is a founding partner at Readsters, where she is immersed in
the world of beginning and struggling readers. Linda designs and presents workshops,
writes books, and develops instructional materials for effective reading instruction. She
has coauthored several publications with her business partner, Michael Hunter, including
Phonics Plug-In, Phonics Blitz, Phonics Boost, and the Diagnostic Decoding Surveys.
She is also a coauthor of the Teaching Reading Essentials Program Guide and Coach’s
Guide (coauthored with Louisa Moats), and DIBELS: the Practical Manual. Linda was
a National LETRS Trainer for seven years. Linda has been presenting workshops and
giving speeches on reading instruction throughout the country since 2000. She taught junior high English
and was a high school and elementary school counselor. However, it was only when Linda volunteered
to teach adults to read that she understood older struggling readers’ needs for explicit phonics and
phonemic awareness instruction at the most basic levels. Linda keeps her skills fresh and innovative by
working with struggling readers of all ages whenever she has time.
About CDL
What does CDL do when we aren’t doing Plain Talk?
Plenty.
We provide real-time, customized professional learning services that are sustained,
collaborative, student-focused, and data-driven.
Customized.
Pragmatic.
Collaborative.
Real-time.
Nothing canned. Nothing scripted. Our professional learning is designed, facilitated, evaluated, and
adjusted to meet the needs of your educators.
With a boots-on-the-ground approach, we provide collaborative learning sessions, coaching,
modeling, and observations with feedback.
We examine student and teacher data with your leadership team, and then build professional
learning in response to student and teacher needs.
We tackle real-time issues such as critical thinking, remediating struggling readers, and building and
sustaining collective capacity.
Focused.
We focus on the knowledge and skills to enable students become proficient learners who succeed in
core academic subjects and meet challenging standards.
Relevant and aligned.
CDL’s professional learning services are relevant to the needs of your students and your teachers,
and aligned with the professional learning definition in the 2016 Every Student Succeeds Act.
Robust.
Diversified.
We travel.
We have robust expertise in literacy, evidence-based strategies, how students learn, early childhood,
student-specific intervention and remediation, leadership, and building collective capacity.
We have experts at every level from early childhood through high school ready to work with your
educators.
Give us a call - we are ready to travel to you.
www.cdl.org | [email protected] | (504) 840-9786
PLAIN TALK ABOUT LITERACY AND LEARNING
New Orleans, LA | March 13-15, 2017
Objectives
What EXACTLY Is the Difference
between Balanced Literacy and
Explicit, Systematic Reading
Instruction?
Participants will understand:
• What balanced literacy is
• What explicit, systematic reading instruction is
Why Does It Matter?
• Why all early grade reading teachers should be
teaching early reading skills using explicit,
systematic instruction
Presented at:
Plain Talk About
Literacy and Learning
New Orleans, LA
March 14, 2017
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
• How to recognize the difference between the
Presented by:
two approaches to early reading instruction
Linda Farrell
[email protected]
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
1
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
2
Topics
1.  Why are we talking about balanced literacy?
2.  Why are we talking about explicit, systematic
early reading instruction?
Topic 1
3.  What is explicit, systematic reading
Why Are We Talking About
Balanced Literacy?
instruction?
4.  What is balanced literacy?
5.  How to recognize balanced literacy in the
classroom (including dangerous strategies
6.  How to recognize explicit, systematic instruction
in the classroom
7.  Do all students need systematic, explicit
instruction?
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
3
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
4
Balanced Literacy Is Everywhere
• Most teachers we encounter say that they
teach balanced literacy
Topic 2
• Most teacher preparation early reading courses
teach balanced literacy
• Most early reading course textbooks are based
on balanced literacy
Why Are We Talking About
Explicit, Systematic Early
Reading Instruction?
• Even teachers who state they teach explicit,
structured early reading instruction include
balanced literacy strategies when teaching
beginning reading
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
Center for Development and Learning
(504) 840-9786 | www.cdl.org | [email protected]
5
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
6
1
Explicit, Systematic Instruction Is
Strongly Supported by Science
• Many peer-reviewed studies over the past 40+
years demonstrate that explicit, systematic
early reading instruction is more effective than
other methods
–  This is especially true for struggling readers
Topic 4
What Is Balanced Literacy?
and students from low SES areas.
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
7
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
8
There Is No One Definition for
Balanced Literacy
“Balanced Reading Instruction”
The term “balanced reading
instruction” is not new. It
has been used to describe
literacy programs that
balanced reading to
children, reading with
children, and reading by
children (Holdaway, 1980).
There is much disagreement
as to the exact definition of
balanced reading
instruction. It has come to
mean a lot of different
things to different people
(Reutzel, 1999).
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
9
Balanced Literacy Can Include
Everything
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
10
Common Elements of Balanced
Literacy Definitions
In general, a balanced
reading program is one that
includes reading, writing,
spelling, phonics, and other
skills-based instruction
(Cassidy, & Cassidy,
1999/2000).
• All skill and strategy instruction is based on
“authentic” literature.
• Phonics, comprehension, and other strategies
taught are based on the teacher’s perception of
the students’ needs, gleaned from observation
and/or informal assessment.
• Phonics is taught within mini-lessons and/or with a
Basal readers, direct instruction, workbooks,
quality children’s literature, independent reading
and writing can all be part of a balanced reading
program (Cassidy, Brozo, & Cassidy, 2000)
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
Center for Development and Learning
(504) 840-9786 | www.cdl.org | [email protected]
11
“word study” approach.
• A combination of whole-group and small-group
instruction is included in daily lessons
• Guided reading is the basis of small-group
instruction.
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
12
2
The 3 Cueing System
3 Cueing System Defined
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
13
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
14
Ubiquitous Strategy Posters #1
Basis for 3 Cueing System
• Goodman (1976) described skilled reading as a
"psycholinguistic guessing game" (p.259).
• He sees reading as a sophisticated guessing game
driven largely by the reader's linguistic knowledge, and
as little as possible by the print.
• Smith (1975) expressed this view succinctly. "The art of
becoming a fluent reader lies in learning to rely less and
less on information from the eyes" (p. 50)
Quotes taken from”The Three Cueing System: Will It Ever Go
Away?” http://www.nifdi.org/resources/news/hempenstallblog/402-the-three-cueing-system-in-reading-will-it-ever-goaway
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
15
Ubiquitous Strategy Posters #2
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
Center for Development and Learning
(504) 840-9786 | www.cdl.org | [email protected]
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
16
Ubiquitous Strategy Posters #3
17
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
18
3
Ubiquitous Strategy Posters #4
Guided Reading
• Ask 10 teachers to define guided reading and
you will get 10 different answers.
• Most definitions will have these components
–  Small, homogenous groups
–  Leveled readers
–  Repeated reading of the same text throughout the
week so that by the end of the week all or most
students can read the text “independently”
–  Use of the strategies on the ubiquitous poster to
“decode” the words
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
19
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
20
Leveled Books
Premise of Early Leveled Books
Leveled books are leveled with criteria
such as:
• In lower leveled books for emergent,
beginning, or struggling readers, the words
are easier for students with decoding
weaknesses to guess, as opposed to sounding
out the word.
• Length of words in the book
• Number of different words in the book
• Size and font and layout of the book
• Difficulty of vocabulary and concepts
• Predictability of words
• Complexity of language and syntax
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
21
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
22
Guided Reading Strategies
Different Kinds of Mistakes
• In guided reading, the teacher uses prompts
• Guided reading employs another practice that
based on the cueing system to help students
figure out unfamiliar words.
develops the habit of relying on content before
decoding.
• These prompts include “Look at the picture”
• When a student makes a reading error that
and “What word with the same first sound
makes sense?”
does not change the text’s meaning, the
teacher does not correct the student.
• These strategies encourage students to guess
at words, and then applying context to
determine whether the word makes sense.
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
Center for Development and Learning
(504) 840-9786 | www.cdl.org | [email protected]
23
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
24
4
Examples of Mistakes that Are
Not Corrected
• Sally rode her horse every day.
–  The student reads “pony” instead of “horse”
Topic 3
• Jamaya got the book for her mother.
What Is Explicit, Systematic
Early Reading Instruction?
–  The student reads “a book” instead of “the book”
–  The student reads “mom” instead of mother
• The explorer had been almost every place on
the earth.
–  The student reads “in the world” instead of “on the
earth”
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
25
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
Main Elements of Explicit,
Systematic Instruction
26
Well-Defined Scope & Sequence
• A well-defined scope and sequence of skills is
1. Pre Reading Skills
taught, starting with the easiest skills and
building to more complex skills
Phonological
• Each skill is directly taught without any
assumption that the student will learn the skill
on his/her own
• Students practice skills to mastery before
–  Assessments provide the evidence that students have
mastered skills
• Cumulative skill practice is included as the
lessons progress
Orthographic
1. 
R-Controlled vowels
1. 
Letter Names
2. 
Open syllables
2. 
Letter Sounds
3. 
Silent E
3. 
A few high frequency words
4. 
Vowel Teams
2. Basic Phonics
learning the next skill
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
(identify, blend, segment, manipulate)
3. Advanced Phonics
(short vowels)
1. 
Short vowels (CVC & VC)
1. 
R-Controlled vowels
2. 
Digraphs
2. 
3 + Syllables
3. 
Blends
3. 
Open syllables
4. 
Two syllable words
4. 
Silent E
5. 
Vowel Teams
27
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
28
Terms Used to Describe Explicit,
Systematic Instruction
Explicit Instruction
• Explicit
• The teacher directly teaches specifically what
the student is expected to learn.
• Systematic, Cumulative, Sequential
–  the acquisition of any part of a skill or any concept is
• Structured
not left to chance, and the student does not have to
infer or discover in order to learn.
When a teacher provides explicit instruction she or he
clearly models or demonstrates skills and strategies and
provides clear descriptions of new concepts (providing
both clear examples and non-examples). Students don't
have to infer what they are supposed to learn.
Carolyn Denton
(retrieved from RTI Action Network website)
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
Center for Development and Learning
(504) 840-9786 | www.cdl.org | [email protected]
29
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
30
5
Systematic, Cumulative, Sequential
Instruction
Structured Instruction
• Intentionally builds from the simple to the
• Detailed guidance is provided on exactly what to
teach and how to teach
complex.
–  Students are first taught how to do the simplest
• includes teacher modeling, guided and
task.
–  They gradually learn and achieve mastery with more
difficult and complex tasks, combining the skills
taught previously.
independent practice for the student, and
assessment of mastery (“I do”, “we do”, “you do”)
• Students are assessed on mastery of skills and do
The hallmark of a systematic phonics approach
or program is that a sequential set of phonics
elements is delineated and these elements are
taught along a dimension of explicitness . . .
not move to the next skill until demonstrating
mastery.
• Lessons have cumulative practice of skills
mastered
• The major emphasis is on individual practice, not
on choral practice.
Report of the National Reading Panel (2000)
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
(includes elements of explicit instruction)
31
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
32
“Balanced Literacy” Signs
• Guided Reading
• Leveled Books
• Multiple word attack strategies
Topic 5
How To Recognize Balanced
Literacy in the Classroom
–  Look at the picture
–  Think about what word would fit
–  Read to the end of the sentence and go back to the
difficult word and think about a word that would fit
• All instruction, including phonics, is based around a
leveled book or another “authentic” text
• Students read the same story over the week so
that they can read it without errors at the end of
the week
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
33
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
34
“Explicit, Systematic” Signs
• Separate phonics and comprehension instruction
–  Phonics is based on decodable text
Topic 6
How to Recognize Explicit,
Systematic Early Reading
Instruction in the Classroom
–  Comprehension is with read alouds
• Decodable reading for phonics instruction
• An abundance of individual reading
• I do, we do, you do lesson structure
• An explicit scope and sequence for phonics
instruction
–  Instruction is differentiated based on which skills students
have mastered
• Students are always directed to look at the word to
decode it
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
Center for Development and Learning
(504) 840-9786 | www.cdl.org | [email protected]
35
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
36
6
All Students Must Know How to Match
Sounds and Symbols in Order to Decode Well
• All strong readers, no matter what instruction they
Topic 7
received, mastered every part of the “code”
between sounds and letters.
Do All Students Need
Explicit, Systematic Earlly
Reading Instruction?
–  Some of us learned this easily as they were read to
as children.
–  Others needed explicit instruction
• The only way to know whether or not a
student has mastered the code is with
assessment of decoding skills at every level.
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
Center for Development and Learning
(504) 840-9786 | www.cdl.org | [email protected]
37
© 2017 Readsters, LLC
38
7