Glossary
A
alphabet knowledge
Alphabet knowledge is the knowledge of letter names and sounds. The alphabetic principle refers to the idea that there is a systematic relationship between letters and groups of letters representing the sounds of spoken words.
D
decodable text
Decodable text refers to text or books that contain words reflecting grapheme-phoneme correspondences and morphological patterns that have been explicitly and systematically taught to early readers. Decodable texts are used in early reading instruction to practice phonics skills.
differentiated instruction
Differentiated instruction is effective instruction that shapes each student’s learning experience in response to the student’s particular learning strengths and interests.
digraph
A digraph is a combination of two letters representing one sound, for example: consonant diagraphs: ph, sh, ch, etc., and vowel digraphs: ar, ea, ir, er, oa, ue, etc.
E
explicit instruction
Explicit instruction is an approach to provide clear, direct, purposeful teaching of specific knowledge, skills, and strategies. It provides learning opportunities for structured learning, clear direction, and specified processes. It requires teachers to:
- Explain the skill and knowledge
- Frequently model the use of skills
- Verbalize thought processes, including steps of learning skills, strategies or processes
- Provide opportunities for students to practice using strategies and apply knowledge and skills
- Mentor and monitor student practices
- Provide timely descriptive feedback based on on-going assessment data to guide student practices until they can apply their knowledge and skills independently.
F
fluency
Fluency is the ability to identify words accurately and to be able to read text quickly, with ease, pace, automaticity and expression. It is the conduit between word recognition and comprehension. Fluency comes from practice in reading texts that primarily contain familiar sight words so that the student will encounter few unfamiliar words. As they develop fluency, students read expressively, with proper phrasing and punctuation, and gain more meaning from the text.
G
grapheme
A grapheme is a letter or a cluster of letters that represent a phoneme in a word. For example, single letters often represent a phoneme (e.g., c, g, t, p) but digraphs (e.g., sh, ch) are common and 3 or 4 letters can also represent a single phoneme occasionally (e.g., ‘igh’ in ‘light’ or ‘eigh’ in ‘eight’).
grapheme-to-phoneme correspondence
Grapheme-to-phoneme correspondence is the association between a grapheme and its corresponding phoneme. For example, when a student sees the letter ‘d’ and articulates the sound /d/ (as in dog). It may also be known (less precisely), as Letter-Sound Correspondence or Sound-Symbol Relationships.
M
morpheme
A morpheme is the smallest unit of meaning within words, consisting of prefixes, suffixes and roots. Words are made up of one or more morphemes. Morphemic knowledge refers to the understanding of how morphemes can be used to form words.
morphology
Morphology is the study of word structures and the patterns (e.g., prefixes, roots and suffixes) of how words are formed, and how words are related to each other in the same language.
multimodality
Multimodality refers to the use of a combination of multiple sensory and communicative modes, such as auditory, visual, audio, gestural, tactile and spatial.
N
neural pathway
A neural pathway is a series of connected neurons that send signals from one part of the brain to another. This is what allows us to complete complex as well as simple thoughts and actions.
O
onset and rime
Onset is the consonant(s) or the cluster of consonants that occurs before a vowel in a syllable. Rime is the part of the syllable that contains the vowel and all that follows it. For example, in the word “big”, /b/ is the onset, and /ig/ is the rime.
orthographic mapping
Orthographic mapping is an internal cognitive process, not a skill, teaching technique, or activity. Through this process, the brain links the phoneme sequence in a known spoken word with the sequence of letters in the corresponding written word. After decoding a word sufficiently often, the internal representation of the sequence of letters is stored in long-term memory, linked with the word’s pronunciation and meaning. At this point, the word can be recognized automatically as a “sight word”, without deploying a decoding strategy. With repeated practice of decoding many words, students build up a growing bank of sight words.
P
phoneme
A phoneme is the smallest unit of sound in spoken words.
phonemic awareness
Phonemic awareness is a subcomponent of phonological awareness. It refers to the ability to identify and manipulate the smallest unit of sound in spoken words, called phonemes.
phonological awareness
Phonological awareness refers to the ability to reflect on the sound structure of spoken language, including the ability to identify and produce words that share the same rhyme, hear individual syllables within a word, and break a syllable into its onset – initial sound(s) before the vowel sound and rime – the rest of the syllable.
phonics
Phonics refers to the systematic and structured teaching of grapheme-to-phoneme correspondences and how to use these to decode/read and spell words.
R
rhyme
Words rhyme when they have the same or similar ending sounds, for example, “rain” rhymes with “pain”, “stain”.
rime
See onset and rime.
S
self-efficacy
Self-efficacy is defined as people’s beliefs about their capabilities to produce designated levels of performance that exercise influence over events that affect their lives. Self-efficacy beliefs determine how people feel, think, motivate themselves, and behave. (Source: Bandura, A. 1994. Self-efficacy. In V. S. Ramachaudra [Ed.], Encyclopedia of human behavior [Vol. 4, pp. 71-81]. New York: Academic Press.)
sight words
A sight word is recognized by a student automatically without explicitly deploying a decoding strategy. With increasing practice at decoding many words, students can build up a growing bank of sight words. Orthographic mapping is the cognitive process that allows individuals to commit words into memory and store them for accurate and effortless recognition. Sight words are different from high frequency words. High frequency words refer to words that are most common in the English language.
syllable
A syllable is the smallest segment of a word that includes one vowel sound, which may have an accompanying consonant, for example, “family” has three syllables: fam-i-ly.
systematic instruction
Systematic instruction refers to a carefully planned sequence for instruction of specific concepts, skills and procedures, with prerequisite skills taught first.
The term “systematic” is often paired with the term “explicit” in reading instruction to refer to employing instructional strategies that are evidence-based. For example: explicit systematic phonics instruction involves:
- Clearly identifying a useful set of grapheme-to-phoneme correspondences
- Planning and introducing these correspondences into a consistent logical instructional sequence
- Carefully scaffolding the introduction and instruction of grapheme-to-phoneme correspondences and phonic skills from simple to more complex.
U
Universal Design for Learning (UDL)
The goal of Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is to create a learning environment that is open and accessible to all students, regardless of age, skills, or situation. Instruction based on principles of universal design is flexible and supportive, can be adjusted to meet different student needs, and enables all students to access the curriculum as fully as possible. In a UDL framework, teachers use systematic approaches and programs that allow the greatest number of students to be successful and gain the required skills and knowledge.
W
word study
Word study is an instructional approach to develop word reading skills that builds on the foundation of phonemic awareness, phonics and decoding skills and incorporates other relevant aspects of words such as morphology and semantics. Word study helps to make explicit orthographic patterns across words. Word study can be part of reading, spelling, and vocabulary instruction past K-3, and it becomes progressively more complex.
