Join the waitlist for Building Readers for Life Conference 2026!
You may think of phonemic and phonological awareness as something for the primary grades, for early readers, or for non-readers. If you teach older struggling readers or language arts classes for upper elementary or middle school, you may not find phonemic awareness tasks among the materials at your disposal. However, for a lot of readers…
Phonemic awareness might be one of the most important, most talked about, and most misunderstood aspects of literacy. Some of that confusion stems from the similarities and differences between phonological and phonemic Awareness. They are very much related, but not interchangeable. If Phonological Awareness is an umbrella that covers skills, those skills include hearing words…
Teaching to mastery is one of the most important considerations when teaching your students with dyslexia. Striving readers and writers very often find the class and instruction moving forward before they have had a chance to master new concepts. This results in learning gaps. When I encountered this in pupils at school, I would describe…
Late summer means cooler evenings and back to school! I can already picture the shine of freshly sharpened pencils, new sneakers, and the excitement of seeing friends. However, even for the most seasoned teachers, back to school can create nerves. But, I’ve got tips for all my structured literacy teacher friends! Here are My Top…
During these challenging times, you may be adjusting to distance learning. You may be learning how to teach virtually and communicate through a technological intermediary. In addition to the learning curve, there are additional factors that make online learning challenging for you and your students. The increased screen time for many children can be overstimulating….
For our students with dyslexia, the specialized instruction they get through Orton-Gillingham lessons is extra important. With a little creativity and flexibility, delivering effective Orton-Gillingham lesson plans when tutoring online is possible. Depending on a tutor’s training or programming, the exact sequence and order of instruction may vary, but these tips apply to all Orton-Gillingham-based…
Schwa vowels can be puzzling to children and adults at first. Breaking down schwa sounds by groups can be helpful. Starting with schwa a sounds is one of the common unstressed syllables in the English language. With this “How to Teach Schwa Tutorial”, your students will be able to pick this unstressed syllable up rather…
One question that comes up in discussion among OG colleagues more than just about anything else is about students who are having difficulty distinguishing vowel sounds. Sometimes they struggle with two similar short vowel sounds. Sometimes they have difficulty distinguishing between short and long vowel sounds. We are always looking to add to our bag…
If there is one thing Orton-Gillingham teachers can never have enough of, it is decodable text. Finding books that are highly decodable, engaging for our students and suitable for a wide variety of ages is challenging. Differences in scopes and sequences further complicate matters. However, there are some resources that I turn to again and…