McKay Martin Literature Review 1

Introduction: Phonics Intervention and Literacy Skill Development

Being a first grade teacher in a Title I school, I strive every year to provide my students

with the best education that cannot only fill their heads with content but with life skills that will

follow them in the years to come. Having previously taught fifth grade, I have witnessed many

students who were passed on to each new grade level without the necessary independent skills to

survive academically. In my years as a fifth grade teacher, I received many students who were

reading on a third, second, and even first grade reading levels. I had learned that some of these

students did not receive phonics training and there are also many components that led these

students to not become fully prepared for higher-grade levels. This led to my transition to

teaching first grade; so that I could do my best to ensure that future students were given the

necessary skills to conquer, higher grade levels, with literacy skills that will only grow with time.

For the past three years, Cobb County School District has selected a handful of

elementary schools to implement the Benchmark Phonics program that serves Kindergarten

through second grade. The program implementation began in 2016 with the Kindergarten class at

my school. I received these students as first graders and was highly impressed with their literacy

skills and how they were able to grow in literacy. Those students have now moved up to second

grade and are continuing to progress and show strength in their literacy skills. Having seen this

program in action, I truly believe phonics to be one of the best types of intervention that we can

implement for our students to grow in their literacy skills. Therefore, I have decided to research

how much effect phonics interventions truly have on literacy development and how it can further

help our future students grow. How does the implementation of phonics intervention help

students further grow in their literacy skill development? Just as important as the phonics

program are the students being taught through the program. I am the first grade teacher of a first
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grade inclusion class containing 14 students. My class consists of two special education students

one being an ESOL student, nine ESOL students altogether, and the remainder are native English

speakers and general education students. I am confident that, with all of these diverse students,

phonics instruction can serve each and every one of them positively.

Phonemic Awareness Instructions Helps Children Grow in Their Reading Skills

Linnea et al. carried out numerous studies with other researchers that evaluated the

effectiveness of phonemic awareness on reading skills. The effectiveness of these reading skills

were analyzed by the National Reading Panel. The study was a quantitative meta-analysis

completed by the National Reading Panel that evaluated fifty-two studies used to analyze the

effects of phonemic awareness instruction on reading skills. The results of the study showed that

phonemic awareness showed a significant impact on reading and spelling skills for the students

in the studies. Linnea et al. reports:

“Our findings indicate that PA contributes significantly to reading and spelling

acquisition, but there is much more that children need to be taught in order to become

competent readers and writers” (2001).

Given this information, while phonemic awareness is certainly important to the growth of

literacy development, it takes so much more to develop children who are proficient in literacy.

Usefulness of Systematic Phonics Instruction for Early Literacy Skills

A study completed by Simone, et al. consisted of thirty-eight quantitative experiments

measuring the effectiveness and usefulness of phonics instruction for early readers. This study

believes that phonemic awareness is a part of phonics but is not the sole necessary component

make its instruction impressionable and valuable. Simone writes:

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“Although they are often confused, phonics instruction is different from phonemic

awareness instruction. The goal of phonemic awareness (PA) instruction is to teach

children to focus on and manipulate phonemes in spoken words, for example, blending

sounds to form words (/t/-/o/-/d/ = “toad”), or segmenting words into phonemes (“shock”

= /s/-/a/-/k/). Some PA programs teach children to use letters to manipulate phonemes in

speech. This makes them more similar to phonics programs that may teach children to

sound out and blend letters to decode words or to segment words into phonemes to spell

words. However, phonics programs typically cover more than this and include instruction

and practice in reading words in and out of text” (2001).

In this study, there were sixty-six treatment-controlled comparisons completed within the

thirty-eight quantitative experiment it was determined that through phonics instruction, the

growth in reading skills was moderate. These skills only continued to grow once phonics

instruction was stopped. It was also determined that the earlier the instruction started the higher

students grew in their literacy skills.

Phonics Intervention and the Benefit of English Language Learners and Native English

Speakers

An experimental study completed by Vadasy and Sanders containing 78 language

minority students and 59 non-language minority students measure the effects of retained

students, who received Kindergarten phonics intervention. It was discovered that language

minority students who received greater time with first grade phonetic word study and second

grade meaning instruction result with higher reading scores. Non-Language Minority students

who received greater time in first grade phonetic word study and second grade meaning

instruction also received higher reading scores by the end of second grade. Vadasy reports:
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“The findings from the current study are consistent with those from the small number of

earlier follow-up studies of early reading interventions for LM students. In particular,

Gunn et al. (2000, 2002, 2005) reported moderate treatment effects for decoding and oral

reading fluency at follow-up, and Cirino et al. (2009) and Vaughn et al. (2008) reported

treatment effects for word reading, word reading fluency, comprehension, and spelling at

1-year and 3- to 4-year follow-up. In comparison to these studies, the current study shows

that LM treatment students maintained significant advantage over controls for word

reading and spelling but not fluency or comprehension (in the presence of instructional

variables). Differences in outcomes among the earlier supplemental early reading

interventions for LM children Grades K–3 may reflect variations in instructional

emphases, group sizes, and instructional intensity that warrant further study” (2012).

This study can support the positive effects for phonics instruction generated toward

Language and Non-Language Minorities. It also supports my argument that phonics instruction

can benefit the literacy skills of both native English speakers as well as ESOL students.

How Phonics Interventions Benefit Students with Reading Disabilities

In a study initiated by Lovett (2000), et al. students with reading disabilities were given

separate components of phonetic interventions to measure whether these interventions would

help these students progress in their reading skills. It was an empirical study containing eighty-

five students with severe reading disabilities. These students were assigned to seventy

intervention hours where they received one out of five phonetic sequenced interventions:

phonological analysis, blending direct instruction, word identification strategy training,

classroom survival skills and a mathematic control treatment. Clearly this study associated with

more than just phonics but they are all skills that strived for the same goal as I have, to give all
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students academic preparedness. The students within this study were evaluated before the

interventions, three times during the interventions, and after the interventions. To determine the

benefits of phonics instruction for students with reading disabilities, growth measures were taken

through standardized academic achievement tests of reading. The results showed linear growth

as a result of the interventions implemented. Lovett states:

“The central findings from this study are the superior outcomes and steeper learning

curves that were achieved when phonologically and strategy-based approaches to

remediation were combined. The finding of superior linear growth with time and

treatment for children receiving both approaches to word identification learning

underscores the separate contributions to treatment and remediation furnished by the

PHAB/DI and WIST programs. These effects cannot be attributed to time in treatment or

to the benefits of receiving a comprehensive deficit-oriented remedial program” (2000).

The study presented gave me support in my needs to provide phonics instruction for my

students, who struggle with reading. It is my belief that phonics can even assist students who

struggle with reading disabilities. This article provides me with data detailing that while students

may struggle with reading disabilities, they are still able to grow in their literacy skills.

References

Bump, S.K., Swedberg, T.L., &Yates, C.R. (1997, May 1). Improving reading and language arts

skills of at-risk first graders through direct instruction of print awareness, phoneme

awareness, and phonological processing.

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Gwernan-Jones, R., Macmillan, P., & Norwich, B. (2018). A pilot evaluation of the reading

intervention ‘own-voice intensive phonics’. Journal of Research in Special Educational

Needs, 18(2), 136-146.

Kartal, G., & Terziyan, T. (2016). Development and evaluation of game-like phonological

awareness software for kindergarteners. Journal of Education Computing Research,

53(4), 519-539.

Linnea C., E., Simone R., N., Steven A., S., & Dale M., W. (2001). Systematic phonics

instruction helps students learn to read: evidence from the national reading panel's meta-

analysis. Review of Educational Research, (3), 393.

Lovett, M.W., Lacerenza, L., Borden, S.L., Frijters, J.C., Steinbach, K.A., & De Palma, M.

(2000). Components of effective remediation for developmental reading disabilities:

Combining phonological and strategy-based instruction to improve outcomes. Journal of

Educational Psychology, 92(2), 263-283. Doi:10.1037/0022-0663.92.2.263.

Torgesen, J.K., Wagner, R.K., Rashotte, C.A., Rose, E., Lindamood, P., Conway, T., & Garvan,

C. (1999). Preventing reading failure in young children with phonological processing

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disabilities: group and individual responses to instruction. Journal of Educational

Psychology, (4), 579.

Vadasy, P. F., & Sanders, E. A. (2012). Two-year follow-up of a kindergarten phonics

intervention for english learners and native english speakers: contextualizing treatment

impacts by classroom literacy instruction. Journal Of Educational Psychology, 104(4),

987-1005.

Vandervelden, M.& Siegel L. (1997). Teaching phonological processing skills in early literacy: a

developmental approach. Learning Disability Quarterly, (2), 63.

Van Norman, E., Nelson, P., & Parker, D. (2018). A comparison of nonsense-word fluency and

curriculum-based measurement of reading to measure response to phonics instruction.

School Psychology Quarterly, doi: 10.1037/spq0000237.