TL;DR
Foundational reading training should help teachers explain how spoken sounds connect to print, and teach students to read words accurately and fluently. Sterling Literacy Consulting's foundational series ties that work to vocabulary, comprehension, assessment and explicit instruction. When a district chooses professional learning, the starting point should be the knowledge and teaching practices its educators need to strengthen.
What should foundational reading professional development cover?
Foundational reading professional development should cover speech sounds, letter-sound relationships, word reading, spelling and fluent reading, with clear connections to language and comprehension.
The What Works Clearinghouse foundational-skills guide connects academic language, sounds and letters, word reading and writing, and daily reading of connected text. Its recommendations address kindergarten through grade 3.
So teachers need to see how those areas work together. Recognizing a spelling pattern helps a student read the word. Knowing what the words and sentences mean helps the reader make sense of the text. A good training plan explains both the skills and the instruction that builds them.
Sterling Literacy's Science of Reading Foundations: Structured Literacy series serves prekindergarten through grade 8. The series includes the Simple View of Reading, explicit instruction, phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension. Assessment and multi-tiered systems of support (MTSS) are part of the series too.
That range lets a district start where its teams are. A team new to the foundations may need an overview before it focuses on one teaching practice. Another team may already know the terms and want help using them during lessons.
What should teachers learn about explicit word-reading instruction?
Teachers should learn how to explain a word-reading skill, model it clearly, guide student practice and respond to errors.
The International Dyslexia Association's structured-literacy overview describes explicit, systematic teaching of spoken and written language. That includes the relationships between speech sounds and the way they're written.
A small teaching task makes those ideas concrete. Teachers might prepare an explanation of one letter-sound relationship, demonstrate how to blend a word and rehearse what they'd say after an error. Then the facilitator helps them look at whether their language and examples make the skill clear.
Practice like this is most useful when it looks closely at:
- The explanation. What exactly is the teacher asking students to learn?
- The examples. Do the chosen words show the intended pattern?
- The response. How will the teacher find out what students understood?
- The feedback. What explanation or guided practice could help after an error?
Sterling Literacy lists Phonological Awareness to Phonemic Awareness and Phonics & word work among its focused offerings. A district can talk through either topic in light of the lessons its teachers are preparing and the difficulties they're seeing.
How should training connect word reading with text reading?
Training should help teachers plan how students will apply word-reading skills while reading connected text and making sense of what it says.
Picture a lesson-planning activity. Teachers begin with a few words that show a pattern they've taught, then find where students will meet that pattern in a passage. From there, they think about the support students need to read it accurately and talk about what it means.
The passage itself deserves a close look. Which words draw on earlier teaching? Which language might need explaining? Where could the teacher stop and check whether students understood what they read?
Rehearsal matters here. The Learning Policy Institute's research review identifies active learning, models of practice and feedback among the features of effective professional development. Planning and rehearsing a lesson gives teachers a chance to work with those features during training.
If your district is choosing new materials, connect this preparation to its plan for reading curriculum implementation. Teachers need to understand where the program provides practice and how its lessons build on one another.
How can districts choose foundational reading training topics?
Districts can choose foundational reading training topics by comparing student needs with the knowledge and practices educators want to develop.
Planning starts with a focused description of the work. One grade-level team may need help explaining phonics routines, while another needs a stronger understanding of oral language. The professional learning plan can name those priorities and point to the sessions that fit.
The foundational professional learning series offers several starting points:
- Foundations of Language & Literacy for Young Learners addresses oral language, phonological awareness, alphabet knowledge, early writing and family engagement.
- Science of Reading Foundations: Structured Literacy connects the research foundations with instructional content, assessment and MTSS.
- Focused modules cover phonological and phonemic awareness, phonics and word work, oral reading fluency, vocabulary and reading comprehension.
In a districtwide plan, it should be clear how these choices relate. Leaders can sort out what educators need to understand together, and where grade-level or role-specific learning is more useful. Session names help organize that conversation. But the decision should come back to the instruction students need.
What should school leaders learn about foundational reading?
School leaders need enough instructional knowledge to recognize the practices teachers are learning and to support their use in classrooms.
Sterling Literacy's Science of Reading Foundations: Leadership Version adds fidelity monitoring, walkthroughs and leading coaching to the foundations series. That gives leaders a defined learning option alongside the teacher-focused work.
When a district plans that learning, the link to classroom observation should be explicit. Say teachers are learning a word-reading routine. Leaders need to understand what the routine is for before they talk with a teacher about what they observed. Then the feedback can address both the teaching practice and how students responded.
What happens after the first sessions? The guide to support after training explores how schools can carry that learning into classroom practice. Planning for follow-through helps leaders decide what support teachers will need once the initial sessions end.
If you're shaping a foundational reading plan, talk with the Sterling Literacy team about the grades involved, your current materials and the teaching practices your educators want to strengthen.
Frequently asked questions about foundational reading training
What is the difference between phonological and phonemic awareness?
Phonological awareness means recognizing and working with the sounds of spoken language, including larger units such as syllables. Phonemic awareness is narrower. It focuses on the individual speech sounds within words. Phonics brings in print, connecting speech sounds with written letters and letter combinations.
Is structured literacy the same as phonics?
Phonics is one part of structured literacy. Structured literacy also addresses other aspects of spoken and written language, including meaningful word parts, sentence structure and meaning. The term describes both what is taught and the explicit, systematic way it's taught.
What grades does Sterling Literacy's foundations series serve?
Sterling Literacy lists Science of Reading Foundations: Structured Literacy for prekindergarten through grade 8, with a matching leadership version. Individual modules have their own audiences. Phonics & word work, for example, is listed for kindergarten through grade 12. It's worth matching the offering you select to the educators and students involved.
Does foundational reading training require a new curriculum?
Professional learning and curriculum adoption are separate decisions. Teachers can build their knowledge while working with the materials their district already uses. If those materials also need a review, the district can handle that through a curriculum evaluation and adoption process.