Basal reader

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Basal readers are textbooks used to teach reading and associated skills to schoolchildren. [1] Commonly called "reading books" or "readers" they are usually published as anthologies that combine previously published short stories, excerpts of longer narratives, and original works. A standard basal series comes with individual identical books for students, a Teacher's Edition of the book, and a collection of workbooks, assessments, and activities.

Contents

Description

Basal readers usually are well organized. Stories are chosen to illustrate and develop specific skills, which are taught in a pre-determined sequence. Often, new words are introduced, and then reinforced, in a very deliberate sequence to build the student’s reading vocabulary.

The teacher's editions are also tightly organized, containing much more than the answer key to the questions that usually appear at the end of each reading passage. The teacher's book also contains suggestions for pre-reading and post-reading activities and assessments, as well as scripted questions to ask students at specific points in a story. The teacher’s editions usually seek to make it easier for the teacher to present, reinforce, and test the reading skills covered in the corresponding student book and student workbook.

History

Basal readers have been in use in the United States since the mid-1860s, beginning with a series called the McGuffey Readers.[ citation needed ] In the McGuffey Readers, the first book focused on teaching Phonics thoroughly, while later readers introduced other vocabulary, including non-phonetic “sight words”. This was the first reader published with the idea of having one text for each grade level.

Since then, teaching methodologies in school basals have shifted regularly. The Scott Foresman Company published what is perhaps the most famous basal series, whose stories starred two children named Dick and Jane. Dick and Jane books emphasized memorizing words on sight, a method which came to be known as "look and say". The competing Alice and Jerry readers also used the “look and say” method. This philosophy came under attack in the late 1950s, largely due to Rudolf Flesch's book Why Johnny Can't Read . This was a scathing condemnation of the "look say" method, and advocated a return to programs that stressed teaching phonics to beginning readers.

During the 1970s and early 1980s, the pendulum did swing back toward a more phonics-based approach. During the latter part of the 1980s, basal usage declined as reading programs began to turn to whole language and so-called balanced reading programs that relied more heavily on trade books, rather than textbooks. The 1990s and early years of the 21st century have seen a renewed interest in skills acquisition which has sparked a resurgence in basal dominance.

Benefits

The highly planned nature of basal readers is seen as one of their strengths, as this eases the load on teachers, particularly those who are inexperienced. Specific skills can be easily targeted, tested, and remediated. Those with very controlled vocabulary usage may ease difficulties for beginner or weak readers. Students who are reading below grade level will receive some benefits from using the on-level basal. The exposure will prepare them for state testing. Using a basal reader as a starting point for grade level reading allows educators to quickly assess student reading level. Basals are not meant to be the only resource a student uses, just the starting point.

See also

Authors
Types
Education
Examples

Related Research Articles

Whole language is a philosophy of reading and a discredited educational method originally developed for teaching literacy in English to young children. The method became a major model for education in the United States, Canada, New Zealand, and the UK in the 1980s and 1990s, despite there being no scientific support for the method's effectiveness. It is based on the premise that learning to read English comes naturally to humans, especially young children, in the same way that learning to speak develops naturally.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Phonics</span> Method of teaching reading and writing

Phonics is a method for teaching reading and writing to beginners. To use phonics is to teach the relationship between the sounds of the spoken language (phonemes), and the letters (graphemes) or groups of letters or syllables of the written language. Phonics is also known as the alphabetic principle or the alphabetic code. It can be used with any writing system that is alphabetic, such as that of English, Russian, and most other languages. Phonics is also sometimes used as part of the process of teaching Chinese people to read and write Chinese characters, which are not alphabetic, using pinyin, which is alphabetic.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">McGuffey Readers</span> Series of childrens early reading books

The Eclectic Readers were a series of graded primers for grade levels 1–6. They were widely used as textbooks in American schools from the mid-19th century to the early 20th century, and are still used today in some private schools and homeschooling.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dick and Jane</span> Series of childrens early reading books

Dick and Jane are the two main characters created by Zerna Sharp for a series of basal readers written by William S. Gray to teach children to read. The characters first appeared in the Elson-Gray Readers in 1930 and continued in a subsequent series of books through the final version in 1965. These readers were used in classrooms in the United States and in other English-speaking countries for nearly four decades, reaching the height of their popularity in the 1950s, when 80 percent of first-grade students in the United States used them. Although the Dick and Jane series of primers continued to be sold until 1973 and remained in use in some classrooms throughout the 1970s, they were replaced with other reading texts by the 1980s and gradually disappeared from school curricula.

Zerna Addas Sharp was an American educator and book editor who is best known as the creator of the Dick and Jane series of beginning readers for elementary school-aged children. Published by Scott, Foresman and Company of Chicago, Illinois, the readers, which described the activities of her fictional siblings, "Dick," "Jane," "Sally," and other characters, were widely used in schools in the United States and many other English-speaking countries for nearly forty years. The series, which included such titles as We Look and See, We Come and Go, We Work and Play, and Fun with Dick and Jane, among others, was marketed until 1973 and used the look-say method of teaching reading.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sustained silent reading</span>

Sustained silent reading (SSR) is a form of school-based recreational reading, or free voluntary reading, where students read silently in a designated period every day, with the underlying assumption being that students learn to read by reading constantly. While classroom implementation of SSR is fairly widespread, some critics note that the data showcasing SSR's effectiveness is insufficient and that SSR alone does not craft proficient readers. Despite this, proponents maintain that successful models of SSR typically allow students to select their own books and do not require testing for comprehension or book reports. Schools have implemented SSR under a variety of names, such as "Drop Everything and Read (DEAR)", "Free Uninterrupted Reading (FUR)", or "Uninterrupted sustained silent reading (USSR)".

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Reading comprehension is the ability to process written text, understand its meaning, and to integrate with what the reader already knows. Reading comprehension relies on two abilities that are connected to each other: word reading and language comprehension. Comprehension specifically is a "creative, multifaceted process" that is dependent upon four language skills: phonology, syntax, semantics, and pragmatics.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Synthetic phonics</span> Teaching reading by blending and segmenting the sounds of the letters

Synthetic phonics, also known as blended phonics or inductive phonics, is a method of teaching English reading which first teaches the letter sounds and then builds up to blending these sounds together to achieve full pronunciation of whole words.

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Decodable text is a type of text often used in beginning reading instruction. Decodable texts are carefully sequenced to progressively incorporate words that are consistent with the letters and corresponding phonemes that have been taught to the new reader. Therefore, with this type of text new readers can decipher words using the phonics skills they have been taught. For instance, children could decode a phrase such as “Pat the fat rat” if they had been taught the letter-sound associations for each letter—that 'p' stands for the sound /p/, 'a' for the sound /a/, etc.

Guided reading is "small-group reading instruction designed to provide differentiated teaching that supports students in developing reading proficiency". The small group model allows students to be taught in a way that is intended to be more focused on their specific needs, accelerating their progress.

High frequency sight words are commonly used words that young children are encouraged to memorize as a whole by sight, so that they can automatically recognize these words in print without having to use any strategies to decode. Sight words were introduced after whole language fell out of favor with the education establishment.

The Dolch word list is a list of frequently used English words, compiled by Edward William Dolch, a major proponent of the "whole-word" method of beginning reading instruction. The list was first published in a journal article in 1936 and then published in his book Problems in Reading in 1948.

Balanced literacy is a theory of teaching reading and writing the English language that arose in the 1990s and has a variety of interpretations. For some, balanced literacy strikes a balance between whole language and phonics and puts an end to the so called reading wars. Others say balanced literacy, in practice, usually means the whole language approach to reading.

Analytic phonics refers to a very common approach to the teaching of reading that starts at the word level, not at the sound (phoneme) level. It does not teach the blending of sounds together as is done in synthetic phonics. One method is to have students identify a common sound in a set of words that each contain that same sound. For example, the teacher and student discuss how the following words are alike: pat, park, push and pen. Analytic phonics is often taught together with levelled-reading books, look-say practice, and the use of aids such as phonics worksheets.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Reading</span> Taking in the meaning of letters or symbols

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Why Johnny Can't Read—And What You Can Do About It is a 1955 book-length exposé of American reading education by Rudolf Flesch. It was an immediate bestseller for 37 weeks and became an educational cause célèbre. In the book, the author concluded that the "(look-say)" method was ineffective because it lacked proper phonics training. Additionally, Flesch was critical of the simple stories and limited text and vocabulary of the Dick and Jane style readers that taught students to read by memorization of words. Flesch also believed that the look-say method did not properly prepare students to read more complex materials in later grade levels.

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References

  1. Closson, Troy (2023-05-09). "New York Is Forcing Schools to Change How They Teach Children to Read". nytimes.com. New York Times. Retrieved 2023-06-08. Into Reading is the most traditional option, a "basal" program that uses texts written specifically to teach reading.