By Amanda Carroll
This issue ofNASET’s LD Report was written by Amanda Carroll, a graduate student at Winthrop University. The purpose of this article is to share a study done to evaluate a research-based strategy for a group of students who are struggling with sight word retention. Being able to recall a sight word as soon as it is seen helps increase a student’s fluency and accuracy. Increasing fluency and accuracy will help with the student’s ability to comprehend what they are reading. This research-based sight word instruction strategy was administered to a group of students over a two-week period to determine its effectiveness in helping these struggling students with their sight word retention. The results indicated a growth in sight word retention following the two-week period. After use of this strategy, the students were better able to read and spell the sight words taught during the implementation of the strategy.
Abstract
The purpose of this article is to share a study done to evaluate a research-based strategy for a group of students who are struggling with sight word retention. Being able to recall a sight word as soon as it is seen helps increase a student’s fluency and accuracy. Increasing fluency and accuracy will help with the student’s ability to comprehend what they are reading. This research-based sight word instruction strategy was administered to a group of students over a two-week period to determine its effectiveness in helping these struggling students with their sight word retention. The results indicated a growth in sight word retention following the two-week period. After use of this strategy, the students were better able to read and spell the sight words taught during the implementation of the strategy.
Problem
The struggle of student sight word retention is felt every day in classrooms all over the country. Sight word lists are created to compile a collection of words that are commonly seen at a certain reading and grade level. Students struggling with sight word retention will struggle with reading fluently and accurately because they are having to decode almost every word they come to. This struggle with fluency and accuracy will then lead to struggles with comprehension, again because they have to decode so many of the words they read. Implementing strategies to help build the student sight word retention will help build the fluency and accuracy of our readers which will then increase their comprehension abilities. The link between reading and writing also leads to the need for the students to not only be able to read these words but also spell these words. Being able to read and spell these commonly seen sight words will make our students better readers, writers, and speakers.
After some district level testing that was completed by my students at the beginning of the year, it was determined that some of my students were struggling with their abilities in reading fluency and accuracy. These results lead to the development of a small group with three male second grade students. All three of these students received similar scores on district level testing and were struggling with the same aspects of reading: fluency and accuracy. As I read with these students every day in class during reading groups on leveled passages, I noticed that we were doing a lot of decoding as we read. We would begin with a new passage and then go through it decoding the majority of the words on the first day. By the second, third, and even fourth day with the same passage, we were still doing a lot of decoding every time we read the passage. At this point, I realized that these three students were struggling with sight word retention. This led to the research and creation of a strategy implementation plan with these three students. The goal of this strategy implementation plan was to help increase sight word retention using several research-based strategies.
Preparing for Instruction
In order to prepare for instruction several steps have to occur. First, I began by searching for research-based strategies to create my own strategy implementation plan. Through research I found several studies completed by different researchers that showed several different promising strategies I could implement.
Ruwe, McLaughlin, Derby, and Johnson (2001) completed a study on middle school aged boys from a self-contained special education class. These boys were all struggling readers who greatly increased their scores and their knowledge of words from the use of several strategies. These strategies include having the word presented to them repeatedly, having the pronunciation modeled, the students repeating the word, and immediate feedback (both corrective and praising).
Reifman, Pascarella, and Larson (1981) completed a study with first graders divided into two groups: experimental and control. The students in the experimental group made much larger gains than those students in the control group. The strategies used with the experimental group included writing the words on flashcards, using word analysis skills to analyze the words/learn them, and made sentences with their words.
January, Lovelace, Foster, and Ardoin (2017) completed a study comparing two flashcard intervention strategies (SIR-Strategic Incremental Rehearsal and IR-Incremental Rehearsal) with four general education students who had been identified as struggling readers. These researchers found that the SIR model was more effective for three out of the four students in the study. The SIR model used strategies such as presenting the target word, modeling how to say the target word, the student says the target word, feedback by the teacher (corrective and/or praising), adding additional words as students learn the first word, and shuffling words and practicing them repeatedly until students recall them correctly.
Barbetta and Heward (1994) completed a study with four students identified as having developmental disabilities. The students in this study had large increases in their correct responses and even retained their knowledge (determined by maintenance tests completed one and two weeks after instruction). This success was based on several strategies that helped the students grow their sight word recognition including immediate error correction, reviewing incorrect words until the students get them correct, and teacher praising.
After completing the necessary research to find research-based strategies that have worked in various studies, a plan had to be created. Using the research-based strategies, a plan was created for collecting baseline data, putting together the necessary classroom procedures, putting together the necessary materials, implementing week one of the strategy implementation, collecting progress monitoring data to make instructional adjustments for week two, implementing week two of strategy implementation, and then finally collecting posttest data to determine if students had met the objective of 100% accuracy or not.
Classroom Environment
In order to efficiently and successfully implement this strategy implementation plan, the classroom environment must be established. The first important aspect of the classroom environment is that it must be supportive. A supportive classroom environment is necessary for students to feel open to learning and the possibility of making mistakes. Making mistakes is part of learning. If a student is not confident enough to possibly make mistakes on the path to learning, they will not be as successful as they could in their learning. Another important aspect of the classroom environment, especially when implementing strategies in a general education classroom setting, is to have a quiet classroom with established procedures. The other students who are not part of the implementation plan group need to know the expectations their teacher has for them. These expectations should include the noise level expectation and the procedures they should follow. The procedures should be clearly spelled out and the teacher should think of all possible scenarios that could happen and how students should respond. Procedures set in my classroom include what to do if you need to use the bathroom, what to do if you need a pencil, what to do if you need a tissue, what to do if you have a question, what to do if you finish your work, what to do if you are sick/bleeding, and so many more. In the beginning of the year we set these classroom procedure expectations and we practiced them. We practiced them repeatedly and discussed how we could make things better. Things are not perfect and occasionally we need “check-ups” to discuss procedure concerns that come up or a refresher on what the expectations are. Setting a supportive classroom environment where every student knows the expectations and the procedures has been imperative to making my interventions effective.
Materials Needed
The list of necessary materials to implement this intervention strategy is not extensive. The materials begin with a place to sit. In our classroom we use our small group kidney table and enough chairs for the students and teacher. The next set of materials we needed was a set of sight word flashcards. Our set of flashcards was comprised of the fifteen sight words we focused on during our two week intervention implementation. When we began the intervention implementation, we just had one set of flashcards that we all used together at our small group table. After analyzing the data after week one, I decided to create a set of these flashcards for all three of my students, so they would have their own set. I found that this helped their success because they were able to flip through and view their words all day rather than just when they were receiving direct instruction from me. Below you will find an example of the flashcards I created for the students just by simply creating a table in Word. The last material that we needed were whiteboards, dry erase markers, and dry erase erasers. We used the whiteboards when writing the words down and when we would practice writing a sentence using the word. This small list of materials makes this intervention strategy possible for any teacher to implement.
Example Set of Flashcards:
|
back |
girl |
should |
|
another |
thing |
right |
|
where |
please |
because |
|
people |
away |
found |
|
stand |
friend |
bring |
Teaching Strategies
The research-based strategies discussed in the “Preparing for Instruction” section guided the creation of the teaching strategies to be used in this strategy implementation plan. First, let me begin by sharing the set-up of my two week instructional plan. The instruction was direct sight word instruction held in the general education classroom. This instruction was held in a small group setting with the three students and one general education teacher, myself. Since this instruction was held in a small group within a general education classroom among other students, it was imperative that the classroom environment be established and that students know the procedures and expectations. The sessions lasted twenty minutes each for two weeks. The instruction was held all week and then the progress monitoring was held on the last day of the first week, three hours after the conclusion of their twenty minute instruction session. The progress monitoring results were analyzed to make any adjustments and then the second week followed in the same format as the first week.
The teaching strategies used in this strategy implementation plan came largely from the research-based strategies discovered through my studies. To begin, the teacher used flashcards during instruction (Ruwe, McLaughlin, Derby, & Johnson, 2011). The teacher showed students the flashcard and stated the word. The students then restated the word back to the teacher. Praise was given as students got words correct and any errors were immediately corrected (Barbetta & Heward, 1994). If an error was made, the word was restated to the students and the students repeated the word (Barbetta & Heward, 1994). This was done until the students got the word correct. When the students got a word correct, it went to the back of the stack (Ruwe et al., 2011). If the students got the word incorrect, the word was restated by the teacher and students until correct and then put two or three words back in the stack, so the word would be reviewed again soon (Ruwe et al., 2011). After the teacher said the word and the students correctly said the word, the teacher and students used the word in a sentence and discussed what the word meant (Reifman, Pascarella, & Larson, 1981).
Since there is a large link between reading and writing, the teacher and students stated the word aloud, spelled the word aloud, and then restated the word. This process of stating the word, spelling the word, and restating the word was repeated while the students and teacher tapped down their arm as they spelled the word, wrote the word in the air as they spelled the word, and wrote on the table as they spelled the word. These multiple versions of stating, spelling, and restating not only allowed for further practice but also met the needs of all learning types.
Once the above process was completed and the students had been successful with the target word, another target word was introduced, and the same process occurred again. Every new day of intervention instruction began with a review of the previously learned words (January, Lovelace, Foster, & Ardoin, 2017). If the students knew all of the previously learned words, a new set of words began to be introduced. If the students did not know the previously learned words, the review was continued until all of the words were known by the students (January et al., 2017).
Assessment Procedures
All assessment data was collected through the use of the Sight Word Assessment. This assessment was created using the fifteen words chosen for this strategy intervention. The students were assessed individually to ensure accurate data. Each student was shown one of the words. If the student was able to correctly recall the word within three seconds, they were given credit for knowing the word. If they were unable to recall the word within three seconds or they recalled the wrong word, they were not given credit for knowing the word. This process continued until all fifteen words had been tested.
This Sight Word Assessment tool was used for the pretest to collect baseline data. It was used to guide instruction through the first week of the implementation plan. At the end of the first week, the Sight Word Assessment was given again for progress monitoring purposes. The information gathered at the end of the first week was used to guide instruction through the second week of the implementation plan. At the end of the second week, the Sight Word Assessment was given again as the posttest. The information gathered at the end of the second week was used to determine if students met the target objective or not.
The results of the Sight Word Assessment were recorded each time on a separate recording chart (one for each testing period and each student). This information was then gathered and recorded in a chart, so student growth could be monitored, and data could be compared.
Results
At the beginning of the strategy implementation plan, pretest data was taken. The data showed that the students were, in fact, struggling with sight word retention. When given a set of fifteen first grade sight words the first student correctly recalled two out of the fifteen words, student two correctly recalled four out of the fifteen words, and student three correctly recalled two out of the fifteen words.
By the end of week one, progress monitoring data showed that student sight word retention had already increased. The data showed increases for all three students, but there was still work to be done. When given the same set of fifteen first grade sight words, the first student correctly recalled twelve out of fifteen words, student two correctly recalled eight out of fifteen words, and student three correctly recalled eleven out of fifteen words.
At the end of the two week strategy implementation, posttest data was taken. The data again showed a large increase in sight word retention for all three students. When given the same set of fifteen first grade sight words, the first student correctly recalled fifteen out of fifteen words, student two correctly recalled fourteen out of fifteen words, and student three correctly recalled fifteen out of fifteen words.
Two of the three students were able to achieve the target objective of 100% accuracy with the fifteen sight words. One of the three students did not meet the target objective of 100% accuracy of the fifteen sight words. This student missed one word but the one word he missed was “people” and he responded “person.” While it was not 100% accurate, it was very similar. Due to these findings and results, I would consider this strategy implementation plan a success for these three students.
Student data from pretest baseline through posttest:
|
Student |
Baseline Data (out of 15) |
Week 1 Data (out of 15) |
Week 2 Data (out of 15) |
|
Student #1 |
2 |
12 |
15 |
|
Student #2 |
4 |
8 |
14 |
|
Student #3 |
2 |
11 |
15 |
Pretest/Baseline Data:
|
BASELINE DATA
Student #1: 2 correct out of 15
Student #2: 4 correct out of 15
Student #3: 2 correct out of 15
|
Week One Progress Monitoring Data:
|
END OF WEEK #1 DATA
Student #1: 12 correct out of 15
Student #2: 8 correct out of 15
Student #3: 11 correct out of 15
|
Week Two Posttest Data:
|
WEEK 2 DATA
Student #1: 15 correct out of 15
Student #2: 14 correct out of 15
Student #3: 15 correct out of 15
|
Conclusion
Every year there are students all over the country who struggle with reading fluently and accurately and therefore struggle with comprehension. These fluency and accuracy struggles can sometimes, as with my three students for example, be due to troubles with sight word retention. As a teacher, it is important for us to have many resources and strategies in our toolbox that we can pull out as we see students struggling. The strategies I implemented throughout my intervention plan have greatly helped my students and their ability to retain the sight words taught to them. Since this implementation plan has wrapped up, I have continued using these same strategies to help build the sight word retention of these three students with similar results. Given the success I have had with these strategies and how easy they are to create and implement, I would be confident in saying this is a resource any teacher could add to their toolbox.
References
Barbetta, P. M., & Heward, W. L. (1994). Effects of immediate and delayed error correction on the acquisition and maintenance of sight. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 27(1), 177. Retrieved from https://winthropuniversity.idm.oclc.org/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=9406223836
January, S.-A., Lovelace, M., Foster, T., & Ardoin, S. (2017). A Comparison of Two Flashcard Interventions for Teaching Sight Words to Early Readers. Journal of Behavioral Education, 26(2), 151-168. https://doi-org.winthropuniversity.idm/oclc.org/10.1007/s10864-016-9263-2
Reifman, B., Pascarella, E. T., & Larson, A. (1981). Effects of Word-Bank Instruction on Sight Word Acquisition: An Experimental Note. Journal of Educational Research, 74(3), 175- 178. https://doi-org.winthropuniversity.idm.oclc.org/10.1080/00220671.1981.10885305
Ruwe, K., McLaughlin, T., Derby, K., & Johnson, J. (2011). The Multiple Effects of Direct Instruction Flashcards on Sight Word Acquisition, Passage Reading, and Errors for Three Middle School Students with Intellectual Disabilities. Journal of Developmental & Physical Disabilities, 23(3), 241-255. http://doi-org.winthropuniversity.idm.oclc.org/10.1007/s10882-010-9220-2
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