Reading with Brittany

06/24/2025

“Results showed that children in the handwriting groups (i.e., trained through hand-copying or tracing) achieved higher accuracy across all posttest tasks compared with those in the typing groups. These outcomes illustrate the importance of handwriting experience in learning alphabetic and orthographic representations, favoring the graphomotor hypothesis. Thus, educators should be cautious about replacing pencil and paper with digital devices during the period of children’s reading acquisition.”

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022096525000013?via%3Dihub&fbclid=IwQ0xDSwLA-vdleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHsoZ3jw-mgBVlGYXqW-n0MRD1YxlEpCaQ4YElbPGVSGNW_ubF1-0v6_1Y2kf_aem_JbIffdrgOwTOSxtTMxT0Hw

03/06/2025

Hi insta! It's been a while, but I went down a rabbit hole recently and decided to make a post about it (and a free resource!).

I would love to hear others thoughts on this concept.

More 🍋 words and suggestions for activities are in my bio!

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Disclaimer: This concept/resource may be appropriate for students in middle school and above, provided they receive extensive instruction and regular explicit practice at the phonology level. Instructors are encouraged to determine if this concept is appropriate for each individual student and differentiate instruction as needed.

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04/13/2024

I can't wait to dive into summer reading with kids at 🌞

🌞📚 Welcome to our Summer Book Club! Immerse your child in a world of enchanting stories and literary adventures. We cater to young readers from kindergarten through 12th grade in a serene outdoor setting. Our club offers limited slots for personalized attention and quality interaction. It’s not just about reading but also about comprehending and appreciating literature. Each session is an opportunity to socialize, discover new books, and make lasting friendships. Join us and make your child’s summer reading a fun, immersive journey they will look forward to every week!

📣 Stay updated on book announcements and sneak-peaks by following us on Facebook and Instagram!

📩 Register by contacting us (link in bio!); we'll send you all the details!

08/01/2022

Incredible! Human rights can evolve with us if we are willing to accept the possibilities!

The sciences of reading have already proven this to us, yet we have not done the crucial steps of systematically accepting the possibilities for every person to read. Let's get there!

07/10/2022

07/06/2022

So many people feel as though their language is foreign to them, especially while reading and spelling.

Reading is not a natural process, and for 1 in 5 people it is inherently difficult to learn, but it doesn't have to be.

That is why I am here for you.

Let's learn how to read together.

Contact link in my bio:

https://linktr.ee/readingwithbrittany

https://mycrd.is/readingwithbrittany

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07/06/2022

Here are a few of the many techniques discussed in David Kilpatrick's "Equipped for Reading Success," one of my favorite references!

One thing I love about these techniques is how you can utilize them formally for direct teaching, or informally for helping students that are "stuck" on a word or correcting errors.

Share some of your favorite takeaways from ERS in the comments! 💙

Note: I realized after posting that I misspelled "graphemes" on the 4th slide. I will eventually repost it with the correct spelling.
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06/23/2022

❗TONS of FREE teaching resources for you to start your SOR journey, even on a tight budget!

These are just some of the amazing content makers out there, but each of these offers a plethora of downloadable content that you simply can't miss out on! Did I mention they're all free?!

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05/17/2022

"Recent research indicates that morphological awareness is associated with reading and spelling growth from first grade onward, in parallel with phoneme awareness and general print knowledge." (Moats, 2020)

While researching ways to further engage students in studying morphology, I came across SWI ("Structured Word Inquiry" or "Scientific Word Investigation").

"1) This instruction explicitly targets any features and conventions that govern “word structure.”

2) This instruction employs not just an “inquiry” approach, but a “structured inquiry” approach."

All the digging has left me feeling joyful, and after watching Pete Bowers' presentation I hope you do too!

The YouTube link is in my bio! This post shares some of my notes on the presentation.

(This all started after I found and their beautiful lessons using word sums and matrixes for SWI. Check them out!)

What are your thoughts on SWI?

Note: I realized after posting that I misspelled Dr. Bowers' name on the first and last slide. I will eventually repost it with the correct spelling.
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12/07/2021

My first FREEBIE! 😁🎁

I recently started working with a new student and we learned our keywords for the vowels (short sounds) and consonants (except x and q because I typically like to address them in isolation) in the alphabet!

This activity integrates phonemic awareness by listening for the first sound in each picture (/p/ at the beginning of '"pig" 🐷) and sound-symbol awareness when labeling the letter that matches the sound (p - pig - /p/).

LINK IN BIO!

Try using letter stamps to label each picture! I couldn't find mine 🤦‍♀️, but my student did a great job writing them!

11/12/2021

Beats in words are called SYLLABLES.

Every syllable in English will have 1 VOWEL SOUND (one sound can be represented by several letters - "igh" says one sound - /I/ like in the word n-igh-t.)

If you sing 🎵" Happy birthday"🎵 slowly, you'll sing "haaap-pyyy biiirth-daaay!"

When we sing a tune we often sing with the beat, breaking lyrics up into syllables! When we hold a note like Celine Dion or an opera singer, we hold the vowel sound in each beat!

Listening to spoken words with multiple syllables and separating them is how I usually start introducing the concept of syllables to my students, to then isolating each vowel sound in each syllable (phonemic awareness).

When we begin looking at written words with multiple syllables, I like to focus on just building syllable bridges for a couple of lessons (steps 1 - 3 on the 2nd picture).

Then it's time to split them up! There are several syllable patterns (making different syllable types - I will discuss syllable types in another post) for various syllable bridges. Learn the pattern for splitting up a VCCV syllable bridge on the last slide!

Like, comment, and share! 😊