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Blank Spelling Grids {Phonemes or Syllables}

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These Blank Spelling Grids are such a simple way to integrate phonemic awareness and orthographic mapping into your spelling instruction! One of the things I find with struggling readers and spellers is that they have a hard time distinguishing the individual sounds in words. Instead of hearing a word like hat as /h/-/a/-/t/, they often process it as /hat/. These…
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Article Word Sorts for A and AN

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Be sure download our FREE Article Word Sorts for a and an at the END of this post! Articles a and an can be a bit confusing. I see questions often about them, so I thought I’d talk about them today as well as share a freebie for your learners. You might also like our Parts of Speech Posters and…
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Teaching Phonemic Awareness

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Teaching phonemic awareness is an important daily part of structured literacy. The good news is that teaching phonemic awareness doesn’t need to take hours of instruction each day…and it can be pretty fun, too! You’ll like our Phonemic Awareness Lesson Plans & Printable Activities.   What Exactly is Phonemic Awareness? In order to understand it, we must first talk about…
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Why I’ve Shifted Away From Balanced Literacy

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The reasons I’ve shifted away from balanced literacy is a post that’s been a long time coming. There’s a good reason for that. It’s been a slow {and somewhat painful} journey. You may enjoy our series on Structured Literacy Series or our Resources for Dyslexia Series. I was heavily trained in the ways of balanced literacy. Sure, I’ve always held…
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Solve Word Problems with STEPS

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Being asked to solve word problems was the absolute bane of my existence when I was in school. I mean, what place do letters and words have in math anyway. {Can I get a witness?} And word problems are even more frustrating for kids who struggle with executive function skills or reading/reading comprehension. *This freebie can be found at the…
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