Welcome to Tampareads.com

You've come to a web site that is full of reading materials designed for beginning readers and older students who never quite mastered the reading basics.

Several sections of this site are being developed with the latest technologies in RealAudio teaching support (we call the "Talking Tutor") which can coach a student through new material.  

Also included in the phonics section of this site are colorful worksheets designed to teach phonemic awareness using a highly effective memorizing technique known as "Recognition Memory."  Recognition Memory (which will be explained in more detail later) is simply a teaching procedure that is far more efficient than conventional methods for learning essential reading skills in children with reading learning disabilities or below average reading ability.  In other words, recognition memory techniques allow a child to memorize important reading information, where if conventional teaching techniques were used the child would have faced failure.

Over the coming months, more worksheets will be added and
they are free for anyone to use

This web site has been developed by
Richard W. Pressinger (M.Ed.)
who was a Reading Teacher Trainer for the U.S. Peace Corps and was a Reading Resource Teacher for 8 classes in Kindergarten and Grade 1 during the 1998-99 school year
at Seminole Elementary School in Tampa, Florida.

The information on this web site has been developed according to the conclusions from National Institute of Health's Reading Research Project investigating how children with reading difficulties learn best. Their research is part of President Clinton's National "America Reads" program.

To summarize the NIH results, the researchers stated that after studying thousands of different children in many different areas of the U.S. that approximately 20% of the school population with significant reading difficulties appear to only progress in reading when taught using a very specialized approach. 

This specialized approach uses what is referred to as "explicit and systematic instruction" of the sounds made by words.

The following 3 paragraphs discuss this NIH research and was quoted from the March 1998 issue of the publication Education Reporter.

Dr. Joe Torgeson is a professor of psychology and director of the Center for the Study of Reading and Reading Disabilities at Florida State University.  He has over 100 publications on the subject of learning disabilities and serves on the editorial board of three professional research journals.  Dr. Torgeson was recently awarded one of two five-year grants from the NICHD to study the prevention and remediation of reading disabilities in children.

Converging research reveals that phonemic awareness is the most potent predictor of success in learning to read.  "Phonemic awareness," explained Torgeson, "is the ability to notice, think about, or manipulate the individual sounds in words." One in five children lack phonemic awareness and are unable to segment words and syllables into phonemes and therefore do not develop the ability to decode single words accurately and fluently.

However, phonemic awareness followed by whole language instruction is not sufficient to prevent reading disabilities according to Torgeson's research. "Good readers don't predict or guess based on context," he said.  Sampling the text and using context to "predict" words characterized the behavior of poor readers, not good readers who read every word and rely extensively on the letter-sound relationships.   "Explicit, systematic, and intensive instruction is better," he explained.

Simply stated,
if you are teaching a bright child how to read it doesn't really matter which reading approach to use.  However, if you are trying to teach children with below average reading skills you must teach using "explicit phonics instruction" if significant progress is ever going to be made.  This means that we need to teach the sounds of words and letters first - period.

Again, this is the specific recommendation from the
Department of Education Branch at the National Institute of Health.
To view the details of the NIH - Department of Education research
you can visit their website at
http://www.ed.gov/inits/americareads/nichd.html.

NOT ALL SCHOOLS ARE CREATED EQUAL

While some schools may only have 10-20% of their population demonstrating below average reading skills, there are other schools which have over 50% of their student population in this "below average" category.   Therefore, the importance of this research is even more critical for schools with higher percentages of children from impoverished backgrounds.

Here at TAMPA'S READING PLACE the reading materials have been developed according to the NIH findings.  Along with the phonetically based reading vocabulary worksheets and intense phonemic awareness strategies embedded in the worksheets in this site, there are also other reading strategies used to help the child memorize the information.  These are outlined below:

The Memory Tricks

The goal in reading, of course, is to reach the point where a child can see a word and say it immediately - no hesitation.   This is accomplished when we have placed the word into the child's "permanent" long term memory. For some children, I have seen permanent memorization of a word achieved after they have seen and practiced a word 3 or 4 times in one day.  For others 10 - 20 times.  However, for children with learning difficulties, I have seen this take upwards of 20 - 50 times.   To help explain why this discrepancy occurs anatomical research of brain structures of these children has found a biological basis for their problem including brain cells that are smaller in diameter and cells that are randomly organized in the reading areas in the brain's left hemisphere (in healthy brains the cells are organized in a column fashion).  For more information on reading skills and brain physiology you can visit our Learning Disabilities web site.

Another important conclusion stated in the NIH research was that "SIGHT WORD" memorization was one of the major predictors of reading comprehension.

This certainly makes sense.  If a child can read a word quickly - they are more likely to be able to concentrate on the story material.  However, before reaching this point of "permanent word memorization" we must be sure we give the child some worthwhile strategies to figure out words using the sounds in the word (phonetic decoding), otherwise frustration will occur and the child will do anything he/she can to avoid picking up a book.

Below are the roads used at Tampa's Reading Place to get to this point - each adding a little extra horsepower toward reaching our goal of - "Permanently Memorizing the Word."

1) Phonics Grouping of Words
As recommended by the National Institutes of Health Research, studying words with "Common Phonetic Rules" was found to be the most effective way to teach reading words to children who have difficulty in reading.   In other words, teach "short a" words together, teach "ar" words together, teach "ou" words together, etc.  As you can see, the child will then at least have some logic and consistency in trying to figure out a difficult word.

Each new level of words from the word lists in this web site are grouped according to the same specific phonetic vowel sounds, thereby giving the child a common word attack skill which can be used in each of the new words.  This greatly increases efficiency in decoding the words for the child and also helps in the memorization of the phonics skill itself. 

2)  Stop at the Vowel Sound
I've personally had great success with this technique and recommend it highly.  The child is taught the word decoding trick called - "STOP AT THE VOWEL SOUND"  when attempting to read a new word.   In contrast to the Old School Phonics which typically teaches rhyming word patterns, such as "at" words - cat - rat - pat - etc., in the approach used on this web site, it is recommended you teach the child to read a new word by sounding out the word only up to the first vowel sound.  For instance - if the child is attempting to "figure out" (decode) the word - "read," the child is told to look only at "rea" first.  I don't teach that "ead" has a sound and it is to be added to the sound of "r", but rather that letter r says "ur" and "ea" has the sound of long e - therefore, making the sound of "rea....".  Now adding the sound of "d" to the end and figuring out the word is an easy and logical process for the child.  Using this strategy, the child is being taught to phonetically flow through the word from left to right and to make themselves "Aware" of the sounds (Phonemes) in the word.

3)  Study Ten Words at a Time
We make a big mistake as educators by exposing some children to more and more new words before the "old words" have been memorized, in essence, diluting the learning process to such an extent that nothing can be placed permanently into the long term memory.  As stated previously, while many "above average" readers can reach near total memorization of a word after seeing and practicing the word on only 5 - 10 occasions, a child with below average reading talent may take much, much longer to permanently memorize the word.  Unfortunately, life isn't always fair  

If you would like to learn more about the biological differences between the brain of a Learning Disability and normal child, I completed a graduate research project at the University of South Florida entitled "Environmental Factors Capable of Causing Learning Disabilities and Behavior Disorders in Children."  Give this link a  "click" and bookmark it because it makes for some very interesting reading and also explains the research of scientists who believe these are the reasons why we are seeing more and more children today with learning and behavior disorders.

4)  Time Delay Memorizing Strategy
This is an extremely important and effective memorizing technique that is best explained by example.

Let's say you study any set of words for 30 minutes with a child -
While studying for 30 minutes is certainly a good thing, there is a simple procedure we can implement that will make this 30 minutes even more efficient in memorizing the material.

Rather than studying for 30 minutes straight, the human brain will memorize more effectively if we do the following:

1. Study the words for 20 minutes and then move onto something else.

2. Wait awhile (30-60 minutes) and review the reading material for 5 minutes

3. Wait another one or two hours and again review the material for 5 minutes. 

While both scenarios implement 30 minutes total lesson time, the second procedure is far more effective for pushing the words and sounds deeper into the child's memory.  There is something almost "magical" about forgetting the word and then being reminded of it later with an "OH YEAH - THAT'S WHAT IT IS..." response. 

We have specifically designed the worksheets that correspond with each reading level to incorporate this "Time Delay Memorizing Strategy."  Each reading vocabulary worksheet is divided into three sections using the same ten words.  The first section includes fill-in-the-blank sentences which use the memory technique discussed below called "Recognition Memory" - the second section is a "Word Letter Mix" where the child must unscramble the letters to make the actual word and the third section is an "Alphabetical Order"  exercise designed with very low frustration as there are only five words at a time to alphabetize.

So here we have three separate sections which expose the child to the word after a time delay of some 4-5 minutes from the previous section.

Remember when you were handed back a test paper in college and you saw the right answer and said "OH YEAH! THAT'S WHAT IT IS!".   You remembered the answer I'm sure for many months after that, unfortunately, it didn't make the test grade any better. 

Also, the Time Delay Strategy should be used by reviewing the words again the following day and again the day after that (for a total of three days).  However, again after one or two weeks, it's good to go back and review the words from the previous Levels (Put a list of them on the wall).  Finally, the ultimate time delay strategy is to give some type of homework using all ten words from the lesson. 

Below are some examples of other time delay strategies which could be used for students working in the lower Levels 1-5:

• Print the words 2 or 3 times each

• Doing the Level Worksheet again at home with their parents

• Put the words into a 3 or 4 word sentence

For students above Level 5 (and who know the words in levels 1-5), a great extra homework assignment is to have them put the words into a at least a 6-7 word sentence and not begin with the word "I."

5) Recognition Memory
Memory scientists have found another technique which helps to push new information closer to being permanently memorized.  It is called "Recognition Memory" and is extremely effective when used with low readers and is excellent to use with an entire class in a group exercise.

Below is a quick example of a Recognition Memory Strategy -

Rather than simply asking the child - "What is this word?"
a Recognition Memory Strategy would be to say -
"Is this the word jar or jump?"

You can see how this can be easily modified to use with
an entire class.

1)  Write the ten level words on the board.
2)  Tell the students to number their papers from 1 - 10.
3)  Ask the class - "Where is the word ... (say a word from the board) and continue on for all ten words.  As an added fun activity to this exercise, try playing a guessing game using the recognition memory format.  For instance, if you want the class to write the word jump, rather than telling them to write the word jump - try saying - "Which word means hopping up and down ?"   The students I've worked with love the challenge of this exercise...

This is a fantastic way to begin and end the last few minutes of the day.

6)  TEACH ONE DIFFICULT WORD PER DAY
This is another of the NIH recommendations I agree with wholeheartedly.

While most of the common words in our language are consistent with their letter/sound patterns, thereby making the reading decoding process a straight forward exercise, there are many common words in our language that do not follow the phonetic decoding rules, and therefore, can be quite difficult to master for many children.

In a "SIGHT WORD" Test of 1st Grade Vocabulary Words I gave to approximately 100 first grade students during the last month of school in Tampa, Florida, I discovered a very interesting pattern.   While some words were read correctly by 80-90% of all students (such as - can - did - in - take), other words just as common as these were far more difficult for the children.  For example, the words "want" "said" "does" and "where" were only read correctly by about 20% of the children I tested.   As you can imagine, this "failure to learn" basic sight words (common in National Reading Tests) would seriously lower a  child's reading test score since they are essential for achieving comprehension of a test question.  Also, since these words do not have any "visual" meaning, the picture clue strategy taught by "whole language" advocates is meaningless.

Why Some Words are More Difficult to Learn

Why was there such a difference in the learning mastery between the two groups of words?  They are both just as common as the other so that is not the reason.

The answer is simply that the second group of words either do not follow the "vowel-sound" rules we taught to the children or they are very similar in spelling to other common words.  For example, the word - "want" was confused with the word "went" by most students and the word "said" was read as "sad" by the majority of 1st grade students.  Think about the consequences of this for a moment and how it would reflect on an entire school's test scores.  The words "said" "want" and "went" are certainly words which occur in test questions frequently.

How to Overcome the Problem

In order to overcome this deficit we need to identify these "more difficult words" and implement their own unique teaching strategy. 

One of my daily rituals at the school where I work is to have several students teach what we call the "WORD OF THE DAY" on the school's daily televised "Morning Show".  Again, this is just not any word, but is chosen because it is more difficult to learn than other words. 

There appears to be about 100 critical sight words that fall into this "highly difficult to learn" category.   Therefore, these words would certainly be "worthy" of being added to a specialized  ONE NEW WORD A DAY strategy as recommended by the NIH research, thereby giving these words  more opportunity to be memorized.  If you would like to see a photograph of me standing next to the word prop I use to teach the WORD OF THE DAY in the 1st grade classes - click here.  You can then press the "BACK" button at the top of your browser to return here later.

Below are other ways to make sure these "most difficult" first grade sight words are memorized:

1. Write the word in perfect print on a full size sheet of paper and place it somewhere in plain view on the front board.

2. Teach the word for 1 minute in the morning stressing the first letter phonetic sound (as the rest of the sounds are usually not accurate).  I've found even telling the students - "THIS LOOKS LIKE THE WORD _________  (actually saying what it appears to be phonetically, and then saying  - "But it isn't that word - it really is _________ (saying the actual word).  Honestly folks, this doesn't confuse the kids and seems to work very well.

3. Use any creative way you can think of to help memorize the word.  (I've even taped the word over my tie or worn a word hat).  Maybe even play a little memorizing game where the child repeats the spelling of the word and writes it on a piece of paper.

4. Ask the word again after five minutes - as most children will not remember the word at this time. You can use the recognition memory trick if a student is having trouble remembering by saying (for example) - Is this the word "sad" or "said?

5. After another hour ask the word again - using the same procedure as in #3.

6. Repeat asking the word every 30 or 60 minutes (remember this is the Time Delay memorizing strategy).  At lunch time I stand by the cashier holding the "Daily Word" so as each child walks by with their lunch they must say the word to pass by - if they can't say it I give them 2 choices which always results in a correct answer.  Before lunch is over I print out the word about 10 times on my computer on card stock paper and line the word along the route walking back to the class.  As the students walk back to class they are told to count how many times they see the word.  This keeps them diligently looking and helps solidify the sight recognition of the word.  By the end of the day - most children will have the word memorized, especially if you developed a unique and unusual way to teach the word.  Below are 40 words which are good words to use in any WORD OF THE DAY program.

WORDS OF THE  DAY - DIFFICULT SIGHT WORDS