WPM Phonics & Decoding Skills Flashcards

Which instructional approach is most supported by research for teaching students with dyslexia to decode?

Answer: Structured literacy with explicit phonics

Research consistently shows that structured literacy with explicit, systematic phonics instruction is most effective for students with dyslexia.

What is a 'decodable text' used for in early phonics instruction?

Answer: Text that contains mostly words students can sound out using taught phonics patterns

Decodable texts are carefully controlled to include words composed of phonics patterns already taught, allowing students to practice decoding accurately.

Which phoneme manipulation task is considered most advanced?

Answer: Phoneme substitution

Phoneme substitution requires students to replace one sound in a word with another to make a new word, making it a more complex manipulation task.

The 'schwa' sound in English is best described as:

Answer: The reduced, unstressed vowel sound /ə/ found in unstressed syllables

The schwa is the most common vowel sound in English and occurs in unstressed syllables, such as the 'a' in 'about' or the 'e' in 'item'.

In morpheme-based decoding, what is a 'base word'?

Answer: The core meaningful unit that can stand alone and to which affixes are added

A base word is the free morpheme at the core of a word family, such as 'read' in 'reading', 'reader', and 'reread'.

Which activity BEST develops phoneme blending skills in early readers?

Answer: Having students listen to segmented sounds and identify the whole word

Blending practice requires students to listen to isolated phonemes and merge them into a recognizable word, directly building the blending skill.