The Science of Decodables: How to Use Them Effectively


In This Webinar

This webinar will begin by identifying the purposes of decodables and the opportunities in which they may be most useful. It will focus on how to introduce students to decodable text, how to do a bookwalk (not a picturewalk) in a decodable, and how to follow up. It will also address the importance of using a phonics scope and sequence when choosing each other. Lastly, it will clarify how not to use decodables—ineffective practices that don't make use of the textual scaffolds.

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About Our Literacy Expert



About the Author

Dr. Heidi Anne Mesmer

Dr. Heidi Anne Mesmer is a literacy professor at the Virginia Tech School of Education.  A former classroom teacher, Mesmer works extensively with teachers, schools, and young readers, directing numerous school-based initiatives to improve reading instruction. She studies beginning reading instruction and text difficulty, and her work has been published in The Reading Teacher, Reading Research Quarterly, The Educational Researcher, Elementary School Journal, and Early Childhood Research Quarterly. She is the author of Tools for Matching Readers to Texts, Reading Interventions in Primary Grades, and Teaching Skills for Complex Texts.



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