Learn about the reading process and how things like dyslexia can make it harder to learn.

The Importance of Vocabulary for Reading Comprehension

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When it comes to reading comprehension, vocabulary knowledge is essential. Without a strong vocabulary, readers may struggle to make sense of the texts they encounter. But why is vocabulary so important, and how can parents and educators help build it effectively?

Vocabulary: The Key to Unlocking Meaning

Family reading togetherVocabulary is the foundation of understanding. When readers know the meanings of the words they encounter, they can better understand sentences, paragraphs, and entire texts. Without this knowledge, comprehension becomes much harder, and the joy of reading can fade.

Research shows that a rich vocabulary enhances both basic understanding and deeper comprehension. Readers use vocabulary to grasp the literal meaning of a text and to infer hidden messages. Both types of understanding depend on a reader’s knowledge of words.

Vocabulary, Mental Imagery, and Cognitive Development

Oasis imageVocabulary development plays a key role in cognitive growth. Each new word represents a concept or idea, and the more words a child learns, the better they understand the world. This expanded understanding helps them connect texts to their own experiences, deepening comprehension.

Mental imagery strengthens the connection between vocabulary and comprehension. Descriptive words help readers create pictures in their minds, making the text more engaging and easier to remember. For instance, phrases like “lush forest” or “towering skyscraper” trigger vivid mental images, enhancing understanding and creating a richer reading experience.

Building Vocabulary: Strategies for Success

Here are some practical strategies to support vocabulary development:

  1. Read Aloud Together: Reading aloud introduces children to new words in context. Choose books slightly above their independent reading level to help expand their vocabulary.
  2. Encourage Wide Reading: Provide access to a variety of materials, including fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and informational texts. Different genres introduce unique words and ideas.
  3. Teach Word-Learning Strategies: Show students how to figure out unfamiliar words by teaching prefixes, suffixes, root words, and context clues.
  4. Play Word Games: Games like Scrabble, Boggle, or vocabulary apps make learning fun and interactive.Example of a word game like a word scramble.
  5. Talk About Words: Discuss interesting or unusual words during conversations at home or in the classroom. This builds curiosity about language.
  6. Use Visual Imagery: Use visual imagery to create vivid mental images of vocabulary words. This taps into personal experience as well as visualization for better memory.
  7. Reinforce Through Writing: Encourage students to use new vocabulary in their writing. This strengthens understanding and helps solidify word meanings in memory.

Long-Term Benefits of a Strong Vocabulary

A strong vocabulary doesn’t just support reading comprehension—it’s a lifelong skill. From academic success to career readiness, vocabulary enables individuals to express themselves clearly, understand complex ideas, and engage with the world. It also enhances critical thinking and problem-solving abilities, which makes it a vital part of overall learning.

Final Thoughts

Building a strong vocabulary is an investment in a child’s success. By creating word-rich environments at home and in the classroom, parents and educators can empower young readers to thrive. Incorporating mental imagery techniques can make reading more vivid and memorable and turn every book into an adventure. The more words a child knows, the more opportunities they have—in books and in life.

 

If you or your child needs help with Reading Comprehension, we can help! Reach out to learn about our ReadingFish program for reading comprehension today!

The Building Blocks of Reading: Mastering the 44 English Phonemes image

The Building Blocks of Reading: Mastering the 44 English Phonemes

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The English language is built on 44 distinct sounds, or phonemes, that form the foundation of how we read and speak. While this may seem like a manageable number, the combinations of these sounds create endless possibilities for words. For emerging readers, the journey begins with identifying, articulating, and blending these sounds to form words.

From Sounds to Symbols: The Basics of Reading

Step 1: Recognizing and Naming Sounds

From a young age, children naturally begin to recognize and produce the sounds that make up spoken language. They then connect these sounds to labels, such as recognizing that the letter ‘a’ says the sound /a/, like in “apple.” This process, known as phonemic awareness, sets the stage for reading.

Student matching a with picture of an apple

Step 2: Linking Sounds to Symbols

The next challenge is associating each sound with a visual representation—a letter or group of letters. This process involves three essential components:

  • Phoneme: The distinct sound.
  • Grapheme: The written symbol (e.g., the letter ‘a’).
  • Letter Name: The spoken label for the grapheme.

This connection between sound, symbol, and label forms the foundation of reading and writing.

 

Adding Symbols to Sounds

 

The Complexity of English Sounds

Vowels and Consonants

  • Vowels: The five vowels (a, e, i, o, u) produce open, voiced sounds. For example, the sound /a/ in “cat” or /e/ in “meet.”
  • Consonants: The remaining letters (e.g., b, d, f) produce sounds by shaping or stopping airflow.

Together, these letters create the basis for English sounds, but additional techniques are needed to cover all 44 phonemes.

Digraphs and Letter Combinations

To represent extra sounds, letters are combined into digraphs where two letters identify and represent a new, distinct sound. Examples include:

  • Consonant Digraphs: th, sh, ch, wh, ng, th
  • Vowel Digraphs: oo (boot), ee (meet)

Short and Long Vowels

Each vowel has a short and long sound. For instance:

  • Short: /a/ as in “cat.”
  • Long: /ae/ as in “cake.”

While the short sounds are represented by just the letter, the long sounds often involve multiple spellings. Weigh and way use different letters to spell the same sound /ae/, this adds complexity for learners.

R-Controlled Vowels

When vowels pair with the letter “r,” they take on unique sounds:

  • /ar/ as in “car”
  • /er/ as in “her” or “girl” or “turn”
  • /or/ as in “porch”

Additional Sounds

English includes other sounds, such as:

  • /oo/ as in “moon”
  • /uu/ as in “foot”
  • /oi/ as in “boil” or “boy”
  • /au/ as in “haul” or “awe”
  • /ou/ as in “out” or “wow”

These varied phonemes—and their often unpredictable spellings—require extra attention from both learners and instructors.

 

44 Phonemes of English Chart

The Challenges of Sound-Symbol Association

For emerging readers, associating sounds with their corresponding symbols can be a hurdle. The same sound may have multiple spellings, and the same letter combination can produce different sounds. For example:

  • /th/ sounds different in “thin” versus “that.”

Additionally, individual learners face unique challenges. Some may struggle with auditory processing, making it difficult to distinguish sounds. Others may have trouble recalling letter names, shapes, or corresponding phonemes. These challenges highlight the importance of patience, creativity, and positive reinforcement in teaching.

 

Tips for Supporting Emerging Readers

  1. Be patient: Every learner progresses at their own pace.
  2. Use multi-sensory activities: Engage sight, sound, and touch to reinforce letter-sound connections.
  3. Celebrate progress: Positive feedback builds confidence and motivation.
  4. Practice consistently: Regular practice with fun and engaging activities solidifies learning.

What is Structured Phonics versus Whole Language?

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What is Structured Phonics vs. Whole Language?

There has been a long-lasting debate among academics regarding the most effective method in teaching students how to read. The dispute between believers in structured phonics verses those in support of the whole language approach began as early as the 1820’s and culminated in the United States in 1987 when the state of California, as part of the new language-arts curriculum, passed bills favoring the whole-language approach over basic decoding skills.

What are these two radically different approaches? Why did the two approaches create the “Reading War”? Read on for a deep dive into the conflict that helped define modern reading instruction.

Structured Phonics Instruction

Phonics instruction lays its foundation in teaching letter-sound relationships. In essence, phonetic-based reading attempts to break written language down into small and manageable components. Learners correlate certain letter symbols with their respective sounds allowing them to piece them together to create words, or in the case of reading, deconstruct a word into the various parts then weave the sounds together to form a pronounceable word (also known as decoding).

For example, a student will be taught that individual letters have a specific sound such as the letter ‘B’ saying ‘buh’ /b/ not its name “bee”. This will happen for the rest of the letters in the alphabet, so when a student is presented with the word “bat” – they will be able to break it down into its parts and sound it out correctly: “buh..aaa..tt – bat”

Later in the phonetic instruction process, students will learn that small groups of letters can be linked together in patterns which will always say the same sound such as “tch, dge, ng”.

Phonetic instruction is a methodical approach to analyze sounds, letters, and ultimately words.

Whole Language Instruction

Whole language instruction differs drastically by attempting to teach words and sentences as whole pieces of language – words are not systematically analyzed or pulled apart as they are in phonics instruction. Those that believe in whole language instruction argue that language should not be broken down into letters and decoded, but instead language is a complete system of meaning with words functioning in relation to each other in context. In other words, the most important focus should not be on sounds at all but primarily on the meaning and context.

The whole language approach was defended on rational grounds in the 1800’s in the Worcester primer: “It is not very important, perhaps, that a child should know the letters before it begins to read. It may learn first to read words by seeing them, hearing them pronounced, and having their meanings illustrated; and afterward it may learn to analyze them or name the letters of which they are composed.”

The three arguments used to promote whole language instruction are:

1)       Reading time does not depend on word length; therefore, word recognition must not rest on the systematic breakdown of words. This, however, has been proven incorrect as our brain processes all letters simultaneously, not one at a time.

2)       We are slightly faster at reading words in lowercase than in uppercase; thus, it is the contour of letters and the resulting contour-specific signature of each word which is most important in reading. The contour is lost in upper case letters, which are all the same size, so our reading speed is reduced.  But this is incorrect understanding because if we actually used contour to identify letters, we would be unable to read the upper-case letters at all, let alone at a slower pace.

3)       Typographical errors that respect the overall contour of a word is harder to detect than those that violate it. An example is in the word “test”, where an error of “tesf” is harder to identify than an error of “tesq” where the ascending letter “t” has been replaced by another ascending letter “f” and a descending letter “q” respectively. But this is merely due to the similarity between the “f” and the “t”, not a whole-word resemblance.

The Solution

The two approaches to teach reading skills differ dramatically in how learners are instructed to approach unfamiliar printed words. Phonics instructs a learner to try to analyze the word into parts and to sound it out. Whole-language encourages the learner to guess the word from the context of the story or accompanying pictures. Regarding the clues to understanding a word, phonics instruction believes they are found within the word itself, while whole language looks externally or outside the word.

At the end of the day, results matter above everything else. The National Reading Panel found that children who are taught phonics systematically and explicitly make greater progress in reading than those taught with any other type of instruction. This result is corroborated when California students’ test scores plummeted after instituting whole language instruction in 1987 and the National Assessment of Educational Progress found that 3 out of every 4 students were below average for their age.

Phonics instruction is the better instruction method by a long shot. At the Colorado Reading Center, phonics is our focus to implement deep understanding of word decoding in our students. At the same time as phonics instruction, we apply some sight word reading with the most common words found in a particular reading level – this is important so that we get our students, who are generally behind their grade, quickly up to the level they should be to perform well in school.

Help and Resources

Developing the skill of reading is incredibly important for successful progress in school for all new learners. If you feel that a loved one or family friend could use a guide to become more proficient in understanding phonics, send them over to the professionals at the Colorado Reading Center for testing and learning resources. Our clinicians help students of any age and welcome all inquiries – take a look at our website or give us a call for more information!

What is Phonemic Awareness?

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What is Phonemic Awareness?

Beginning the learning process of reading can be quite a difficult undertaking. When we think of new readers and how they learn, we usually picture children’s stories and the alphabet, but whether the beginner is a child or an adult that never acquired the necessary skills, the first step towards success is phonemic awareness.

Phonemic awareness is the ability to hear and manipulate the sounds in spoken words and the understanding that spoken words and syllables are made up of sequences of speech sounds (Yopp, 1992).

 

Phonemic versus Phonological Awareness

Many people have the incorrect understanding that phonemic awareness and phonological awareness are the same thing, or synonyms of one another. It is important to be clear that although they are similar, they are indeed unique, and this differentiation is key to understanding the development process.

Phonemic awareness is a subset of phonological awareness. Phonemic awareness is more specific and deals with the ability to identify individual sounds within words, called phonemes (“cat…/c/ /a/ /t/”), as well as manipulate them within a given word (“Change the /c/ to a /b/… now the word is bat”). Phonetic awareness is a broader term referring to the more developed ability of being able to hear, identify, and manipulate larger units of sounds such as onsets and syllables and recognition of rhyming words.

For beginning learners, and for the purpose of this blog, we will be focusing on phonemic awareness (the more specific term), as it will be the first skill that needs to be developed.

Why is Phonemic Awareness Important?

Phonemic awareness is critical for identifying reading development in new learners, and it is the most important pre-reading skill that can be developed being central to the role in learning to read and to spell. According to the National Reading Panel, “Teaching phonemic awareness to children significantly improves their reading more than instruction that lacks any attention to phonemic awareness.”

It is well accepted that phonemic awareness is the best predictor of reading and writing success in young children. It helps learners to master sound-spelling relationships, thus improving this skill through structured education is critical for a higher chance of being able to read and write when literacy instruction begins.

Without phonemic awareness, learners will be unable to group words with similar and dissimilar sounds, blend and split syllables, blend sounds into words, break a word down into its sequence of sounds, nor detect and manipulate sounds within words. It is the foundation, so to speak, of a future reader and writer and without it fluency can never be achieved.

How Learners Develop Phonemic Awareness

The development of phonemic awareness is unique for every learner. Some are able to begin growing phonemic awareness naturally through rhyming stories (like Dr. Seuss), through singing and learning nursery rhymes, or even by listening and reading along with a parent or teacher. This can be a very fortunate start to the learning process for some students, but others may need systematic and specific phonemic awareness teaching to grow in their abilities in preparation for writing and reading. There are many online resources as well as professional institutions available for this type of instruction.

Levels of Phonemic Awareness

Marilyn Jager Adams, a specialist in cognition and education at Brown University, created a widely used definition of phonemic awareness in 1990, and developed a basic understanding of the skills leading to phonemic awareness in five distinct levels.

1)       Ability to hear rhymes (“dog, fog”) and alliteration (repeated initial sounds in words, i.e “purple poster”).

2)       Ability to identify similarities and differences in rhyme and alliteration across and between words.

3)       Ability to blend and segment syllables (“rain-bow…rainbow”).

4)       Ability to split a spoken word into phonemes (“bag…b-a-g”).

5)       Ability to identify and manipulate the sounds in words (“Say ‘dog’. Now change the last sound to a /t/. What word do you have now?”)

Help Developing Phonemic Awareness

Developing the skill of phonemic awareness is incredibly important for the successful progress in reading and writing for all new learners. If you feel that a loved one or family friend could use a guide to become more proficient in phonemic awareness, send them over to the professionals at the Colorado Reading Center. Our clinicians help students of any age and welcome all inquiries – take a look at our website or give us a call for more information!

What is Visual Memory?

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What is Visual Memory?

Memory is the general process by which knowledge is encoded, stored, and later retrieved within the brain. More specifically, visual memory involves the ability to store and retrieve previously experienced imagery obtained by the optical nerve (sensations/ perceptions) when the original input or stimulus of the imagery is no longer available or present.

In other words, visual memory allows a person to recreate imagery within their mind as a recollection of the stimulus – such as a letter, word, picture, or landscape – once the stimulus is no longer able to be seen.

 

Types of Visual Memory

Scientists have classified visual memory into three distinct categories: iconic memory, visual short-term memory, and visual long-term memory.

Iconic memory, also known as visual sensory memory, is a unique, an incredibly short-lasting memory type that can best be described through an example. If you have ever been into a haunted house during the Halloween season that has strobe lights, you may remember that when the light flashes in a dark room it provides a moment of perception of the room, and your mind will be able to retain that perception for about half a second. Another example is taking a picture in a dark room with the flash on, which will create the same effects.

Visual short-term memory (STM) retains visual information for only a few seconds so that it can be utilized in the function of ongoing cognitive tasks. Visual STM is longer-lasting and more durable than that of iconic imagery. It plays a big role, for example, in the task of driving a car by remembering road signs that you have passed and retaining an understanding of the location of other vehicles around you.

Visual long-term memory (LTM) is the ability to recall images or places that have been viewed in the distant past. Whether it is retaining the memory of the directions to get to a restaurant you visited last week or a fond recollection of the view of a gorgeous hike you took years ago, your visual LTM is driving this ability.

How Does Visual Memory Work?

Put into a very simple way, visual memory and visualization skills are our ability to interact with symbols, images, and words. The process includes our retina receiving visual input or stimuli which flows into the brain, and from the brain the shapes and colors are retained or recalled.

Visual memory is incredibly important to learning and education as at least 80 percent of what we learn is visual. It is a critical factor in reading, spelling, and writing allowing an individual to readily reproduce a sequence of visual inputs.

Skills in visual memory in school can help with:

–          Spelling and remembering sight words

–          Reading and reading comprehension

–          Recognition of letters and numbers

–          Quickly copying notes from a board

–          Forming a mental image of a word, like seeing a picture of a dog in their head when they see or read the word “dog”

Visual memory is also clearly important for situations outside of school including:

–          Remembering location of important items (shoes, phone)

–          Ability to give directions

–          Remembering phone numbers

–          Recalling memories

 

How to Detect Visual Memory Issues

Someone that may have problems with their visual memory may display the following signs:

–          Individual may have difficulty copying words and images

–          Difficulty copying and recognizing numbers, letters, or symbols

–          Slow at writing and reading

–          Bad reading comprehension or difficulty remembering details

–          Poor spelling

–          Sounding out every word when reading

–          Poor math skills

–          Mixing up common letters like ‘p,q’ and ‘d,b’

Just like all other learning disabilities, it is critical to have a professional test the individual experiencing difficulty. The sooner the issue is diagnosed, the sooner solutions can be implemented.

How Do You Improve Visual Memory?

If you or someone you know is having trouble with visual memory, there are a variety of exercises and games to help strengthen the skill.

Some ideas to get started include:

–          Memory games that include words

–          I-Spy game

–          Attempt to visualize something unusual – start with a word like “alien” then describe what you see

–          Recall what happened during the day

–          Look at pictures/ paintings, take them away, then try to describe what you saw

–          Rhyming games

–          Matching game (multiple card pairs face down, player turns over two at a time and attempts to find its match)

Help and Resources

Developing the skill of visual memory is incredibly important for the successful progress in reading and writing for all new learners. If you feel that a loved one or family friend could use a guide to become more proficient in visual memory, send them over to the professionals at the Colorado Reading Center for testing and learning resources. Our clinicians help students of any age and welcome all inquiries – take a look at our website or give us a call for more information!

What is Encoding versus Decoding?

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The Essentials of Encoding and Decoding

Communication is the essence of interaction for the majority of living things – animals, but especially humans, rely on the ability to communicate through various forms. The process of communication requires a sender and a receiver of a message or signal, and it cannot be better emulated than through the human invention of reading and writing.

Encoding and decoding, perhaps better represented as writing and reading respectively, are the fundamental abilities that together allow for the mastery of linguistic communication. Learning to spell, read, and write can be challenging for people, but is especially true for language learners with disabilities such as dyslexia and dysgraphia.

So, what are these skills that many people take for granted? How can we overcome difficulties in acquiring them? And what resources are available to start succeeding in linguistic communication?

What is Encoding?

Encoding is a process in which a message is created or formulated for communication purposes by a sender or an encoder. While encoding can be considered as verbal (through words, signs, photos) or non-verbal (body language, facial expressions), our focus is on encoding in reading/ writing. In the case of reading and writing, encoding is the translation of a spoken word or sound into a written symbol- essentially what we refer to as spelling.

When starting the learning process of encoding, students must first know the English alphabet and the corresponding sound that each of the distinct letters make. Students will then learn to write the alphabet which leads to spelling actual words. In order to spell (encode) a word that they can say, the student must be able to break down the word into the sounds they hear and ascribe a symbol to those respective sounds – this skill usually forms at the end of kindergarten or the beginning of first grade.

The message is created by the encoder, then passed on to the receiver, who then decodes it.

What is Decoding?

Keeping with the focus of reading and writing, the other side of the coin to the encoder is the receiver of the message or the decoder. Decoding is the translation of the symbolic representation of a written word or letter into an understood sound or sound pattern and thus the resulting interpretation of the message.

In order for someone to decode, they must have strong phonemic awareness, which is the ability to hear and manipulate the sounds in spoken words and the understanding that spoken words and syllables are made up of sequences of speech sounds (Yopp, 1992). Identifying and in turn gaining a sense of meaning from these unique sounds by looking at, or rather, reading a written word is the key to decoding.

What Skills are Needed to Encode and Decode?

A basic set of skills are required for English language learners to begin encoding and decoding. On the surface level, a learner will need knowledge of the sound-symbol relationship (phonics), knowledge of the 44 phonemes (basic units of sound), knowledge of the English alphabet, and phonemic awareness.

The process of encoding and decoding requires both auditory and visual skills to connect between the two, and the fundamentals of the English language begin to be grasped as students gain the knowledge of phonology, orthography, and morphology. For example, knowing why the ‘-ed’ ending makes each of its three sounds, /d/, /t/, and /id/, is uncovered when a student can identify the final sound in the root word. Overtime as they become proficient in these concepts to identify and spell words, it will ultimately lead to automatic word recognition and achieving fluency.

What is Word Attack?

Word-attack and word-attack strategies help students decode, pronounce, and understand unfamiliar words they may come across when reading. By empowering students with a flexible set of tools to break down a word into smaller pieces they will be less likely to feel lost and give up while giving them confidence and a better chance of success when facing the unknown.

A useful word-attack strategy is to break a word down into more manageable parts and sound out each portion independently of the others. For example, if you have a long, one syllable word such as ‘stouts’, it may be helpful to break it up as ‘st/ou/ts’ – each portion is only two letters which is much easier for a beginning reader than trying to tackle it all at once. The same tool applies when faced with an unknown, multisyllable word such as ‘disregarded’. Try breaking it down into ‘dis/re/gard/ed’, which will be less overwhelming, easier to pronounce, and more likely to land understanding for the reader.

Help When Needed

Learning to read, write, and spell can be a challenging undertaking for a developing language student. There are many resources available including books and videos to help during the process; and if you feel that a loved one or family friend could use a guide to become more proficient in encoding and decoding, send them over to the professionals at the Colorado Reading Center. Our clinicians help students of any age and welcome all inquiries – take a look at our website or give us a call for more information!

The Sound Symbol Association

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Understanding the 44 Sounds of English

Did you know that English uses just 44 sounds (phonemes) to build every word we speak and read? That may not sound like much, but the number of combinations is endless. For young readers, learning to hear, make, and blend these sounds is the foundation of reading.

From Sounds to Letters

Children start by recognizing and producing the 44 phonemes of English. The next step is connecting these sounds to letter names. For example: “The letter a says /a/, like in apple.” At this stage, children are adding a label (the letter’s name) to the sound they already know.

After that comes the challenge of connecting the sound and name to a symbol. A child begins to recognize that the written letter a represents the /a/ sound. This creates a three-part connection:

  • Phoneme: the sound

  • Grapheme: the written symbol

  • Letter name: the label we give it

Together, these form the foundation of sound–symbol association


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Why English Isn’t Simple

If English had one letter for every sound, reading would be much easier. But we only have 26 letters to represent 44 sounds. That means some letters get used in creative ways — and readers need to learn extra rules and patterns.

  • Four letters (c, q, x, y) don’t always have their own consistent sound identity.

  • Five letters are vowels (a, e, i, o, u). Vowels give words their “voice.”

  • The remaining 17 letters are consonants, made by shaping and stopping sounds with the mouth.

So far that covers 22 sounds. Where do the others come from?

Digraphs and Special Sounds

To make the rest, English combines letters into digraphs — two letters that work together to make one sound. Examples include:

  • th → /th/ as in thin or /th/ as in this

  • sh → /sh/ as in ship

  • ch → /ch/ as in chip

  • ng → /ng/ as in ring

  • zh → /zh/ as in casual or Asia

Altogether, digraphs add seven more sounds, bringing us to 29.

Vowels: Short, Long, and R-Controlled

  • Short vowels: /a/ in apple, /e/ in egg, etc.

  • Long vowels: when vowels “say their name,” like /a/ in cake.

  • R-controlled vowels: /ar/ in car, /or/ in horn, /er/ in bird.

With these, we reach 39.

The Last Five

English finishes the set with:

  • /oo/ as in moon

  • /ʊʊ/ as in book

  • /oi/ as in boil

     

  • /ou/ as in cow

  • /au/ as in haul

That brings the total to 44 phonemes.

Why This Matters for Readers

Learning to connect sounds, letters, and symbols is complex. Some students struggle with:

  • Auditory processing → hearing and distinguishing sounds

  • Memory → recalling letter names, forms, or sounds

  • Multiple spellings → realizing one sound may have several spellings

This is why teachers must approach instruction with patience, playfulness, and praise. Building phonemic awareness and sound–symbol association is the key step that unlocks reading success.

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