Hands-on Reading Activities to Help Struggling Readers | ep. 119

Lauren Moseley discusses her experience fostering dogs through Three Little Pitties, a Texas-based rescue. Visit https://www.threelittlepittiesrescue.org to learn more. Moseley shares the process of finding homes for them. She shares her personal journey of fostering a pregnant dog named Anise and the challenges and rewards of fostering. 

T.D. and Lauren discuss Ms. Moseley's transition from self-contained to departmentalized teaching, focusing on language arts and social studies. They both emphasize the importance of systematic reading programs and the use of various teaching tools and strategies to help struggling readers, such as using magnetic letters and sand trays. 

Tiffany's Tip focuses on the benefits of play-based learning by incorporating movement.



Episode Highlights:
0:00:03 – Lauren Moseley returns to the podcast and introduces her foster dog, Anise.
0:01:57 – Lauren discusses her experience fostering dogs and the importance of animal rescue.
0:08:08 – Lauren shares her transition to teaching only language arts and social studies, and how it allows for deeper dives into reading instruction.
0:10:27 – Discussion about the science of reading and helping students decode tricky words and names.
0:12:19 – TD Flenaugh describes professional development and the use of manipulatives like Magna doodles and pipe cleaners for reading intervention.
0:16:10 – TD explains the benefits of observing other teachers and organizing magnetic letters for reading activities.
0:20:01 – Tiffany’s Tip: Introduction to play-based learning and using movement (e.g., freeze dance, hopping while counting) to engage students.
0:21:30 – Tiffany’s Tip: Sharing inspirational Instagram accounts for creative classroom ideas

Transcript

TD Flenaugh: 0:03

Lauren Moseley, I'm so glad you're back on the podcast.

Lauren Moseley: 0:06

Well, hello

TD Flenaugh: 0:09

Audience, she's here. I mean, she's like, been playing hard to get I don't know where she was! No, just playing. Tell them what's been...

Lauren Moseley: 0:19

What's been going on. Come here. this is, this is why I've been busy. Come here, come here. Hold on. Let me see if she'll come up. Come here, come here. This is my new I love so much, and she takes up all of my time. This is Anise. She is my foster dog. Actually, I rescued her. And yeah. So it's been part of the reason I have a new baby. You know how new moms are?

TD Flenaugh: 0:47

Yep, new moms. Yeah, you had your maternity leave. Yeah, she's back. I'm back.

Lauren Moseley: 0:52

Yes, we got her a little a little bit more trained, so now I'm, I can have her in the house, and she's, she's got a free roaming I don't have to worry about stuff too much.

TD Flenaugh: 1:02

Okay

Lauren Moseley: 1:03

yeah, so we're good, and she already has a potential adopter, and I've only had her for a little over a month.

TD Flenaugh: 1:13

Okay, you have to tell me about this because, like, give me the details, because you were telling me that your foster dog, I don't know you have a transport sit like, Tell me about it, because I it's so unfamiliar, and I don't know if people in the audience out there like, if they need to foster dogs and just have a place to give them or like, tell us about it. Hi. Thank you so much for joining the falling for learning podcast. We have this podcast to help parents and caregivers with having the resources, strategies and tools needed to make sure that their children are on track for learning and to stay on track for success.

Lauren Moseley: 1:57

So I have this thing. People collect different things. Some people collect coins, collect vintage, you know, milk glass vases. I collect dogs, and I don't keep them, because I would have 20 dogs, and that's just not sustainable. So I partnered with three little pitties, which is here in Texas, an amazing rescue. And, you know, they they're very well established. They have a great program. They have a great veterinarian program. They have a great training program, beautiful facility. The dogs are kept safe and they're exercised. They have tons of volunteers. So whenever I find a dog that I know would make an amazing pet, I, you know, just tell them, Hey, I found this dog I am willing to foster. Can you help me find her a good family? And that's what they do. They they have a social media crew that, you know, puts this great montage together for her, like, she's got, like, little glamor shots, little, you know, little video. I'm Anise. Exactly

TD Flenaugh: 3:05

glamor roll. Okay, yes, you call that like, when kids are being scouted, or they want to be scouted for the teams, they have, like, a, I don't know what they call it.

Lauren Moseley: 3:15

portfolio, like, a little, yeah, yeah, yeah. So she's got hers. It's online, and because they are such a good rescue, and they really do, you know, they have great outreach programs. They have spay and neuter programs. They just do so much for people who are animal lovers like myself. They want to place these dogs with the right with the right families, so they vet them very well to make sure that the family fits the dog, and the dog fits the family, and they have so much success that they're popular, and people will, you know, refer friends and say, Hey, if you want a pet, don't, don't shop adopt. And that's, ah,

TD Flenaugh: 3:56

don't shop adopt. So we definitely put that in the show notes, because I know he's out there, they want to know, like, if they could foster a dog, or, you know, they might be collecting dogs and they need to give some away, but they don't want to, you know, leave them just out on the street or whatever. Can you tell us a little bit about the dog story

Unknown: 4:17

my dog? Oh, okay, so I took a year off from fostering back in November, my my last dog was placed in November. Her name was ginger, and she she just, was just such a great, great dog. But I was tired and I needed a break, because it's a lot of work. You got to train them, you have to exercise them, you have to keep them social. So I took a year off, and in March, I kept seeing this dog at the gas station, and I was like, No, I can't do it. I can't do it. I need a break. So March went by, and I saw her in like, a few months later and she was pregnant. Like, oh no. And I'm like, Lauren, if you take this dog. You're gonna have to take a dog with puppies. So what are you gonna do? So I thought about it, thought about it, and then I didn't see her again for a long, long, long, long time. And then the next time I saw her, which was in August, she was no longer pregnant, so I went, I went around the area and asked, Hey, do you guys? Have you seen puppies? Do you know this dog? Do you know who owns his dog. They're like, Oh, no, we just feed her. She hangs out. You know, she's just kind of a stray. There was a food truck out there, so, you know, she was in the trash at the food truck never found the puppies. But then one day, I was driving home and I did see a little puppy in the street. Rip. That's it. I'm going to get her so yeah, August 19, I and she knew me by then, because I had seen her at the gas station several times. I gave her like little tree Pat her on the head. But yeah, I got her on the 19th, she came straight to me. She was like, I was waiting for you. Out of retirement, out of retirement, yep, and yeah. Got her in the program immediately, and they were like, We love her. She's great, and her application is out there already. Three Little Pitties. Look her up. I wish I had some more information. So maybe if some of the listeners want to check her out, but she's got applications already. She'll probably be gone.

TD Flenaugh: 6:23

She's a hot commodity, but at least if, if you weren't aware of three little pities, yes, you know, this is something, I mean when we think about falling for learning and getting our kids involved with the community like this is something they could do. They could help foster dogs. They can help, you know, volunteer, you know, because the dogs are just out, and then unfortunately, like she said her, that the puppies, you know, at least we know that one of them, or more, probably more, because we don't know where the puppies are, did not survive. So, yeah, we're doing a service for the community, and that could be a pathway, you know, to a kid's career or something like that, so or just a lifelong hobby. I mean, it's gives your your life dimension and purpose, or whatever you know, every dog additional purpose. You know,

Lauren Moseley: 7:18

I tell people, every dog is an emotional support dog. When I'm having our day, we can go play fetch, I feel instantly better. Just, even just taking her for a ride in the car, I feel instantly better. There's something about the way that dogs kind of like they're studying you. They want to know all about you, and something about the connection is just, yeah, it's therapy. So, yeah, lots of young volunteers at the rescue too. So absolutely, get your kids involved.

TD Flenaugh: 7:48

Okay, all right, so you're back with us. And so the school year has been underway. We've had lots of different interviews and stuff like that. What are you noticing this year? Like, what's going well? What's happening going well?

Lauren Moseley: 8:08

Well, I am self contained this year, last year. I'm sorry. I am departmentalized this year, last year, I was self contained. So I taught all subjects this year. I'm only doing language arts and social studies, which is less work in the sense of, I don't have as much to plan for, but it's really opening up some space for me to do a little bit more of a deeper dive into language arts. And you know, what are some other resources and tools that are out there ways better incorporate my language arts and my social studies together. So even though i I miss having that intimate group, that core 20 kids and that's all I have, and we, you know, I can manage my time a little better now, because I have that hard stop and you gotta switch classes. I 40 kids now, but this week, I think I have learned all their names, because that was

TD Flenaugh: 9:05

Wow. When'd you start? Though,

Lauren Moseley: 9:09

we started August 18. No, not 18th. August 11. August 11, okay,

TD Flenaugh: 9:17

so a month and a half,

Lauren Moseley: 9:21

and I have an Isaiah and an Elijah, and they, I get those flip flopped all the time. I'm like, hey, they're both biblical names. I'm sorry,

TD Flenaugh: 9:29

but, yeah, it's just so funny. I I haven't had that perspective. Yeah, yeah. I mean, you know, I've done middle, elementary, high school, and, yeah, I mean, I think it's a long time, but I'm not going to judge you,

Lauren Moseley: 9:48

but I've never had to do 40 names. No,

TD Flenaugh: 9:51

no, I understand an adjustment for you. It's twice what you need to do. I'm not going to say I didn't get kids mixed up. Still, I still got names mixed up. Up and yeah, just their look sometimes, and it's not always like that. They look exactly alike, but something about them is the same, yeah, yeah. They'll remind me every time I get mixed up, but I'll get it, you know. Sorry, you know. But okay, how do you like just focusing on English, you know, English language arts and history,

Lauren Moseley: 10:27

um, I, I like it. I think the pro we're doing a science of reading. You know, our program is amplify reading. And I really love the program. So, you know, the first year was a little learning curve. I understood the concepts, but, you know, there's lots of components and pieces, and I'm just trying to learn the core curriculum at the time. Second year, okay, I dabbled a little bit into the extra things. I had some supplementary materials and some additional resources. This year, I really am understanding better how to infuse all the things that we talk about, signs of reading throughout the day, like even when we're like for names, for instance, for instance, just even helping the kids understand how names, because their their origin stories are sometimes from other cultures or other languages that they don't follow the normal The rules are English language rules, and so just having the kids say, hey, my My name has a tricky spelling. You know, those kind of conversations with them about words. And you know, having the kids really understand that there's a code to reading. Yes, you can break the code. You can read anything you know, stand you know, the process, the literal science of how to learn to read. So even though I have kids who are maybe they're not fluent readers, I love how I've been able to kind of help them have this mindset of, of, even if you just can decode and segment words that's considered that counts, you know, like, I can't read yet. I'm like, sure you you just, you just read that word yes, had to go at cat, but you read it back,

TD Flenaugh: 12:19

yes, I have had those conversations as you know, I'm a interventionist for literacy, and I am working on my reading Specialist credential, you Yeah, so I'm working on that. I've already been trained in Orton Gillingham, LETRS , which is, I always like to say what acronyms mean, but I can't remember right now, l, e, t, R, S, which is why we have the alphabet soup, because we don't have to remember what. Anyway. So we're, yeah, we're working on that. And I've been getting, like, great training from my program through my district, and then good, really good training from my like, we have academies like for our interventionists once a month we go, and today, on Friday, we went to go see one of our leaders, the leaders that is intervention, and she's been an interventionist for five years to teach. It's a group of us. About 10 of us, watched her class, her and her intervention, her instructional aide. We're teaching a group of small group and switching kids. It was about six of them, and she was, it was just really good. She had so many layers of things like little Magna doodles for them to write on when they were doing their auditory drill, where they had the like, what letter? What letter makes the /m/ sound? So they have to say M. And so they on their little Magna doodle thing, they wrote M, they could erase it for the next one. And they're like, which letter, I mean, which letters or spells/sh/. So you can put sh on the Magna doodle and it erase. So I was like, That is so nice. And they're segmenting oral, segmenting where they're like,/p/ at or pat. Then they had, like a pipe cleaner, and it was like it had like, like three bumps on it, or something like, I don't know, so they could kind of like feel the three bumps, like three sounds, so they touched it, so it is like so many like layers of things, because I'm, well, I was actually high school right before this position. But I actually don't keep saying I never taught, well, I taught a first grade class long, long time ago when I had a private school before I started in public school. So. But I did grow up teaching kids to read, but I didn't have like the science of reading. I didn't do it. I did it like systematically and in some ways. But obviously, there's so many layers to it, and what's really important about it is when a student is struggling to learn how to read, to break that code, these extra modalities and manipulatives help them to grasp the concept, because me just saying to you, but you may not get it and and some kids get it and they don't need it, but the kids who need it, it's very helpful to have these different manipulatives so they could see you doing that, or using your arm, or doing your at you know, like you're helping them through. And that's who I serve as an interventionist, if you're a struggling reader, that's so we need those extras, yeah, because that is what they need to really grasp the concept something's not connecting and trying all these different things helps them.

Lauren Moseley: 16:05

Yeah, I just wrote down pick up pipe cleaners

TD Flenaugh: 16:10

I love. Yes, I learned so much by just going, that's like the best professional development seeing other teachers, because even the way they've organized things, actually the you know, just seeing them deliver something, I may be delivering it a little bit differently, but when you know, but that is helpful to see the way they deliver and interpret that same lesson, but then also just how they organize things, how they have things up. All of those things are very were very helpful for me. So I was very excited to be able to see that. And I was they had something in the book, The teacher's edition, that was saying, manipulative letters, right? And I got some magnetic letters, but they were all separated, and they were like, seven, S's, seven, TDS, like, all in a row, right? But it just took so much time. I would be like, Okay, let's pass out the S's, let's pass out the TDS, let's pass out the A's, right? We did it and it was, it worked, but it was takes a long time, and we only have 30 minutes for the kids, right? But finally, I thought with, you know, it had magnetic trays, like cookie sheets from the 99 cent store, which is no longer 99 cents. But anyway, magnetic cookie sheets. And then they had, we had the alphabet typed out, right? And then it was very similar to the magnetic letters, and then you put them on top of it on the tray, so it's all magnetic. I'll show a picture. I need to show a picture. But, yeah, it just was such an easier way to organize it, right? I got six of those printouts and then magnetized those letters on top of the on top of the typed letters right, and then put it on the cookie tray. And so then, now kids will have their whole ABC Alphabet already organized with magnets. And then you could pull down the s, pull down the A, right, rather than let me pass out an S, let me pass out an A, I forgot to pass out the B's, okay, right? So now we have everything a through z there, and we can easily make cat and then put it back at the C, A, T, put it back. We just need to change the C to B, pull down the B, right? And so it was just so nice to have those materials. And I actually put those in the show notes. So you'll Yeah, I love that, yeah. So it's just so much easier to organize it, easier for the kids to put it back together at the end and get and store

Lauren Moseley: 19:00

it sheets. Okay, I got pipe cleaners and cookie sheets.

TD Flenaugh: 19:13

Now the rewrite method and the rewrite method workbook are your go to resource for helping kids to learn to fall in love with writing, it has the tips, tools, resources, strategies and skill building activities to Help kids fall out of writing heat and into loving to write, get your book set today. We have today, Tiffany's Tip on play based learning

Tiffany Curry: 20:01

movement is another way, just maybe making thing, like a freeze dance type of thing, where you're like, have the music going, and then you have, like, a magic word that makes everybody freeze, or, you know, you're counting, and you're jumping around, you know, and you're hopping, you're counting as your hop, and just all kinds of fun ways that are learning that aren't as the conventional ways, yes, typically think of sitting at a desk with your pencil and your book and your paper and things like that, you know, kind of thinking outside of the box in that way. And I also wanted to share some of the Instagram accounts that really inspire me when I'm trying to come up with ideas and things to do with the kids, just three of them. One of them is where learning meets play. So it's like, where underscore learning underscore meets underscore play. Okay, that's a really cool teacher in Australia, actually, and she has this big, beautiful classroom with so many just engaging toys and manipulatives and textures and colors, and it's just like a dream. So I like to see what she comes up with, what she sets out for the children. Each day, she just makes it so beautiful and engaging. And it's like, I want to, I want to go to her class, definitely do some of the activities I'm so, you know, inspired by her. And then there's mulberry HOUSE Play School. And they are also a play based learning preschool, and it's just beautiful how everything is set up for the kids. It's very engaging. And the kids just their creativity is on full display. They are just in their creating and playing and building and making all day long in such a fun environment. So I get a lot of inspiration from that, that Instagram account, and she has an amazing Amazon storefront where you see all the materials that she has at her school. You could buy them, you know, some of them to kind of help your kids. But I, I really find her, her really helpful, helpful. And then another one is called Tinker, wonder play, and she's like, lots of creative ideas as well for play based learning. So I just think that is just helps the child become more engaged. And as we mentioned in another tip about noticing what your kids are interested in and incorporating that into play and learning it could be really powerful, and giving them the competitive advantage. Like, I know you Yes.

TD Flenaugh: 23:36

I mean, it's so amazing, like, you know, and so I have the parent forms and stuff. I see a lot of people talking about their kids struggle. Struggling to read and things like that. Now, computer programs are great, and I'm saying, yes, use the computer programs, but when you don't be exclusive to computer programs, right? They need to move their hands, but they need to be able to move the letters around and stuff like that. And of course, there are computer programs where you could move letters and stuff like that, yeah. But if your child is, you know, try what. You can't try different things because you don't know what it is that's gonna get it unstuck. Yeah, some of our kids are stuck. They don't they're not making the connection. And all of these different ways, seeing it over again, the B again, the A again, in a different form. It's magnet, it's online, it's typed, it's on the whiteboard, although, you know. And then at some point, it's like, oh, that, you know, they're gonna get it, you know. But you you know, trying these different things are really worth it. And the kids have fun. We also use sand. Okay, yeah. So they gave our, our, our district gave us sand, wow. And so then, you know, then you could write where to stand in the trays. You put it in a little bit. Sand is in trays, yes? So it still makes a mess, still makes a mess, still makes a mess, please? In trays. Yeah. TD, and so you have cat, right? And you can write cat, yeah, right in the sand. And then you also could do your auditory drill, which letter makes the sound. You could just write t So, wherever they are in the lesson, or where they are wherever they are, developmentally, this sand can be helpful,

Lauren Moseley: 25:18

nice. Have you ever seen the the shaving cream in a little ziploc bag with a little food coloring, and so you then they can use the little Ziploc bag, and with their finger pressing the, you know, the letters they can write in, it just makes, you know, makes the whip the shaving cream kind of separate, so you can see where your finger is written the letter, if that's helpful, like that, but,

TD Flenaugh: 25:45

yes, maybe, yes, yes, yes, my instructional aide is great, but she doesn't like, like, I'm the only one who does the sand. She's just like, she doesn't want it too much, and I'm fine with that. It's fine. You know? It's fine. I use the sand every once in a while, I don't use it like every day and not even once a week, but we pull it out every once while the kids, like, beg for it, like, can we get the sand? And I'm like, Okay, next week, next week, the sand.

Lauren Moseley: 26:12

So bye, and do an outdoor lesson.

TD Flenaugh: 26:17

That would work. I like that. That could be like a ca-, like, we could be out in the cafeteria area that's outside, and it's not so bad because, you know, the janitor, like, sprays it down or whatever. So that would, that would solve some of that. Yeah, yeah. So it is a big mess, but I they love it so much, and that's, that's the thing, like parents and educators out there, like, try to think about, like, what's fun and engaging for them, and that's why, sometimes it's whiteboard, sometimes it's magnetic letters, sometimes it might be the Magna doodle that she has, that she's and then she could erase it right away. Sometimes it's the sand, right? Because all of these different ways are engaging to them. And then, you know, when the kids are struggling, they are very much aware that other kids around them are moving and they're not getting it and they're frustrated by it. So having fun and manipulating letters and words in different ways helps them to focus again on it, and hopefully, you know, keep trying, because some of them, some of that, when they're saying I can't read, is also a sign of them giving up, right? Like I don't I can't do it. Like you can do it. You are doing it. And, yeah, yeah. So it's really important, gotta dial into that Absolutely.

Lauren Moseley: 27:43

One of the things I really love about our reading program is how systematic it is. So they spent about 20 lessons in review, like reviewing sounds and reviewing, uh, sight words or tricky words, what you know, whatever you want to call them. And then the first last week was the first time they they read out of their reader. So they're like, Oh, you get a first grade reader now. So they open up the reader, and lo and behold, all the words on that first page. And it's only like two pages of text, and it's maybe three sentences, maybe per page, lots of pictures, but it's all the words we've been doing for the past 20 lessons, right? So everything on there, they they've seen it, they've read it, they've sounded out. They have interacted with these words and lots of different modalities. So they sit down and they open the book, and they're like, I know this. I know all these words. So now it's just a matter of having them read it fluently so that that's where we're at now, like they're, they're at the point where they're feeling like, oh, wow, maybe I can read. But we talk about reading like a robot versus reading like speaking. So that's, you know, I said, if I talk to you like this all day, you would fall asleep just trying to add, add some inflection. And I said, you know, once you get comfortable, that's why you have to read it over. So they're finished with their work. Like, I'm finished. I'm like, Okay, go get your reader. I already read it like you're gonna read it again. You're gonna read it over and over. And that's the reason we're having you read it over, is so you want to get to the point where it sounds like you're talking. We want your teacher. So I even have, like, a, I got the little Janet Jackson headphones, you know, with the little microphone now, so now kids can read to their partner on the microphone, and they're trying to see who can sorry, it's my it's my child

TD Flenaugh: 29:51

who can judge me here, we're all about family here on the following Flenaugh podcast.

Lauren Moseley: 29:55

Thank you. We love it anyway. Yeah, we're, you know, because we want them to. Sound like, you know, they're, if you're on a microphone, that means you have something to say. So we want you to say it like you are, like you are performing. So now that's where we're at. We're, we've had three, three stories so far, and they're practicing with their little microphone. I only have one, so they have to take turns. But anyway, maybe, maybe my principal will hear this. And, you know, give me some more microphones.

TD Flenaugh: 30:23

Started. Donors Choose, and then our audience will give it to you. Oh, we

Lauren Moseley: 30:27

have some at the school. We have, we have them. I'm almost positive I've seen them. I think they were leftovers from covid. So I know we have them somewhere in the building. It's just a matter of, you know, if you'll let us like, you know, get a class set. Not a class I don't want a class set, but maybe a few anyhow, yeah, you know, parents like realize that what they're doing at school. Let them take those readers home, or let them take those little, you know, whatever they're reading, get, get if it's in their skills book or in whatever notebook they have, make copies of them and have it read it over and over and over again. It is that it builds fluency, and it builds their confidence, and it builds their sense of like, Oh my gosh. I i know this, this passage so well, I can read it so fluently, and they they will start seeing the difference in just how they sound when they read like I think that's the big difference. Like the kids who still read very choppy, they sometimes look at awe at the kids who read fluently. I'm like, it's the same year. It's the same thing. It's just they've read it more times than you Yeah, that's it, yeah.

TD Flenaugh: 31:44

And that's so good for us to talk about reading like you're talking because I know that sometimes fluency is misinterpreted, and people think, because, of course, that one of the measures that we give the students is a fluency assessment, where we have them see how much they could read in a minute. And some people will misinterpret that, and kids will misinterpret it as this is speed reading. You know, it's like, no, this is not it. This is reading like you're talking our normal speaking voices are fluent, right? It'll meet the whatever that fluency benchmarking is, if we're reading, if we are speaking the way we're reading, the way we speak, at that rate and speed it works so you don't have to rush through it. And a lot of people get this wrong, and the kids get it wrong, because I'm sure you've seen it. I've seen it where the kids will read really quickly and they have no idea what they read, and so that's not the purpose of reading is to decode by itself. You have to decode, and you have to comprehend you're still not reading. If you're just decoding you have no idea what you read. That is not reading. So it's one part of the equation, but, you know, it's like a multiplication problem. You got to have the the coding times comprehensions of the comprehension of the words, and if you got a zero comprehension of the words, but you've read it's, it's like 100 times zero, a million times zero, the answer is zero. There's no reading there. So it's important to know that.

Lauren Moseley: 33:28

And I think also intonation helps your I feel like your brain, like I said, if I'm if I was reading like this all day, I think my brain would just fall asleep. So I wouldn't it would be boring. But if, in my head, I'm thinking about the characters, I'm thinking about the intonation, like, is the character excited? You know, all those little things that that, once you get the kids reading, and you add that to their their toolbox of strategies for, how do I, how do I, you know, grapple with this, this literature, this text I'm reading. It really does help them with their comprehension. To understand, you know, oh, I have to go back and say that again because there's an exclamation mark that was, I need to say it with excitement, or that's a question. So I need to, I need to ask. I need to read it again like it's a question. So I often times have my kids read things over, just to give them that opportunity to put those intonations in so that when they go back in their reading with their partner, they can practice reading with some feeling. And I think that does really help with comprehension as well.

TD Flenaugh: 34:40

Yeah, that's a good point. Yeah. I

Lauren Moseley: 34:42

was gonna say something else, but my brain, yep.

TD Flenaugh: 34:46

So with the reading, one of the things we do because we do have them read their passages, and that's what you call decodable passages. So if the audience members aren't clear, decodable is like. Passages that they have been taught. It's very restricted, right? It's, you know, this has a lot of at words in it. We've been working on the short a and so we had a little sound, I don't know

Lauren Moseley: 35:17

if I don't know what that was myself. That was my dog, sorry, or not.

TD Flenaugh: 35:20

Was it or a growl? It was like a ding or something? Yeah, sorry, that was probably me. Okay, no, it's fine. I didn't know if it was like, you know, it was like a microphone issue anyway, so, yeah. So the thing about decodable passages is very controlled based on what kids have already learned, yeah, and so they are, you know, beginning readers. It helps give them some success with a passage. We know that fluent readers, readers on grade level, they could read most second grade level texts, whatever grade level they are, and be able to read it with very little issues. But when we have struggling readers, we keep decodable text so they could practice like Lauren was saying those sounds and spellings that they've been working on that they should have be able to have success with, even though it may take them still some time to get fluent with it, they should be able to read the words. So when we have the kids read, one of the first things we do is give them a yellow highlighter, and so we'll have some kind of spelling that they worked on. So all the short a words in this passage we want you to highlight, and so maybe we're working on the SH so all the SH words you want, you know, whatever it is. So that's one way that they could get ready to read. And then one of the things that I was learning about in, you know, when I had my professional development on Friday, is that also having them, you know, mark the tricky words, or those sight words, so tricky words, if people aren't familiar with that, tricky words, sight words, high frequency words, words that you see all the time in text and that often don't follow rules, right? So the right TD doesn't follow the rules. It should say like the but it says the right. And so helping students, and then is that s says a z sound. You know, those words like that are a R, E, helping them to go back and also highlight those tricky words with red, or something like that. And then practicing those words helps. So trying to give a purpose, or every time that they read also is helpful. Like, now you're reading, you know, for the tricky words, now you're reading for that short a sound. Maybe this time you're going to read and you're going to draw a picture of what, like three things that are in the passage. So that's also helpful to try to think about different purposes for reading.

Lauren Moseley: 38:04

Yes, yes. One of the things we do is we put our tricky words in yellow. And yellow means slow down. I was trying to incorporate something that's real world, that's, you know, they can grasp like, you know, help them remember. So, yeah, hello, because you have to slow down and pay attention to see what and I usually underline the part that's tricky. I do have a set of tricky words that are printed out, and the part that's that doesn't follow the rules is underlined so that knows that that's the part that I have to slow down and stop and, you know, it's, it's memorization. But I also have little, I don't know, we do this thing where, like, some, some is a tricky word, and I have kids who could never get the word some that that's just, there's no no. So I started saying, you know, like, some money, and I'll put my hand in my pocket, like I have some money. So now, when they get to that word, I put my hand in my pocket, and they're like, some money, not some money, but just things to help you know that that could be a strategy, you know, giving them a signal of some sort to help them reframe their brain for like, how to attack this word. So now I know for, probably, for the rest of the year, they're going to see that word and think of me putting my hand in my pocket.

TD Flenaugh: 39:29

Yeah, it's great. Yeah. You have to think about what works for them.

Lauren Moseley: 39:33

What works? Yeah, I think try all the things, because it's going to help. You know, like you like you said some kids don't need that, but the ones who did now, now they know the word some and, yeah, it's important.

TD Flenaugh: 39:50

Yeah, even as adults, I think I you know, we all have, like, certain words that we're like, what is that spelling? Again? Mm, hmm. I. Don't know. We should know it, but we don't. Like, I mean, we do, but we got a question, like, Is that the right way to spell receive? Wait a minute, I know

Lauren Moseley: 40:11

me, it's restaurant. I don't know why, restaurant? I Yeah. I always

TD Flenaugh: 40:19

slow down right and ask ourselves, like, Yes, I'm right, I'm right. Well, I thank you so much for joining us. And audience members, thank you again, and we're going to put all of these different ideas in the show notes, and we know that you are, you know, raising kids and supporting kids in education, and we want to help make sure that you do something today that gives them the competitive advantage. Thank you. Have a great week. Enjoy being on. Thanks again for supporting the falling for learning. Podcast. New Episodes go live every Saturday at 5pm you can watch us on youtube.com at falling for learning, or listen on all major podcast platforms such as Apple, Google, Audible, Spotify and much more for More resources, visit falling in love with learning.com we really appreciate you. Have a wonderful week.