# How Decodable Texts Transform Early Reading Development - Link: https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ - Published: 2025-07-21T05:00:00-04:00 - Author: Jeff Bradbury Welcome to Literacy with Laura, the first in a professional development series featuring Laura Stewart, Chief Academic Officer from the 95 Percent Group. In this episode, Jeff Bradbury and Laura Stewart explore key aspects of literacy instruction, focusing on the differences between reading skills and strategies, the importance of oral reading fluency, and effective methods to support English language arts instruction. They also discuss the significance of decodable texts in early reading development and provide practical tips for educators. If you are a new listener to TeacherCast, we would love to hear from you.  Please visit our [Contact Page](http://teachercast.net/contact) and let us know how we can help you today! ## Subscribe to My Weekly Newsletter [To get our weekly Instructional Coaching Tips sent right to your inbox, please subscribe to our weekly newsletter.](https://www.teachercast.net/newsletter) ## Conversation Takeaways * Skills are foundational abilities that children develop through practice. * Reading strategies help students engage with text meaningfully. * Accuracy in oral reading fluency is crucial for comprehension. * Decodable texts support the development of decoding habits. * High impact, repeatable routines maximize cognitive energy for learning. * Explicit instruction benefits all students, including English learners. * Utilizing students’ home language can enhance learning. * Oral language is a vital scaffold for English learners. * Visual aids and graphic organizers support comprehension. * Realia provides tangible experiences to enhance vocabulary. ## Chapters * [00:00](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) Introduction to Literacy and Instruction * [01:29](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) Understanding Skills vs. Strategies in Reading * [03:26](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) Oral Reading Fluency: Accuracy and Comprehension * [06:10](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) Supporting English Language Arts Instruction * [11:13](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) The Importance of Decodable Texts ## **About our Guests** ### **Laura Stewart** Laura Stewart is the Chief Academic Officer at 95 Percent Group. She is a nationally recognized Science of Reading and Structured Literacy advocate who has dedicated her career to improving literacy achievement at leading education companies. Stewart has more than 25 years of academic leadership experience. Most recently, she served as the Chief Innovation Officer for The Reading League and Chief Academic Officer for professional development with the Highlights Education Group. Other key education roles include vice president of professional development for the Rowland Reading Foundation and Zaner-Bloser, school district administrator and adjunct professor. She is the author of several training guides and training workshops, as well as 12 children’s books, and the co-author of _The Everything Guide to Informational Text, K-2: Best Texts, Best Practices_ (Corwin Press, 2014). She serves on several advisory boards, including The Path Forward for Teacher Preparation and Licensure in Early Literacy. ## **About the 95 Percent Group** 95 Percent Group is an education company whose mission is to build on science to empower teachers—supplying the knowledge, resources, and support they need—to develop strong readers. Using an approach that is based in structured literacy, the company’s One95 Literacy Ecosystem™ integrates professional learning and evidence-based literacy products into one cohesive system that supports consistent instructional routines across tiers and is proven and trusted to help students close skill gaps and read fluently. 95 Percent Group is also committed to advancing research, best practices, and thought leadership on the science of reading more broadly. 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Send me new podcasts as they are released Send me new blog posts as they are released Send me a weekly email with a summary of everything that is new. ##### Transcript Jeffrey Bradbury (: [00:13](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) Welcome to the TeacherCast Educational Network. My name is Jeff Bradbury. Welcome to the third episode of our special summer professional development series, Literacy with Laura. So far we've looked at the science of reading. Last week was professional learning and this week we're exploring instruction and assessment. My guest today as always is the 95 Percent group Chief Academic Officer, Laura Stewart. Laura, how are you today? Welcome back to the program. Laura Stewart (: [00:37](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) You know what? I'm doing great, Jeffrey. I'm so excited. You know, we've had some really great questions and I'm really excited for today's episode. Jeffrey Bradbury (: [00:43](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) I am excited too. We've got three amazing questions. The first one, what is the difference between skills and strategies? Laura Stewart (: [00:53](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) So I thought a lot about this and I'm trying to say, want to simplify this as much as possible and not make it super complicated. skills are what you can do. Strategies are how you approach doing it. So I want to give you some very specific examples of skills and strategies in the area of reading. So reading skills are what kids are able to do, should be able to do, need to be able to do. So they're foundational abilities that children develop through practice. So let me give you some specific examples. Phonemic awareness. So a skill for phonemic awareness is identifying and manipulating individual sounds and spoken words. So an example of that skill would be recognizing that cat has three sounds, Phonics, the skill might be connecting sounds with letters or groups of letters. So an example of that skill is knowing that the term as the letters SH make the sound in like ship. ⁓ Decoding a decoding skill is sounding out words using their letter sound knowledge. So an example would be able to read the word bat by blending the sounds. at OK, so those are skills. What kids need to be able to do. They're developed through practice through instruction and practice. Reading strategies is how kids approach reading tasks. So these are what I consider kind of, I guess you would say purposeful. They're purposeful techniques to help us understand and engage with text. So let me give you some examples. ⁓ Predicting is a reading strategy. And that's when students are able to make a prediction or a guess about what will happen next in their text based on the title of the pictures, what has happened so far. So that is a strategy, an approach within text, an approach within text as a way to understand and engage with text. Visualizing is a reading strategy, and that's creating a mental image of what's happening in the story. Making connections is a reading strategy that's relating the text to personal experiences or to other texts or to the world. Another strategy is summarizing. That's being able to retell the main points of a story ⁓ in your own words. Skills, know, teachers can help our students develop skills of decoding by practicing letter sounds and mastering that. At the same time, teachers might be teaching a strategy of predicting through text by asking, what do you think will happen next in a read aloud? So they're complimentary to each other and both critically important in both ability to access text and the ability to understand or think through text. Jeffrey Bradbury (: [03:51](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) Laura, that is a fantastic definition of those two skills. We have another question here that comes from a little bit of a debate. The question here is, what percentage correct for oral reading fluency is the acceptable percentage? Laura Stewart (: [04:07](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) You know, you're right about that. That is kind of a debate sometimes among people in our field. ⁓ so to answer this question, I went right to an expert to solve this debate. So I went to Jan Hasbrook and Jan Hasbrook really is a leading voice on fluency. She's a leading voice on oral reading fluency as a measure of accuracy and comprehension essentially because ORF or oral reading fluency is directly connected to reading comprehension. And so in my conversation with her, she advises us to think about accuracy. because accuracy, of course, is first and foremost when we think about fluency and acceptable fluency. And she says, most of the research on accuracy, again, the ability to both decode and recognize words correctly and know what the word means or how it functions. Most of the research states that 95 Percent is the threshold for adequate comprehension. However, she says, at least one study says that we need to strive for accuracy around 98Percent. So studies have revealed that if the meaning of as few as 2 Percent of the words in a text are unknown, comprehension can be significantly impaired. ⁓ And that's really all about making sure that we have accuracy with those words enabled for us to develop the fluency and ultimately the understanding. So I think a way to summarize this is to say a range is a correct answer, 95 to 98Percent, not a specific precise number because I always want us to remember that we have to take purpose into account. ⁓ Comprehension is always the goal, but accuracy needs to be higher ⁓ when we are reading for, ⁓ you know, precise accuracy versus let's say reading for pleasure or getting the gist etc. Jeffrey Bradbury (: [06:09](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) that is certainly a good solution to that debate. Now, if anybody's looking for resources on this topic, where would they go to find out more information here? Laura Stewart (: [06:18](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) Yeah, so I think one of my best, one of my favorite sources is to, you know, mentioning Jan Hasbrook. This book that she ⁓ wrote with Deb Glaser is a book called Reading Fluency, Understand, Assess and Teach. And this is really kind of, you know, to me a great source to go to. It's very accessible. This text is to really help us understand oral reading fluency, what it is as an assessment and also, you know, the ⁓ correct percentages of oral reading fluency. Also, this book really supports the importance of accuracy, first, foremost, and forever as Jan Hasbrook likes to say. Jeffrey Bradbury (: [07:00](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) We're going to make sure that we have the links to this and all of our resources over on teachercast.net forward slash literacy with Laura ready for our next question. Laura Stewart (: [07:09](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) I am ready, Jeff, bring it on. Jeffrey Bradbury (: [07:10](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) Number three, what are ways we can support our English learners in our ELA instruction? Laura Stewart (: [07:19](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) So Jeff, this is a really big question and we could ⁓ really spend a lot of time on this particular question because there's a lot more to it, but I'm going to try to answer it pretty succinctly here. I am very fortunate that I get to work with⁓ our resident EL expert at 95 Percent group, Dr. Antonio Fierro. And again, this answer can be very complex. Learners. It was published in: 2006 Now to summarize, major point of this document, of this research, ⁓ is that instruction, you know, we have to provide instruction in those key components of reading as identified by the National Reading Panel. They have clear benefits for English learners. So that really important, solid, evidence-aligned instruction that all of our early readers need are really important for English learners. The research also suggests that there needs to be adjustments to these approaches and scaffolds to these approaches to really support English learners. So I'm going to give you six takeaways when we think about those adjustments for scaffolds. So number one, always remember that that solid evidence aligned explicit instruction is good for all students, including our English learners. And to recap what we mean by solid evidence aligned structured literacy, I recommend people go to the International Dyslexic Association website. Number two tip for our English learners for adjustments and scaffolds is, you know, make sure that we identify that students have a linguistic repertoire, know, capitalize on that home language, their language skills and their background knowledge. We don't ever want to diminish what they bring to the table already in language. A third tip would be that oral language is the most important scaffold for our English learners. So making sure that we are engaging in conversation, we're engaging in language, we are ⁓ thinking about vocabulary as both caught and taught throughout our classroom day. A fourth tip that I would offer is think about how do we provide time for processing responses. ⁓ Our English learners need opportunities and actually a lot of our very just early learners need time to process their responses, time for rehearsal of their oral responses, time for additional practice, time for repetition. Those things are really important for English learners. I would say a fifth tip that I would offer is think about how do you use visuals? How do you use graphic organizers? how to use realia in your classroom to really help make concrete concepts in oral language and in reading. Also cooperative learning activities have been very helpful, identified as helpful for our English learners. And then the last thing I'm going to offer everyone is how do we think about establishing what I call high impact, repeatable, replicable routines? That's one of my favorite phrases. Repeatable replicable routines. And these are the routines that we use in the classroom that we use over and over again so that students can maximize their cognitive energy toward learning as opposed to toward the process. So for example, one of our high impact repeatable replicable routines is sound spelling mapping. And if we use this routine over and over again, students are utilizing their cognitive bandwidth to focus on the learning and not focus on what is the routine that I'm supposed to do. So those are just some tips. There's so much more to this, but those are some ideas that I would offer our listeners ideas to consider. Jeffrey Bradbury (: [11:48](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) That is certainly a very comprehensive list. And I would imagine that anybody that's looking to support their English learners would want to make sure that they're hitting most, if not all of these six items. Where can they go to actually get a copy of this list and learn more about this process? Laura Stewart (: [12:05](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) Yeah, so again, at 95 Percent curve, have, ⁓ I mentioned Dr. Antonio Fierro, and he has written ⁓ on this for us on our website. We can access some information there.⁓ And also I mentioned the National Literacy Panel on Language, Minority, Children and Youth. And that's something that people could easily access, just Google that. It's a free download. And it just provides a nice summary of the research around what we need to do to support our English learners. Jeffrey Bradbury (: [12:36](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) Now we have time for just one more question, a bonus question if you will. Here's our last question of the episode. I hear everyone talking about decodable text. Why is it important to use and what do I look for? Laura Stewart (: [12:42](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) Bonus question. So I'm a huge fan. I'm just gonna say that right up front. Huge fan of decodable text. It's text that has a high proportion of words that are phonetically regular.⁓ The regular relationship, I would say, between letters and sounds. And decodable text needs to align with the phonetic elements that the student is learning. So what it does, it provides a reader with practice in the application of skills they're learning in reading. And that's so important. When we're teaching kids about the code and how the code works, we don't want to just teach that in isolation. We have to make sure we're giving our kids opportunities to have success in unlocking the code in real reading. When we use decodable text, it supports their development of what I call the decoding habit for accuracy and fluency and ultimately extraction of meaning. And it gives them confidence that they can be successful in reading. It's early on, decodable text is used early on because it's like training wheels. We provide decodable text for early readers. As their repertoire expands, we gradually release them into less controlled and ultimately uncontrolled text. So that's kind of the meaning or the rationale behind decodable text. So what you look for, When we're looking at decodable text, again, I mentioned the high proportion of words that are phonetically regular, the phonetically regular relationships between letters and sounds, that close match between those phonetic elements and what the student is actually teaching or has been taught, that those phonetic elements follow an evidence-aligned scope and sequence. Another term I like to think about when I think about what to look for in decodable text is cumulative decodability. So as the students are learning more and more about the code, that text follows that progression and builds on what they're learning. We want to make sure that the text is designed so that students are relying on the text itself rather than relying on pictures and guessing about what the text might be. I would also say, frankly, we want to make sure our decodable text is engaging and it's natural sounding language. When I first came up as a teacher, there was decodable text, but it was very meaningless. ⁓ Dan ran, right? but we wanna make sure we have text that has natural language and has meaning. And I do have to give a shout out to 95 Percent group because we have developed and we've patented actually this design for some really unique decodable texts. These are called decodable duos. And these nifty books, first of all, meet what I just said about the what to look for and they match the 95 Percent group scope and sequence of our phonics skills. And they're specifically designed for our K1 students as they're mastering this code. Now what makes them unique is that they have two formats. ⁓ The first one, the first format is just words. And this is for instruction and initial practice, right? So what it does is it focuses kids on what we call inward decoding or eyes on text. Once they've secured that decoding, then they can flip it over. and use the other format, which has illustrations to read for extra practice and enjoyment. So these are really nifty, very popular. Kids love them. Teachers have really responded to these positively. So decodable text, really important for early reading. And I encourage you to check these out. Jeffrey Bradbury (: [16:36](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) Laura, thank you so much for that fantastic answer. Just to clarify for everybody, could you define for us what Rielia is? Laura Stewart (: [16:43](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) Oh yeah, realia. So realia is actual objects. So if we are talking about, if we're, let's say, the sea and bringing in shells and bringing in a starfish, bringing in actual things that kids can touch and feel and experience to help them with vocabulary and concepts. Jeffrey Bradbury (: [17:10](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) of resources for this episode are going to be found over on teachercast.net slash literacy with Laura. Now Laura, in our next episode, we're going to be talking all about intervention and implementation. What are some of the things that you look forward to sharing with us on those two topics? Laura Stewart (: [17:25](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) Yeah, so I'm excited about that. know, this again, this has been a great series because these are real questions that are coming from our listeners and that makes me really excited. You know, I mentioned in episode one of this series about the importance of implementation. And so really addressing that, which is the bridge from research to practice ⁓ is a really important topic that I look forward to digging into. Jeffrey Bradbury (: [17:48](https://teachercast.net/captivate-podcast/dlt-bonus-literacy-with-laura-ep-3/ void(0);) going to be releasing that next week. Don't forget to hit that like and subscribe button so you can be notified when that episode releases. Laura, thanks so much for your time today and I look forward to seeing you on our next episode. that wraps up this episode of TeacherCast on behalf of Lauren, everybody here on TeacherCast. My name is Jeff Bradbury, reminding you guys to keep up the great work in your classrooms and continue sharing your passions with your students.