4 Fantastic Reading Intervention Strategies You Can Use Now

Do you work with struggling readers? Reading intervention is key to help improve reading skills as reading impacts many areas of learning. A good reading intervention program addresses the five keys to reading: phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension.

• Phonemic awareness involves identifying and manipulating sounds in words. Blending and segmenting are phonemic awareness skills. 
• Phonics is used to decode words based on the relationship between sounds and letters. 
• Fluency means reading with both speed and accuracy. 
• Vocabulary means having a broad knowledge of words and their meanings. 
• Comprehension is understanding the meaning of what you read. 

Reading intervention strategies to try

Let’s take a look at reading intervention strategies that cover different keys to reading. 

Tap it, map it, zap it (TMZ)

Tap It, Map It, Zap It is a great tool for practicing phonemic awareness and segmenting. It helps students identify sounds and see that some phonemes are represented by more than one letter. In TMZ, students segment each sound in a word and write the letters used to represent those sounds. For each word, students: 

1. Tap it—Tap a square on the TMZ board as they say each sound in the word.
2. Map it—Write the spellings for each sound as they say it—one sound for each square (Note that there may be more than one letter in a square). 
3. Zap it—Zap the word by writing and saying the whole word. 

You can expand the TMZ activity by cutting the boards apart and having students use them as word puzzles. In this activity, students say each sound as they place that puzzle piece and then blend the sounds together to form a word once the puzzle is together. 

Sort the spellings 

One phonics challenge is understanding alternate spellings of the same sound and knowing which to use. After introducing alternate spellings for a particular sound, Try a Spelling Sort. Identify the sound, then ask students to think of words with that sound. They may be words on your word list or other words students think of. Set up stations around the room with different ways to spell the sound. Students can write their word on a card and deliver it to the station that has the correct spelling of the sound.

Fluency board 

Set up your fluency board with the words students are practicing. Start by reading through the words with students. Then have students read through the board once slowly, focused on accuracy. Then begin working on speed. Tell students that they will read the words on the board until time is up. If they finish reading all of the words on the board, they should start at the beginning and keep reading until time is up. Time for 30 seconds while they read. Have students record how many words they can read in the time given. Each time they use the fluency board, they can record how many words they read to help them see progress.

Word of the week 

Word of the Week is a way to build vocabulary and give students practice with it. Each week choose a word and have students interact with it in different ways. Questions or activities you can include are:

• I heard somebody use the word.
• I used the word when speaking.
• I looked the word up in a dictionary.
• I drew a picture showing the meaning of the word.
• I saw the word in a book, magazine, newspaper or other source. 
• I wrote a sentence using the word. 
• I wrote some words that rhyme with the word. 
• I described the word to a friend. 

You can do this on a worksheet each week as homework, in a literacy station, or in small groups. Students can practice using the word together. 

More reading intervention activities

Need more ideas for any of these keys … or some for comprehension? The Top Notch Teaching Membership is chock full of done for you activities that you can use for reading intervention strategies. You’ll find:

• Phonemic awareness activities like sound bingo. 
• Phonics homework packs — for a whole year
• Phonics cootie catchers
• Fluency boards
• Word of the Week and other word activity packs
• Matching word and picture activities to check comprehension

And so much more — and the membership isn’t limited to literacy or phonics. It’s also teaming with math and science resources, classroom management tools … and so much more. It’s one stop shopping of done for you materials. 

Right now, you can join for only $19/month or save by joining for $190/year. But the price goes up September 1. 

Get all the details and join now for the best price  >> https://topnotchteaching.com/members/