Spark Summit 2024

Amidst the buzz surrounding the Science of Reading, educators are increasingly curious about the role of phonics in secondary classrooms. It is no secret that explicit and systematic instruction along with a strong scope and sequence are foundational to phonics instruction. This session aims to shed light on effective strategies for engaging secondary students while offering explicit phonics instruction to enhance their reading proficiency and elevate students’ comprehension of grade-level texts. Participants will be able to walk away with a tool to help identify striving readers in the secondary classroom and strategies to jump start phonics and fluency instruction in the secondary classroom setting. This session will also focus on the challenges that come with working with striving readers at the secondary level and instructional approaches that can address low motivation and ways to empower students to believe in themselves. Participants will leave equipped with a strategy to aid students in reading multisyllabic words. Finally, this session will show participants how morphology and phonics can be building blocks to student comprehension skills.