Amy Mangan

LEXP 3
The reading program Read Well is used for Kindergarten through Second Grade at Doris

Hancock Elementary School. The guiding principles of this program are:

Children need to read well to feel like they belong in the world of school and in their
community.
Despite differences in background and abilities, every child deserves to receive
instruction that meets his or her individual needs.
Early literacy instruction must be age and individually appropriate.
Teaching young children to read well requires four things: (a) carefully designed
instruction tools, (b) dedicated and skillful teachers who teach with enthusiasm, (c)
sufficient amounts of instructional time, and (d) professional collaboration.
(Sprick, Jones, Dunn, & Gunn, 2008)

The Read Well program is used as our core reading instruction as well as our intervention

program. At the kindergarten level, this program focuses on: phonemic awareness, phonics,

fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. Read Well provides teachers with a scripted manual to

follow for reading instruction. This program has been implemented for several years in both

kindergarten and first grade at Doris Hancock Elementary School. With teaching this program, I

have seen both strengths and weaknesses.

Some of the strengths are: explicit instruction for phonemic awareness, phonics

instruction, focus on fluency, and reading text. During both the whole group and small group

components of the program phonemic awareness and phonics are explicated taught and

practiced. Small group instruction focuses on fluency. The students are provided many

opportunities to practice decoding skills and read text.

Another strength of the program is induction to new vocabulary. Every unit has new

vocabulary for the students to learn. The unit also allows students practice with new vocabulary.
 Some weaknesses of this program are in the areas of comprehension and the selections of

text. Even though the program states that it focuses on comprehension, this area is lacking. One

of the problems is that the questions provided in the manuals are story detail questions. These

questions do not require the students to think about or defend their answers. Questions such as

these do not require higher level thinking skills. These questions are mainly recall questions

about the text. Such questions do not encourage students to think about what they have just read.

With the lack of higher order thinking questions, students are not learning how to analyze text, or

question their knowledge about what they have read. Even kindergarteners should be able to

demonstrate the ability to defend their thinking. The kindergarten team is in the progress of

developing higher order thinking question to supplement selections of text found in the program.

Another weakness of this program is the selection of text. The program offers a great

deal of text in both fiction and non-fiction. Much of text offered requires teacher to build

additional background knowledge for the students. Without the background knowledge it is

difficult for students to connect with the text offered in the program. Another weakness is that

the text lacks diversity among cultures. To remediate this program weakness oral read alouds are

provided by teachers. Students are exposed to additional information about other cultures. This

helps all students connect to the text. As a teacher I understand the importance of exposing

students to all different type of cultural materials.

My reflection of the Read Well program is that although it is a very good program,

supplementary materials are necessary to create a more cohesive program for all students.

References
Sprick, M., Jones, S. V., Dunn, R., & Gunn, B. (2008). Read Well Getting Started.
Boston: Sopris West.