At the middle school level (grades 7-9), we have more and more students who cannot read entering each year. In addition to the students who cannot read at all, we also have many students who are not reading at grade level, and will most likely remain struggling readers for life if we do not intervene. With a flexible principal and an experienced resource department, we have an opportunity to use evidence-based interventions to ensure that we teach all of the students at our school to read well. We will do this using a multi-tiered system of supports (MTSS), which utilizes evidence-based interventions in cascading tiers for all students, not just students with a diagnosis. All students who are reading below grade level will receive targeted interventions, and all students at the school will receive evidence-based general instruction.
More and more students are entering middle school with only an emergent level of literacy. This is due to many factors, including COVID-19 happening at a key instructional period and non-evidence-based literacy instruction. These students have already usually had at least several years of literacy interventions, but they have not yet learned to read. They need systematic phonics-based literacy interventions that teach them the missed foundational skills. They need targeted, strategic interventions that maximise instructional time and ensure that interventions are as effective as possible, in order to catch the students up as quickly as possible. Many more students are also struggling readers, who can read some but not well, and not at grade level. These students, too, need strategic, evidence-based interventions to turn them into strong, proficient readers who can proceed into high school confidently. Anita Archer (2022) commands us to intervene using resources and in ways that “honour” our older students, who are hyper-sensitive to being taught using “baby stuff.” Teenagers’ brains are malleable and open to new experiences, meaning that interventions have the potential to make an enormous, life-changing impact.
A growing body of evidence shows that phonics-based instruction is the most important in creating good readers (Archer, 2022). Many of our struggling readers have not received adequate phonics instruction and demonstrate poor phonemic and phonological awareness. After being screened as reading below grade level, and being given diagnostic assessments to determine precisely which skills and subskills are lacking, students will be given interventions based on their needs, as follows.
Susan Brady (2022) explains that it is “commonly found that older poor readers have not fully mastered phoneme awareness, impeding their reading and spelling skills.” She recommends assessing the reader through diagnostic assessments that consider phonemic awareness, and then providing targeted instruction based on the precise phonemic understandings that the student is lacking. Brady recommends, using a wide breadth of evidence, moving on from a focus on phonological sensitivity, where teachers focus on rhyming, syllables, and the onset and rime. Brady explains, using a comprehensive overview of the associated literature, that putting instructional emphasis on phonological sensitivity wastes students’ time, and does them a “disservice,” especially those students with lower socioeconomic status (Brady, 2022). Instead, she recommends that teachers jump right to phonemic awareness strategies, in keeping with the evidence. She suggests working to develop specific phonemic knowledge, and then having students read short connected sections that are based on these specific patterns. Brady also recommends, based on many studies, that integrating writing with reading helps accelerate the learning to read process, and that students are “empowered” when they “have the excitement and satisfaction of being able to write a note, being able to read a little book” (2022). Teachers need to skip syllable and rhyming work when working with older struggling readers. They need, instead, to figure out exactly which phonemes students struggle with, based on their misspellings, where they stumble when reading, and their diagnostic assessments, and then strategically and specifically teach those phonemes, using direct instruction, repetition, and lots of practice.
Effective instruction must expand beyond phonemic awareness to teach phonics systematically. Phonics are absolutely essential in literacy interventions for middle school students. The brain learns to read by reading every single sound. Automaticity only develops with an excellent grasp of phonics. There is lots of evidence that phonics instruction supports students in becoming good readers (Blevins, 2021). Many students received uneven literacy instruction in elementary school. Systematic phonics instruction can support students in learning to read later. To accomplish this, we must abandon multisensory instruction, which has no evidence behind it (Lane, 2025). Instead, we must teach students from a structured, systematic phonics approach, and ensure that students have lots of opportunity to put phonics into practice. Teachers can give students diagnostic assessments and teach students the specific phonics skills they are lacking. They can teach phonics through modelling, blending, dictation, and having students look at their mouths while making the sound. Students should have the opportunity to write letters and letter sounds on paper, as there is ample evidence that this helps to integrate their reading abilities. They should hear words read aloud, and should have the chance to read them aloud. Teachers can use a structured literacy program, such as UFLI, or work on practicing specific, needed phonics as works best for the student. Teachers should work to ensure that at least half, and likely more than half of each lesson involves students practicing phonics skills independently or in groups, to ensure that they have the opportunity to do what they learn about (Blevins, 2021).
Decoding skills are often lacking in older readers and should be taught after students have a foundational understanding of phonemes and phonics. Teachers should use decodables to practice the specific phonics concept through reading, building the students’ abilities and confidence in their own ability as a reader. Decodables serve a specific purpose, allowing struggling readers to practice and hone their reading abilities until they are capable of extending their reading skills beyond the discrete set of skills that they begin with (Blevins, 2021). Teachers are encouraged to ask students to conduct repeated readings for different purposes (for comprehension, to determine themes, to look at conflict, etc.) to build readers’ fluency. Discussing texts with comprehension questions afterward helps to cement and extend students’ understanding. Writing, as with phonemic awareness, helps to integrate students’ skills (Blevins, 2021). We must use teenage and adult level decodables whenever possible. These are very hard to find but there are some available and we can create more ourselves, using our extensive understanding of the phonics patterns our students need to learn. Doing so will honour students’ ages, experiences, and capabilities.
Finally, developing and practicing word reading strategies will allow students to become proficient readers. We must teach students that the English spelling system makes sense, that they can learn to figure out words based on a few principles, and that almost all English words are spelled phonetically (Flanigan et al, 2022). We can do so by teaching them how to successfully approach multisyllabic and unknown words. Sight words should be taught as you teach any other words: students should be encouraged to approach ‘sight words’ with the same orthographical mapping skills, comparison skills, and does it sound right checks that they use on all other words (Duke & Mesmer, 2016).
It is absolutely critical that we teach struggling students to read using evidence-based methods. For years, teachers have been using ineffective balanced literacy approaches. We are dealing with the fallout of that approach, with many struggling readers at all levels of school and society. It is a matter of both urgency and social justice that we teach students to read in the most targeted, evidence-based ways we can. It is therefore important that teachers at middle school are made aware of the specific things that they should focus on, including phonemic awareness, phonics, decoding, and word reading strategies. With targeted, evidence-based interventions, we can work together to ensure that all of our students become strong readers. “[O]ne of the best gifts reading gives,” Maryanne Wolf explains, is that “it helps people understand each other” (2023). By supporting all of our students to become strong readers through evidence-based interventions, we can help to build a more empathetic, kind, collaborative world.
References
Archer, A. (2022). Providing reading interventions for students in grades 4-9: What research tells us. Oregon RTIi. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbVRcu5orhg
Blevins, W. (2021). Choosing and using decodable text. OregonTRIi. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7bm06Wd43k
Brady, S. (2022). Phoneme awareness research updated. Reading Simplified. https://readingsimplified.com/susan-brady-phoneme-awareness/?psafe_param=1&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=20429512529&utm_content&utm_term&place&net=x&match&gad=1&gclid=CjwKCAjw3dCnBhBCEiwAVvLcu6Cv74ti28u3LDrq221IG6s_U5PS8kvthFfJNdDPkNeoAZmyi_ZcxxoC_3MQAvD_BwE
Duke, N. K., & Mesmer, H. A. E. (2016). Teach “sight words” as you would other words. International Literacy Association. https://www.literacyworldwide.org/blog/literacy-now/2016/06/23/teach-ldquo-sight-words-rdquo-as-you-would-other-words
Flanigan, K, Solic, K, & Gordon, L. (2022). The “P” word revisited: 8 principles for tackling today’s questions and misconceptions about phonics instruction. The Reading Teacher 76.1. https://doi-org.proxy.queensu.ca/10.1002/trtr.2101
Lane, H. (2025). Multisensory instruction: What is it and should I bother? Collaborative Classroom. https://www.collaborativeclassroom.org/blog/multisensory-instruction-what-is-it-and-should-i-bother/
Wolf, M. (2023). The reading brain, digital reading, reading engagement, and dyslexia. To the Classroom.