What the...Orthographic Mapping!?
I have taught for years that sight word flash cards are almost always the wrong way to teach new words to children. I’ve advised parents that by decoding and sounding out words children quickly add words as sight words. All this was based on a study I had read and the experience of seeing it happen over and over with my children and students I had tutored.
Honestly, I hate sight words and think most should be illegal with severe penalties for unauthorized use.
As a result of listening to the podcast Sold a Story, I learned about orthographic mapping. Orthographic mapping is what I’ve been talking about for all these years. I’m sad I am just learning this but I’m excited to pass on this knowledge.
In a nutshell, if children know the sounds of all the phonograms (I teach 70 of them and the 108 sounds that go with them) and can blend them and know most of the 30 spelling rules I teach, they are able to smoothly decode most words. The act of decoding words this way leads to orthographic mapping of the words. This typically happens within 1–4 decodings. So much more quickly and efficiently than repeated viewings of a whole word on a flashcard.
This fits in with my advice to parents when teaching their children to read:
· Learn the phonograms (and spelling rules)
· Blend the phonograms to decode words
· Read and read and read…
All the reading leads to orthographic mapping in a very natural way. It is a lot of work for the parents as they help their child decode words, but wonderful when those words become sight words and are read easily going forward.
It is great to have definition around what I have believed for years. Orthographic mapping…who knew?
If you would like to learn more, here is the link that I found this morning:
If you would like to talk more about how I can help your child improve their reading, contact me at mark@boline-ed.com for a free discovery call.
