I'm going to look specifically at how the child is reading. If they need more phonics, I'll give them phonics skills and strategies. If they need more meaning, which whole-language does, I'm going to do that. In Reading Recovery you make sure you teach exactly how the child learns, because every child learns differently. Homework is given each night, not just with new books but with books the children have come to know, so they will gain fluency.
Children have to understand how sentences are constructed.
It's working from the known. Ty read well from The Biggest Fish , a book familiar to him, but missed some of the emotional cues until Mr. Low directed his attention to the exclamation marks. If he could not read a word, Mr. Low would suggest he read ahead to figure out the word from the context. Throughout the session, Mr. Low took frequent notes on Ty's progress. It makes me learn lots of words and that means I can read other books that are harder than these.