Working memory capacity increases as children grow and their brains develop. Between ages 4 and 5, the neural circuits used in reading are already functional, and by age 6 children have the working memory components found in adults. Each component continues its expansion until reaching ages 16 to 19. In the case of malnourished children, this neurological and cognitive development would likely be delayed or impaired. On the other hand, schooling lengthens working memory, and longer schooling is related to a larger capacity (Abadzi, 2006). Prior knowledge speeds up basic comprehension and frees more working memory to make connections between the new material and previously learned information, to draw inferences, and to ponder implications (Hirsch Jr., 2003). Students can also overcome the limitations of working memory by grasping what kind of text this is, rapidly identifying words, and understanding the grammatical connections between them at the basic level of the sentence. This kind of fluency at the sentence level increases with practice, vocabulary knowledge and exposure to different kinds of writing (Hirsch Jr., 2003).

# **_c. What strategies work best for teaching reading?_**

In the first years of schooling, children will gradually acquire the skills they need to read proficiently. Teachers can introduce these skills separately, but they should be integrated as quickly as possible. Each of the five main early-reading skills should be emphasized at different times, according to the grade and the psychological development of the child, but they should be included on a daily basis as appropriate for the grade (Vaughn & Linan-Thompson, 2004).

For instance, the focus in kindergarten in many countries is on _phonemic awareness_ . Instruction in phonemic awareness involves teaching children to “focus on and manipulate phonemes in spoken syllables and words” (NRP, 2000) and should be taught for approximately 15 to 20 minutes daily for instruction to be effective (Vaughn & Linan-Thompson, 2004). Phonemic awareness involves teaching children to blend or segment the sounds in words using letters and to manipulate sounds in speech without any letters as well (NRP, 2000).

In first grade the focus often turns to _phonics_ and _word study_ , which provide the foundations for literacy instruction in this grade, but related skills such as print awareness and alphabetic knowledge and understanding, can be emphasized since kindergarten. Students should learn to read decodable text in first grade, since doing so allows them to apply their other skills to reading as well. Because of the complexity of English spelling, there has been controversy around the use of phonics in teaching beginning reading since the nineteenth century, but the most recent research, examined by the National Reading Panel (NRP, 2000) indicates that teaching phonics (and related phonics skills, such as phonemic awareness) is a more effective way to teach children early reading skills than is embedded phonics or no phonics instruction. Phonics instruction requires the teacher to provide students with a core body of information about phonics rules, or patterns.<sup>2</sup> According to research, _fluency_ instruction should start the second semester of first grade, when students have built a strong foundation in word identification (Vaughn & Linan-Thompson, 2004). For fluency instruction in first and second grade, reading must be taught in a known

> 2 The National Reading Panel (NRP, 2000) indentifies five Phonics Instructional Approaches: (1) Analogy Phonics, or teaching students unfamiliar words by analogy to known words; (2) Analytic Phonics, or teaching students to analyze letter-sound relations in previously learned words to avoid pronouncing sounds in isolation; (3) Embedded Phonics, or teaching students phonics skills by embedding phonics instruction in text reading; (4) Phonics through Spelling, or teaching students to segment words into phonemes and to select letters for those phonemes; and Synthetic Phonics, or teaching students explicitly to convert letters into sounds (phonemes) and then blend the sounds to form recognizable words.

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