MORPHOLOGICAL WORD CHUNKING VS SYLLABLE TYPES: UNDERSTANDING THE EFFECTIVENESS OF TWO APPROACHES TO POLYSYLLABIC WORD READING INSTRUCTION FOR MIDDLE SCHOOL STRUGGLING READERS

Abstract

Middle school is often the last place where students are taught basic reading skills such as phonology, morphology, fluency, and comprehension before they move on to high school where reading is predominately focused on understanding, analysis, application and evaluation of content area material. In addition, middle school students are exposed to texts with complex structure and an increasing number of multisyllabic words. RTI has attempted to close the gaps for struggling readers, with the goal of bring them closer to grade level. This study focused on whether intensive multi-syllabic word interventions in middle school improve low-frequency word recognition skills and reading fluency. Two alternative word reading programs were examined for their effectiveness with middle school struggling students. One program was phonological based and focused on teaching syllable types while the other program was morphological based and focused on teaching word chunking strategies. The duration of each program was 4 weeks long in order to keep it in line with current interventions used in a RTI setting. Despite a large amount of previous research confirming the merits of both phonological syllable type and morphological word chunking strategies, the results of this study were mixed, with none of the research questions being confirmed. However, effect sizes suggested interesting trends regarding the potential benefits of an intervention based on syllable types. Implications for current approaches of middle school short intensive RTI tier programs are discussed. In particular, some middle school RTI research is showing a trend towards a longer RTI program with the goal of making struggling students more proficient readers over the long term of a full school year or even several years instead of several short tier level movements within a single school year. Future research should not only focus on the best strategies for middle school students struggling with reading such as phonology and morphology, but moreover, how to best implement RTI over time to give these students the best possible future.