Neuroscience

Authored by Samantha Woods, an Occupational Therapist & Certified Neurodevelopmental Therapist with over 30 years’ experience working in consultation with Speech & Language Pathologists. Sam has specialist knowledge of how children learn and children’s learning difficulties.

Write2Spell2Read’s design uses scientific neuroscience research on the most effective ways to teach literacy to ensure that student’s learn to effectively read, write and spell.

To achieve good literacy skills researchers have proven the importance of establishing strong neural pathways or links, that create a triangle between 3 areas of the brain – auditory (hearing, speech & language), visual (sight) and motor (movement & touch). (Levine, 2002)

 Write2Spell2Read’s multisensory design ensures these 3 brain areas work together – combines letter sounds (auditory), 44 sound pictures (visual memory), with handwriting and large body movement (motor).

Automatic handwriting is critical to learning to read and spell

Most other programs do not combine the 3 brain areas, leaving handwriting to be taught in a separate class from spelling and reading.

Researchers have found that handwriting is a critical building block for learning literacy, as motor actions reinforce memory and learning (Levine, 2002). Writing letters that spell sounds at the same time as learning sounds, helps the brain learn to read, write and spell.

Dr. Karin Harman James (2012) found that handwriting is a crucial component in setting up the brain for reading acquisition.

As found in the 2010 Indiana University study using MRI brain imaging, a child must not, just see the letter he is learning, but at the same time write the letter to establish its shape in his mind, learn its name and the sound that it makes.

According to Sherrill (1986) up until the age of eight years, touch and movement have dominance, after which time there is a change of dominance to auditory and visual learning. Because of this research, Write2Spell2Read ensures that handwriting becomes automatic and is used to accelerate learning and memory.

Very important for learning to write, spell and read is motor planning – the brain’s plan of movement. When learning handwriting, students must feel the shape of the letter with their hand, in order for the brain to establish a movement plan that can be recalled each time the letter is written. Through repetition and practice, the writing of letters becomes automatic, to a point where no conscious thought is required. Similarly, knowledge of the letter combinations that spell sounds need to be practiced through writing so that automatic motor plans are established. Literacy success is not achieved if teachers overlook letter reversals or incorrect spelling – these will be established as incorrect motor plans in the brain.

Write2Spell2Read makes use of this knowledge – students develop automatic handwriting.

A strong working memory for literacy success

Program design strengthens Working Memory – more important than IQ, and essential for literacy success.

When motor, visual and auditory skills are automatic, a ‘ripple effect’ occurs. This allows the student’s working memory to focus on the more complex skills of vocabulary and comprehension, resulting in fluency in writing, spelling, and reading.

Improving visual memory for literacy success

To aid visual memory, Write2Spell2Read’s design includes organization by colour coding, 44 sound pictures, one picture for all letter combinations in sound families, and “traffic light” dots to guide writing direction.

Write2Spell2Read’s consistency of design through the whole school assists the student to store and remember this information in visual memory for future use.

Synthetic Phonics

Synthetic phonics approach, recognizing that children must be explicitly taught to write, spell, read and understand words using their individual sounds rather than by visual word recognition alone. Hempenstal’s 2005 study found that effective reading instruction includes teaching children to break apart and manipulate the sounds in words, as well as teaching them that these sounds are represented by letters of the alphabet which can then be blended together to form words. Professor Ken Rowe (2004) also supports this evidence, stating that the most effective way to teach literacy is with explicit phonics instruction linking the letters in our alphabet to the sounds they make.

Write2Spell2Read’s design assists the student to store and remember information in auditory memory for future use.