Building Reading Proficiency at the Secondary Level: A Guide to Resources

What is it? How does it work?

Background:
Benchmark School enrolls struggling readers grades 1–8 who have decoding problems. It is known for teaching "decoding by analogy" strategies in the context of a full literacy program. A vocabulary component was added in the 1990s. The new Word Detectives program for older readers was been piloted and published in 1999.

Overview:
The Benchmark program originates at the Benchmark School in Media, Pennsylvania. The School enrolls struggling readers grades 1–8 whose reading difficulties are due to decoding problems. Since the 1980s, teachers and researchers at Benchmark have shared their programs and strategies for these students. The Benchmark Word Identification programs implements a successful approach to teaching students to decode called "decoding by analogy." Students use known words to decode unknown words, use context as a check for making sense, chunk words into meaningful units, and learn to be flexible in applying known word parts. A vocabulary component was added to the program in the 1990s.

Longitudinal data following Benchmark students through middle school showed that some still lacked fluency and had spelling difficulties. The Word Detectives series adds a segmenting and sound-letter matching component, which has increased the rate of success of these students at Benchmark. Struggling secondary readers are presumed to have acquired phonemic awareness and concepts about print and to be reading at second grade level and above. The program teaches students to:
1. learn "key words" and "special feature words" with the most common English patterns and discover their consistencies;
2. use those words and discoveries about language to decode and spell high frequency words; and
3. develop an awareness of spelling and a control of spelling strategies for high frequency words.

The first phase of the program introduces students to the concepts of decoding and spelling by analogy. A second phase consists of ten-day lesson cycles that support students in applying the concepts to decoding and spelling multisyllable words. Students derive spelling generalizations inductively rather than through direct instruction of rules. The developers say the program should be taught a minimum of 30 minutes a day, five days a week to be successful.

The Benchmark approach is intended to be one part of a full literacy program in which students read widely, and write and talk about what is read. The success of Benchmark students has come about with constant application and a large amount of practice.