Module 1: Reading Reflection

What are some of the major differences between a skills approach to literacy and a

comprehensive or sociopsycholinguistic approach?

The first two chapters of Weaver’s Reading Process and Practice described the different approaches to literacy. I was aware of the skills and comprehensive approach, but I never heard of the sociopsycholinguistic approach.  The first two chapters described the different approaches teachers take to teach their students to read. The first chapter focused on students being able to define words as they read. The second chapter focused on semantic, syntax, and schemas of the reading process.

The skills approach to literacy is when students use the skills that the teacher has taught them in order to learn how to read. The skills approach to reading includes learning lowercase and uppercase letters, isolating the phonemes in words, learning phonics, and being able to decode words. These strategies are influential in teaching a child to read. The skills approach also includes learning how to write along with learning how to read, spelling words correctly, and practicing reading for fluency. If students put all of these practices together then they should become a great, fluent reader.

The comprehensive or sociopsycholinguistic approach is another approach that Weaver describes in Reading Process and Practice. Unlike the skills approach, the comprehensive approach or sociopsycholinguistic help the students understand the meaning of the words. This type of literacy approach adds punctuation, spelling patterns, and teaches the relationship between the different meanings of words.  The comprehensive and sociopsycholinguistic approach teaches that it is just as important to pronounce the words as it is to know the meaning of the words.  This approach states that if a reader does not understand the meaning of words, then they are not reading.

In closing, I am eager to learn how to teach my students to use the sociopsycholinguistic and comprehensive approaches when they are learning to become fluent readers. Even though my students should be able to read when they come to third grade, I will have some students that will not be on grade level. These approaches will be very influential in teaching my students to become successful readers in third grade.