What Is the Difference Between Balanced Literacy and Reading Workshop

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Balanced and structured literacy are two different approaches to teaching reading.

They have things in common, merely when they're referenced in the aforementioned breath they're usually pitted against each other.

I considered myself a "balanced literacy" teacher for many years. Information technology's the approach I learned in graduate school, the arroyo I used as a classroom instructor, and the approach I (used to) teach on my website and in my online form.

However, after a great bargain of research into the science of reading, I now run into things differently.

I at present advocate a structured literacy approach to reading instruction.

This isn't to say that I did every unmarried thing wrong as a balanced literacy teacher, or that counterbalanced literacy teachers today aren't getting anything right.

Nor exercise I recall that we take to throw away everything with the balanced literacy characterization.

Merely it's time to take a skillful look at what we're doing when nosotros teach children to read.

What's the departure betwixt counterbalanced and structured literacy?

Let's kickoff with a definition of balanced literacy.

Balanced literacy is a philosophical orientation that assumes that reading and writing achievement are developed through instruction and support in multiple environments using various approaches that differ past level of teacher support and child control.
Fountas & Pinnell – Guided Reading: Good First Teaching for All Ages

The fact is, if you ask twenty different balanced literacy teachers to ascertain balanced literacy, you will probable become 20 different definitions.

It's just not well-defined.

Just nigh balanced literacy teachers volition say (equally I did) that they teach reading in a style that meets everyone's individual needs while as well promoting a dearest of reading.

Balanced literacy came almost in late xc's as an answer to the whole language and phonics contend.

The hope was that it would provide a much-needed compromise by using the best of both approaches.

To many people, though, balanced literacy is a dirty word.

What went wrong?

Why is structured literacy now coming into favor? Many will tell you that it'south simply some other pendulum swing. I recall it's much deeper than that.

Permit'due south start with a definition.

"The term 'Structured Literacy' is non designed to supersede Orton Gillingham, Multi-Sensory or other terms in mutual apply. It is an umbrella term designed to describe all of the programs that teach reading in essentially the aforementioned way."
Hal Malchow – International Dyslexia Association

I used to be a Strong balanced literacy advocate

Believe me, I never idea I'd be writing an article comparing balanced and structured literacy.

I believed in balanced literacy with all of my heart.

I became ~~irritated~~ very angry when I read articles that slammed balanced literacy.

The articles said I wasn't instruction phonics (I was).

The articles said I was pedagogy guessing (I felt that I was instruction my students to be strategic).

The articles said I should exist doing more explicit teaching (I felt that my mini-lessons served that purpose just besides as a 30-infinitesimal whole class lesson that would likely diameter half my class).

The articles criticized my lack of a structured curriculum (I felt that I knew my students much better than a scripted curriculum whatsoever day).

The manufactures said balanced literacy didn't piece of work. I had plenty of anecdotal evidence that it did.

Hither's the thing. And this is something nosotros all need to take note of.

Balanced literacy works for some children. Many children Exercise learn to read without a lot of explicit instruction.

But it doesn't work for others.

Explicit pedagogy is skilful for all children. It'due south absolutely essential for many of them.

In other words?

If nosotros utilise a counterbalanced literacy approach, we volition not reach all of our students.

Here'south the cardinal divergence between counterbalanced and structured literacy

Balanced literacy is centered around activities that environs children with quality literature and promote a love of reading, whereas structured literacy teaches the structure of language through explicit, systematic, sequential pedagogy.

Balanced literacy teachers typically teach the essential components of reading (phonological awareness, phonics, fluency, comprehension, and vocabulary) through the post-obit structures:

Read aloud
Shared reading
Guided reading
Independent reading

Teachers tend to be more focused on the activities themselves than on the skills.

On the other hand, structured literacy teachers may include read aloud, shared reading, small group instruction, and independent reading in their days, merely they are focused less on activities and more on the structure of language:

Phonology
Sound-symbol correspondences
Syllables
Morphology
Syntax
Semantics

A summary of the differences between balanced and structured literacy

I know that not everyone will agree with my characterizations in the following chart, merely this is how I see it:

Let'due south tackle the differences one by one

Difference #ane

In balanced literacy, nosotros typically come across a haphazard approach to phonemic awareness instruction.
Structured literacy includes systematic, sequential instruction in phonemic awareness.

Through the work of David Kilpatrick, we've learned that phonemic sensation may very well exist the missing key for struggling readers. Information technology'southward essential that we give daily lessons in phonemic awareness.

Our students need lessons in phoneme isolation, blending, segmenting, and manipulation.

(If you're a member of The Measured Mom Plus, cheque out my video series nigh phonological and phonemic awareness).

If you're a balanced literacy instructor, an important change you tin make is to do ten minutes of phonemic awareness didactics every twenty-four hours.

Effort Heggerty's easy-to-employ curriculum (my peak pick!) or the free lessons you can print at Reading Washed Right.

I also recommend the hands-on games that you lot'll find in my phonemic awareness bundle.

Check out our hands-on phonemic awareness activities!

Phonemic Awareness Games & Activities

$24.00

Yous'll get a thorough cess along with meaningful games for teaching all levels of phonemic awareness.

Difference #2

In balanced literacy, phonics lessons are typically quite short and may not follow a scope and sequence.
In structured literacy, phonics is taught through an explicit, systematic and sequential approach (usually through a purchased curriculum).

As a new first course teacher, I had to use a scripted phonics plan that I HATED.

Information technology moved as well quickly for my low readers, and it was immensely boring for my strong ones.

And it took way too much fourth dimension out of our schoolhouse day.

I received permission to ditch that program in my 2d year of teaching first grade, and from then on I had a very "I'll teach it when you demand it" approach to phonics.

I'm fully aware that many balanced teachers Practise have a structured approach to teaching phonics, and I say hurray for them!

But it's not the norm.

A strong phonics lesson is twenty-30 minutes long and has near, if non all, of the post-obit components:

A phonemic sensation warm-up that connects to the phonics skill
Explicit introduction of the new sound-spelling relationship
Blending practice
Word building
Practice reading decodable text
Guided writing practice

(And while there are however pretty boring phonics programs out at that place, in that location are many hands-on programs that let you to run across multiple levels in one classroom.)

Difference #3

Balanced literacy teaches rote memorization of high frequency words.
In structured literacy, loftier frequency words are taught co-ordinate to their phonics patterns, and fifty-fifty irregular words are taught explicitly.

For years I thought it made perfect sense to teach kids to memorize long lists of high frequency words. That's why I created a whole series of sight word books that taught high frequency words through repeated exposure.

I've since removed those books from the website because I've learned that this isn't the best approach for teaching loftier frequency words.

Read: How to teach sight words

After all, kids don't store thousands of whole words in their brains. That's not how the brain learns to read.

A meliorate approach is to teach a small number of "sight words" to become kids started (such as the and is), and to teach the residual when you teach their related phonics patterns.

Every bit for irregular words, yous can all the same be explicit about instruction them.

Check out the video below to learn about my new sight discussion lessons and accompanying decodable books.

Difference #four

In a balanced literacy classroom, beginning readers read leveled texts using the three-cueing system.
In a structured literacy classroom, early readers read decodable texts that include already-learned phonics patterns.

This difference right hither is the 1 that made me realize I could no longer back up a balanced literacy approach.

If you consider yourself a counterbalanced literacy teacher and practise not teach your students to solve words using the film, context clues, first letter (and anything else other than sounding out the word), please comment below … considering as far as I know this blazon of teacher does not exist.

I never Always thought I'd denounce 3-cueing, but after studying the science of reading I can no longer support it.

If this makes you bristle (believe me, I know how you experience), I encourage you to listen to my podcast episode, What's incorrect with iii-cueing?

For years I resisted decodable books because I was sure they would kill a love of reading before information technology could starting time.

After all, wasn't every decodable book boring, stilted, and nonsensical?

Turns out … I was wrong! There are actually many quality decodable books just waiting for you lot to find them.

Deviation #five

In a counterbalanced literacy classroom, at that place is typically a greater focus on the meaning of the text rather than on the accuracy of what is read.
Structured literacy teachers correct misread words; they encourage their students to sound them out.

This sounds crazy, merely for years I believed that "sound it out" should only be said as a concluding resort.

I thought that it was much ameliorate to inquire my students to consider what made sense … because isn't reading all nearly comprehension?

(Well, yes it is, but reading comprehension is a product of decoding and language comprehension. Encounter this podcast: What the science of reading is based on)

I think that the traditional use of running records leads many counterbalanced literacy teachers to believe that getting the general significant right is more important than sounding out every single word.

For that reason, I recommend rethinking running records.

Deviation #vi

Balanced literacy teachers believe that students get better at reading past reading.
Structured literacy teachers will tell you that students go better at reading by learning and practicing the code.

This one is a little tricky. Kids need to practice reading, whether or non they're in a counterbalanced literacy classroom.

But kickoff they demand to learn to decode the words, which they learn through explicit teaching.

As a balanced literacy teacher, I had my students fill their numberless with "only right books" (i.e. leveled books that required them to utilise three-cueing to solve the words) considering I idea that they more than they "read," the more they'd pick information technology up.

Now I know that after kids have developed the habit of connecting the phonemes to the graphemes (sounding out words), reading practise will help them orthographically map the words (i.e. store them in their brains for future, instant retrieval).

Difference #seven

Balanced literacy teachers believe that the indicate of reading instruction is to get children to beloved reading.
Structured literacy teachers believe that the point of reading instruction is to teach children to read.

This is NOT to say that balanced literacy teachers aren't concerned with teaching children to read.

Of course they are.

This is Non to say that structured literacy teachers don't desire children to love reading.

Of grade they do.

But structured literacy teachers understand something I didn't "become" for a long time.

Success breeds motivation.*

When you teach children to read, and they come across that they tin do information technology … that they are actually pulling those words off the folio by connecting the sounds to the messages, THAT is what gets them excited near reading.

*Heard in this podcast episode from The Reading League

Last thoughts

This may exist my longest blog post ever, so it'south time to wrap it upward. Earlier I do, though, I desire to address a few criticisms of each approach.

Critics of balanced literacy say that it'southward haphazard, teaches bad habits, and puts the cart before the horse.

These criticisms were immensely insulting to me not then many months ago.

Merely at present I go information technology.

By not educational activity skills in an explicit, systematic way, I was missing many of them.

By teaching my students to use the picture or context to solve words, I was educational activity them habits that would not serve them when they got into third grade (and the harder texts that came with it).

Past thinking that we needed to focus FIRST on comprehension, I was putting the cart before the horse. (I was expecting them to comprehend what they couldn't even read!) I had to teach them decoding offset. Once their decoding became more automatic, they could develop fluency. And then comprehension came into play.

Critics of structured literacy say information technology'due south tiresome and drill-and-kill. They claim that it stifles fluency, ignores comprehension, and kills the beloved of reading.

I'm not making this upwards. These were my criticisms of structured literacy.

Now I know that explicit, systematic teaching does not have to exist boring. When a knowledgeable, engaging instructor combines the art of teaching with the science of reading, joyful learning can consequence.

At present I know that while it's a picayune painful to hear kids sounding out every word (instead of flying through predictable texts), it's a necessary part of the process. I learned that we can focus on comprehension when a child tin sound out words quickly enough to recollect what was read. Until that fourth dimension, we focus on comprehension through interactive read alouds.

And through conversations with a primary, school psychologist, and many one-time balanced literacy teachers, I finally go it.

We've got to teach kids to read earlier they can dearest information technology.

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