Wilson's Fundations. level 1

A brief overview of Fundations, Wilson Language Basics, Level 1.

1. Fundations–Level 1
Maria Reiss

2. •Three Potential Implementations
•Whole Class
•With additional instruction for struggling students
•Students in Lowest 30
th
Percentile
•Daily lesson, plus supplemental activities
•Students with a Language Learning Disability
•One to one instruction, or small group
Based on Principles of Orton-GillinghamMethodology
Systematic, sequential, and multi-sensory
•Method
Lowest 30
th
Percentile
40-60 min. per day
Language Learning Disability
20-30 min. daily lesson
25-30 min. 1:1 instruction
30-60 min. decodable text
Whole Class
20-30 min. per day

3. •Phonemic Awareness
•Phonics
•Vocabulary
•Fluency
•Comprehension
•Components Emphasized
The 5 Key Components, along with others
•Letter Formation
•Phonological Awareness
•Sound Mastery
•Letter to sound
•Sound to letter
•Sight Word Instruction
•Written Composition

4. •Instructional Design
Structure of a 5 Day Week
•Drill sounds
•Segment and blend words
Day 1
Day 2
Day 5
Day 3
Day 4
•“Word talk” vocabulary words
•Trick Words
•Dictation sounds
•Fluency drills (sounds/ words)
•Drill sounds with sound cards
•Group Practice
•Drill sounds
•Echo find letters and words
•Fluency drills
(sounds, words, non-real
words, TW, phrases)
•Drill sounds
•“Word talk” vocabulary words
•Trick Words
•Fluency drills (trick words)
•Group Practice
•Prosody (unit story)
•Drill sounds
•Fluency drills (phrases)

5. •Sound Cards•Student Notebook
•Sounds
•Spelling
•Vocabulary
•ABC order
•Magnetic Letter Board
•Materials Used
•Fundations
Teacher’s
Manual
•Student
Composition
Book

6. •Sound Cards
•Whole group example of students saying
and echoing with sound cards
•FundationsDictation
•An example of small group work on
dictation, tapping out words, spelling and
writing
•Videos

7. •Scope and Sequence Level 1: 14 Units (2-3 weeks each)
1234567891011121314
New Skill Introduction ..............
Blending/reading new sounds ... .. .
Segmenting/ spelling/syllable types .. ........
PhonemicAwareness Skills ..
Sentence Dictation ..
Trick Words .............
Prosody with Echo Reading ............
Story Re-telling ..........
Baseword/suffix . . ..
Story Structure/Text Types . ... .. .
Composition Skills .. .

8. STRENGTHS
•Explicit and Systematic
•Engages with all 5 Key Components
of Reading
•Teaches for Mastery of Concepts
•Interactive
•Multi-sensory
•Teacher Friendly
•Whole Group or Individualized
•Aligns with Common Core State
Standards
•No Literature-based instruction
WEAKNESSES
•Strengths and Weaknesses

9. •Does Fundationsdo what it claims?
•YES!
•It is extremely systematic and explicit.
•Its repetition and routines encourage growth in
phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary,
and comprehension.
•Evaluation

10. •What Works Clearinghouse
•“No studies of Fundations
®
that fall within the scope of the Students with
Learning Disabilities review protocol meet What Works Clearinghouse (WWC)
evidence standards. The lack of studies meeting WWC evidence standards
means that, at this time, the WWC is unable to draw any conclusions based on
research about the effectiveness or ineffectiveness of Fundations
®
on students
with learning disabilities.”
•WWC found two studies.
•Pang, R. V. (2007). The effects of the Wilson Reading System and Fundationson the decoding skills of
elementary students with reading disabilities. Unpublished master's thesis, California State
University-San Marcos.
•Ineligible because of study design and unequivalentgroup comparisons.
•Robinson, C., & Wahl, M. (2004). Fundations. Tallahassee, FL: Florida Center for Reading Research.
•Ineligible because it is a secondary analysis.
•Research

11. •National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. (2000).
Report of the national reading panel. Teaching children to read:
an evidence-based assessment of the scientific research
literature on reading and its implications for reading instruction
(NIH Publication No. 00-4769). Washington, DC: U.S.
Government Printing Office.
•Robinson, C., & Wahl, M. (2004). Fundations. Tallahassee, FL: Florida
Center for Reading Research.
•Wilson, Barbara A. (2002). Fundationsteacher's manual grades k-1.
first edition. Oxford, MA: Wilson Language Training
Corporation.
•WWC Intervention Report (2010). Fundations: students with learning
disabilies. What Works Clearinghouse. Retrieved from:
http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/wwc/interventionreport.aspx?sid=196
•References