Can the older student benefit from phonic instruction?
A. Most definitely. Often, phonics is the missing cue in an older student’s repertoire of reading strategies; either because he/she was not developmentally ready to benefit from the phonic instruction when it was delivered or because the initial instruction was not effective. Many older readers begin to falter when dealing with more complex, unfamiliar vocabulary, particularly scientific, technological vocabulary. These students have not developed the independent, rapid, automatic, word analysis strategies that are vital to independent literacy.
