Edmark Reading Program in an Autism Classroom

Every one of us works with our students on reading. Whether we are working on reading signs in the community or books, newspapers, or something on a cereal box our students need to know how to read as much as they can. The Edmark Reading program can assist with that!

If you don’t think this program can work for your classroom let me suggest a reading program focused on using visuals and comprehension that has been specifically designed by me! It’s called Reading Visually Comprehension.

One resource that I felt has been super helpful with my students is the Edmark Reading Program. This program is an intervention based and discrete trial based reading program that works with students on sight words to build their abilities to read. The one thing that I really like is the ability to implement repetition with the students to build their accuracy in reading the sight words. It provides you with multiple ways to access the same information so that the students can be super saturated with the information which for students like mine that take a lot of experiences with it to put it into their “known” file in their brain is very important.

The other thing that I like is there is tons of resources. Let me just show you a few, or maybe a ton!

Diving into the Program

So here is the program book. You of course need to use the mastery test of pre-assessment tools to tell you where to start and at what lesson for each student depending on their prior reading ability. Once you have done that you use this book which is super easy to follow as a teacher, paraprofessional or a parent helper in your classroom. It tells you what less you are on and the activities that are available within that lesson. You can keep anecdotal records and dates of completion on it as well.

This is an example of the Word Recognition piece of the lessons. This is there for every lesson to do with the students. You use the orange cover to only show one line at a time and you work through the pages asking the students to read them, find them, or repeat them. This is the discrete trial training model that the curriculum has. I think it is super effective. Even if you have students that learn patterns really quickly. No lesson is the same so you don’t have to worry about a student memorizing it!

This is the Stories section. There is not always a story for each lesson but, when you get a story the nice thing is that it only incorporates words that the student has mastered in other lessons. So, no new words will pop up on you. This makes it more predictable for students and easier to read.

Comprehension with Edmark Reading Program

This is called Picture Match. This is with a lot of the earlier lessons but, still mixed in throughout the higher ones too. The student has to take the board, read the words and then on the next picture below use the picture cards to match to the words on the board. These also get harder as you get into higher lessons.

Here are the Picture Match and Phrase Match cards. Both sets are super useful with the boards. The picture below shows you what the Phrase Match cards go to. The board has all pictures on it in a reverse style set up so that it assesses students ability to do skills in different ways! LOVE IT!

Worksheets from Edmark Reading Program

Then we come to the extras! There is another piece to Edmark Reading Program that can be purchased seperately. I got these materials on a jump drive that can be downloaded onto my laptop and be shared with others. This was very nice to have. Then your district doesn’t have to buy a set for each teacher! This is an example of the Spelling component. The students have to follow the directions to practice not only reading the words but, spelling them too.

These are called Take Home Readers. They don’t have to be taken home but, they are small decodable books that have comprehension questions with them that can be read by the students and answered. The words again aren’t any harder then the lesson that the student is on.

Another great piece to the extra resources are the comprehension worksheets. There are two examples here. The one above shows the easier or earlier lessons where the students do a lot of picture matching and small sentence reading. The picture below shows how the students have to find which word fits best into the sentence without picture support which for my students can be much harder.

Extra Materials for Edmark Reading Program

Lastly, the picture above and the two pictures below are considered Homework activities. These are things that could be sent home as homework. I am not as much of a fan of these but, I think that is because the students I work with are older and feel like they are too easy for them. I’d be more likely to send the comprehension, spelling, or take home readers home for homework then this. I can see where it has it’s benefits though.

Well, I hope that I provided you with some insight into Edmark Reading Program and shown how it was really been a great resource in my classroom. There is a second level to the version I have shown you with even harder words and concepts. There also is another program called Edmark Functional Words with more things likes grocery, job skills, restaurant, and community type words. With the same style and format of this program. Just got that and plan to let you know how that works too in the near future.

In the meantime, there was one thing that I found when using Edmark that I still needed that the program did not provide. I had students that struggled with remembering some of the sight words so I created a product and it is available on TPT. It is called Sight Word Cards Here is a little sneak peak at it!

I also have created a set of task cards that I love using with my students as well! Sight Word Task Cards

3 Responses

sped runner says:

December 2, 2014 at 1:20 am

i love edmark! I use it with several students in my classroom! Have you had any experience with Level 2? Its very different, I have not gotten a "feel" for it yet
Erin Hagey says:

December 5, 2014 at 10:27 pm

I'm with you! I LOOOOOVVVVEEEEE Edmark! I use it in my classroom with most of my learners (some are actually working on grade level words which I have made into Edmark format for those learners). It's definitely my favorite reading program!

Erin
You AUT-a Know
Jennifer Zoglman says:

January 18, 2015 at 9:39 pm

Hi! I found you on the Teaching Blog Addict and am your newest follower. Love your blog about Edmark. It is really helpful for teachers new to the program. Great work!
Warmly,
Jennifer
Astute Hoot: Tools for the Wise Teacher
http://www.astutehoot.com

Edmark Reading Program in an Autism Classroom

Diving into the Program

Comprehension with Edmark Reading Program

Worksheets from Edmark Reading Program

Extra Materials for Edmark Reading Program

3 Responses

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