Welcome to Piper Books
publishers of:
BRI: BEGINNING READING INSTRUCTION
(publication
Spring 2008)
ARI: ADVANCED READING INSTRUCTION
(publication
Autumn 2008)
BRI-ARI, a ground-breaking programme with strong research credentials, is based on over 150 decodable readers, supportive of synthetic phonics. The meticulously structured stories are transparent: i.e. they teach a child to read with the same understanding that he/she brings to understanding everyday speech. By the end of Advanced Reading Instruction: ARI, virtually all children will have acquired functional literacy.
The 78 books that comprise Beginning Reading Instruction: BRI, build the
necessary reading skills of blending and segmenting. Simple stories enhance
both confidence and fluency through frequent exposure to the same words
in different context. Memorisation of whole words, in place of the practice
of decoding skills, is actively discouraged. The code is introduced carefully
and cumulatively and accompanied by simple instructions:
Say the sounds and read the word.
When
you know the word,
just say it;
there is no further need to say the sounds.
No guessing! None! Read through the word.
Teachers, teaching assistants, volunteer helpers, and parents rapidly and easily learn how to use the books, confident that children will avoid faulty guessing habits. The text is cleverly designed to extinguish damaging reading strategies such as guessing and reward skills-building strategies such as blending.
Even today, many recommended ‘catch-up’ programmes are based on confusing read-guess strategies that led to the original National Literacy Strategy 'searchlights' approach, emphatically rejected by the Independent Review of the Teaching of Early Reading (Rose: 2006). BRI-ARI, in contrast, is based uncompromisingly on a solid decoding foundation that provides struggling readers with the precise practice they require.
It is through this intensive focus on decoding skills in BRI instruction, and the thorough build-up of sound-letter knowledge, that confidence to ‘take off’ into reading for pleasure is nurtured and the later ability to tackle the complex reading required in the secondary curriculum is fostered.
SPELL, publication September 2008, begins after a child has learnt to blend the letter/sounds in Books 1-12 of BRI 1. The SPELL word list expands rapidly, always building on the phoneme-grapheme correspondences that have become familiar.
READING/SPELLING MASTERY TESTS, publication September 2008, are quick-to-administer
tests that give a transparent indication of exactly what has been learned
and what still needs to be mastered in order to become a certified reader.
