What is Secret Stories®?
Secret Stories® is a brain based, multisensory approach to phonics instruction that fits snugly between the teaching of reading and writing providing the logical explanations for letter-sound behavior that learners’ brains crave. These logical explanations are shared in the form of “secret” stories, which are the secret reasons WHY letters make all of the crazy sounds that they do when they get together in words. The fact that they are “secret” makes them important to learners, marking the information for memory and prioritized learning in the brain.
Secret Stories® aligns with the way our brain naturally learns by appealing to as many senses as possible through stories, movement, visuals, sounds, experiences, and feelings. By introducing information to the brain from as many angles as possible, more neural connections are created and strengthened. As a result, learning is more holistic and multidimensional. The more systems and modalities utilized for learning, the stronger the learners’ ability to receive and retrieve the information. Secret Stories® multisensory learning experiences are “baked in” to reading and writing experiences across the instructional day for natural skill transfer to reading and writing.
A cornerstone of Secret Stories® instructional design is simultaneous skill access with “dual-track” instruction, ensuring an explicit and systematic approach to skill introduction that is also learner driven. Secret Stories® ensures that learners get what they need when they need it, to read and write what they want, while systematically prioritizing ongoing skill introduction based on teaching the most needed (i.e. “high-leverage”/most needed) skills first. Providing “dual-track” access to the skills kids need to read and write ensures that beginning (and struggling) readers are able to bring more tools to the reading and writing table each day, so as to take the maximum value away.
Is Secret Stories® research-based?
Yes! Secret Stories® is based on decades of educational research, as well as today’s brain science, allowing for streamlined, efficient and accelerated learning. (Click here for the Research and to download the Secret Stories® White Paper.)
Secret Stories® is not a program, but an explicit, systematic, and multisensory approach to phonics instruction that provides a critical base of support to any existing reading curriculum or phonics program.
—It is explicit in that sound-spelling relationships are directly taught, reviewed and applied to reading and writing that occurs throughout the entire instructional day.
—It is systematic in its dual-track approach to how and when skills are taught, based on the brain’s system for learning.
—It is multisensory in that it employs a variety of instructional strategies that engage multiple modalities, including the visual, auditory and kinesthetic pathways for learning. Secret Stories® also makes use of alternative “backdoor” neural pathways by targeting phonics instruction to the earlier developing, social and emotional “feeling” networks, or affective learning domain, attaching meaning to letter sound behaviors that would otherwise have none.
What does Secret Stories® do that my reading series, phonics program or literacy curriculum does not?
Traditional methods of phonics instruction do not make good use of the brain science and are ineffective at successfully engaging the whole brain for enhanced memory and learning. Secret Stories® aligns phonics instruction with how our brains actually learn best, engaging more neural pathways for stronger learner-connections and easier skill retrieval. Weaving abstract letter sounds into stories make them interesting, activating the brain’s positive emotional state, and hooking the information into a strong memory-holding template.
Works with the Brain to Accelerate Phonics Skill Mastery For Reading and Writing
Secret Stories® works with early grade learners’ natural brain development by shifting instruction to the earlier developing, social and emotional “feeling” and psychomotor (motor muscle memory) networks, which are more primed for learning than the slower-developing, higher level cognitive processing centers. This is in stark contrast with traditional phonics instruction, which targets the underdeveloped and less reliable, executive processing centers through rote memorization of letter sounds and phonics skills.
While the cognitive “thinking” domain requires conscious effort and attention be applied for learning, the affective “feeling” and “physical” motor domains do not. Learning occurs naturally and nonconsciously through these neural networks, engaging the whole brain for enhanced student learning. “Emotions simply exist; we don’t have to learn them” (Asher, 2012).
The typical time frame allotted for phonics skill introduction in most core reading series and phonics programs spans three to four grade level years, which is far too long to make early grade learners wait for access to the whole code (Allington, 2012). It is also common practice for beginning grade learners to spend an entire kindergarten year on mastering the individual letters and sounds, despite the research that shows the ability to identify all of the letters and sounds by Halloween in kindergarten is a primary predictor of later student reading success. Reading and writing in kindergarten while only learning a letter a week is impossible.
Taps Body Intelligence to Fast-Track Individual Letter Sound Mastery
Secret Stories® makes use of early learners’ inherently stronger and more reliable, motor memory neural pathways to accelerate mastery of the individual letter sounds (taking just two weeks to two months, via muscle memory) while at the same time, gaining simultaneous access to phonics patterns, or “Secrets.”
Shortening this learning curve is important because once kids know the sounds that letters are supposed to make, they begin to notice when letters that aren’t “doing what they should,” and want to know their Secrets! Giving beginning grade learners simultaneous access to both individual letters sounds and Secrets allows them to bring more tools to the reading and writing table each day, without the designated “waiting time” typically required for skill introduction.
Secret Stories® targets body intelligence for accelerated skill mastery by incorporating physical actions into stories for easy sound skill retrieval. Children are active learners, and research shows that learning is enhanced by movement, particularly when movement is embedded into instruction.
Movement primes the molecular processes that help form memory. Embedding targeted movements into instruction enhances recall and aids in the transfer of skills to long-term memory. This is because what fires together is wired together in the brain. Therefore, performing a task or recalling information that causes different neurons to fire in concert strengthens the connections between them In this way, learning becomes nonconscious and effortless.
Puts the Whole Brain to Work
The easiest way to trigger engagement in the affective “feeling” domain is through stories. Stories establish supportive conditions in the brain for learning and remembering, acting as “memory enhancers.” The structure of a story provides a sort of mental map upon which new information is more easily presented. Moreover, concepts in a story-based format receive a higher level of priority in the brain, often using an emotional hook to engage curiosity.
Stories can put the whole brain to work and are the most effective way to activate multiple areas of the brain, simultaneously. Research shows that the more widespread the connections, the deeper the learning. Stories activate the emotional centers of the brain that aid memory, and unlike with direct instruction, skill content delivered through storytelling promotes the formation of multi-layered memories that result in deeper learning experiences and easier skill retrieval. Additionally, the brain becomes more active when telling or listening to a story, prompting higher levels of learner-engagement.
Secret Stories® provides early and struggling learners with a much-needed framework for memory construction. Each Secret becomes a strong memory-holding template in the brain, allowing for easy retention and retrieval of phonics patterns and sounds.
How is Secret Stories® different from other story-based phonics programs?
First, Secret Stories® is not a program, but cross grade level, teaching “tools” that make phonics make sense to kids. The Secrets exist only for the purpose of reading and writing.
And unlike story-based phonics methods that utilize talking animals or magical kingdoms to teach letter sounds, Secret Stories® connects letter behavior with kids’ own behavior, tapping into already familiar, learner-frameworks of social and emotional understanding. Within this readily familiar thinking-construct, inexperienced readers can predict the most likely sound behaviors of letters just as easily as they could the behaviors of their own friends and classmates.
These social and emotional hooks ground learning in personal meaning and purpose, and spark learners’ curiosity about letter sound behavior. For early grade teachers, as well as those working with struggling readers at the upper grade levels, it can be difficult to foster learner-curiosity about letter sounds and phonics patterns. This is why the affective “feeling” domain is the ideal doorway through which to channel these critical skills.
Secret Stories® put the whole brain to work, activating multiple areas of the brain, simultaneously for deeper learning, stronger connections, and easier skill retrieval. Based on a foundation of emotional connections and social experiences, each story becomes a strong memory-holding template, providing a much-needed framework for memory construction. By targeting instruction to the earlier developing, affective (feeling) domain, abstract letter sound skills become inextricably linked to the social and emotional frameworks of understanding that are already deeply entrenched within the learner, making them meaningful and relevant.
Working seamlessly with existing reading curriculum and instruction, Secret Stories® increases early learner-momentum in both reading and writing by breaking down the grade level walls of that delay learner access to phonics skills. Fostering “dual-track” instruction that is both systematic and learner driven, Secret Stories® supports easy skill transfer to reading and writing with a “buffet“ style approach to skill introduction that aligns with learners’ “need-to-know” and actively engages them in the learning process.
How does Secret Stories® engage both beginning and struggling learners at the upper grade levels?
“It is literally neurobiologically impossible to think deeply about things you don’t care about, which means that best and most durable learning occurs when content sparks interest and is relevant to a child’s life” (Immordino-Yang, 2016).
Activates the Brain’s Emotional Systems
Secret Stories® makes use of the brain’s emotional systems to forge meaningful connections to abstract phonics skills and increase learner-engagement. Cloaking phonics skills as “secret” stories to explain their behavior when they get together aligns with the way in which kids think and learn on a daily basis. In this way, Secret Stories® makes learning phonics skills easy and fun for beginning readers, as well as for struggling readers in the upper grades.
Secret Stories® aligns letter behavior with kid behavior, making it easy for kids of any all ages to “put themselves in the letters’ shoes” to predict their most and next most likely sounds in text—using the same decision-making framework that drives their own behavior on a daily basis. Genuine understanding depends on making emotional connections between concepts. Emotion guides our learning. If something is emotionally stimulating, it is marked for memory and prioritized for learning in the brain. Secret Stories® teaches phonics within a context that is meaningful to kids—forging connections to otherwise meaningless skills in order to make them relevant to learners, and thereby mark them for memory in the brain.
Sparks Curiosity for Learner-Driven Instruction
Sense and meaning are among the major criteria that the brain uses in deciding what to encode into long-term memory. If something does not make sense, the brain will drop it. The brain seeks meaning and relevance, learning best on a need-to-know basis. However, traditional phonics instruction only offers arbitrary rules for letter sound behaviors with no meaning, only rote memorization and skill-based practice.
Secret Stories® accelerates learner access to the code by shifting instructional emphasis from skill-practice to skill-understanding. Secret Stories® disguises phonics skills as “secrets” to make them important to kids— something that they are curious about and want to know. This makes them meaningful and relevant, and therefore, easy to teach and learn.
How much time does it take to teach Secret Stories® each day?
None. Secrets are not taught; they are given. They live in between the reading and writing that occurs throughout the entire instructional day. They are always there, always teaching, always within reach, and always ready for use when needed. Secrets can be shared whenever and wherever they are needed throughout the instructional day. The more Secrets kids know, the more they can read and write independently, using the phonics posters to recall the sound patterns for reading and the spelling patterns for writing.
By maximizing early learner access to the code, beginning learners are empowered to read books that are of genuine interest to them, and to write the stories that they want to tell. Their ability to engage with text in ways that are meaningful to them serves to motivate ongoing reading and writing experiences, which in turn, increase their overall level of skill ability. Whereas traditional reading and phonics programs require time set aside in which to teach grade specific, phonics rules through repetitious, skill-based practice, Secret Stories® multisensory learning experiences are “baked in” to reading and writing across the instructional day for easy transfer to skills.
Whenever and wherever kids are engaging with text, they are discovering “new” Secrets and revisiting “old” ones! The more Secrets they know, the more words they can read and write… and the more they read and write, the more Secrets they want to know. “Need to know” is the driving force behind Secret Stories® accelerated instruction, and it is also a basic tenet of brain based learning upon which Secret Stories® is built. With the Secrets, you’re not teaching more. You’re just teaching better.
How does Secret Stories® phonics instruction support critical thinking for deeper learning?
“When kids are curious, they are open, safe and in an intellectually playful place in which they can explore. In this optimal learning state, learners begin to drive their own learning and instruction, which is the evolutionary ideal.” —Dr. Mary Immordino-Yang
Traditional phonics instruction undermine a learner’s development of a proclivity toward a curious mind state, primarily because of the most commonly heard replies to learners’ questions are, “It just is… It just does…. You just have to remember….”
As a result, beginning grade level learners spend countless hours memorizing hundreds of sight words with little instructional time left to acquire the building blocks needed to read and write. Within this common instructional scenario, the instructional emphasis is placed on teaching the reading and not the reader. When teachers overly focus on the acquisition of the building blocks, students miss the application opportunity.
“If you overly focus on the acquisition of the building blocks (i.e. phonics skills), kids don’t have a sense of how to apply those things in the world (i.e. reading and writing). If you overly focus on the world, they may notice problems, but have no skills with which to solve the problems. They need a balance of both.”— Dr. Mary Helen Immordino-Yang
Secret Stories® balances the teaching of phonics skills with reading and writing by giving beginning learners access to as much of the code as possible, as soon as possible, so as to be able to make sense of daily experiences and interactions with text. Its instructional design fosters a curious state— one in which learners explore and notice, and then follow what they have noticed and try to play it out to read and spell words. When a learner asks “why,” it means that they know enough to know that something isn’t right, and that they are motivated to get to the bottom of it. A learner that is engaged in this deep learning process is both active and reflective. “This deep learning state provides a context for understanding in which passion and insatiable curiosity flourish, weaving a virtual tapestry of connections that grounds ones learning in the roots of personal meaning and purpose” —Stephanie Marshall-Pace
What about teaching sight words?
Sight words are words that are recognized “by sight,” rather than sounded-out. All words eventually become sight words for experienced readers. For beginning readers, however, a great deal of time and energy is often spent learning sight words, known as “high frequency” words. For beginning grade learners, who own so little of the alphabetic code, it’s virtually impossible to make sense of the many different sounds that letters make when they come together in words. To compensate, teachers will often rely on the rote memorization of sight words to help students “read.”
Overreliance on sight words is frequent and most often due to early learners’ gross lack of skills in comparison to the required text level assessments. To compensate, beginning readers must memorize hundreds of sight words before the end of second grade, often forcing teachers to prioritize teaching the “reading” over teaching the reader.
Secret Stories® empowers kids to decode approximately 95% of the most commonly memorized sight words (i.e. high-frequency words) by applying what they know about letter behavior to predict their most likely sounds.
Stanford University’s study on sight words and the brain notes that as long as participants used the letter-sound patterns, they were able to read words they had never seen before; and more importantly, that there is no need to memorize what can be read (McCandliss & Noble, 2016).
This study shows why underscoring the traditionally slow pace of existing reading curriculum and phonics instruction with Secret Stories® is so important, particularly at the earliest grade levels, as it provides a way for learners to actually understand the sounds that letters make so that they can read words instead of memorize them.
How is Secret Stories® different at the early grade levels vs. the upper grades levels?
Primary Grades (pre-K to 2nd grade)
Secret Stories® provides for the simultaneous acquisition of individual letter sounds and phonics patterns, so as to empower learners with a comprehensive skill base for reading and writing from the earliest possible grade levels so as to form and read words early on.
Intermediate Grades (3rd-5th grade & above)
Secret Stories® provides teachers with a quick and easy means for “plugging holes” in learner-skill ability without impeding the momentum of on-grade level instruction. For learners who are on grade level or above, knowledge of the Secrets enhances spelling ability and strengthens accuracy in decoding complex vocabulary in higher level, advanced texts.
How does Secret Stories® use music to increase skill- automaticity in reading and writing?
Research shows that in order for a learner to truly own a skill, he must be able to manipulate it quickly and effortlessly in order to know that he knows it.
The fast-paced musical exercises on the Secret Stories® Musical Brain Teasers™ phonics download (with the exception of the “Better Alphabet Song”) are intended to serve this purpose. They are mini-musical brainteasers that bolster learner skill-automaticity with newly acquired letter sound and phonics skills—from individual letters and sounds to complex phonics patterns.
The musical exercises prompt rapid progression from “sound to symbol” and “symbol to sound,” mimicking the decoding (reading) and encoding (writing) processes. They are aren’t pretty songs, but engaging, fast-paced, challenging and FUN musical “puzzles!”
Unlike traditional, skill-based songs, they cannot be sung on “auto-pilot” without any conscious thought, as they are constantly changing, and thus continually challenging learners to think-fast and speed-up their “sound-symbol” processing time.
Secret Stories® makes use music to not only acquire skills, but to manipulate them, so as to continue raising the bar on learner skill ability and smooth the transition from “learning to read” to “reading to learn.”