Scarborough's Reading Rope

Reading Rope

Skilled reading resembles the strands of a rope. Dr. Scarborough created a genius visual for parents and educators to understand the complexity of becoming a skilled reader. For many children, learning to read is a challenging undertaking. The Reading Rope, created by Dr. Hollis Scarborough, captures the essence of this task, illustrating the interconnectedness and interdependence of all the components that are intertwined when becoming a skilled reader.

The Reading Rope consists of lower and upper strands. The word-recognition strands (phonological awareness, decoding, and sight recognition of familiar words) work together as the reader becomes accurate, fluent, and increasingly automatic with repetition and practice. Concurrently, the language-comprehension strands (background knowledge, vocabulary, language structures, verbal reasoning, and literacy knowledge) reinforce one another and then weave together with the word-recognition strands to produce a skilled reader. This does not happen overnight; it requires instruction and practice over time.

Image courtesy of www.learninga-z.com

Please read the following articles to gain a better understanding of Scarborough's Reading Rope and the importance of each of these individual skills in helping our students to become skilled readers.