Fast Tracks

Many students have already mastered beginning decoding skills but continue to struggle with more advanced skills. They struggle to accurately and fluently read multi syllable words and words with advanced vowels.

We recognize these students don’t need all the instruction in our Phonics Suite™ lessons, however teaching significant portions of it can yield great results. That is why we developed Fast Tracks. Fast Tracks is a system for giving the students what they need in early lessons, quickly and efficiently, so they can effectively participate in the lessons that will produce the greatest benefit.

For students in grades 4–12, Phonics Blitz™ is the right set of instruction. In the past, we have suggested that all students start at Lesson 1 and progress systematically through each lesson. We still believe that Lesson 1 is the right starting place, but Fast Tracking is a way to zoom through some lessons in order to focus on the lessons that will be the most beneficial.   

Fast Tracking has two paths: a Fast Track to Lesson 10 of Blitz and a Fast Track to Lesson 25 of Blitz. The Grouping Matrix™ and the ADS Plus can help you qualify for students for this flexible instruction.

Fast Tracking to Lesson 10 is for students who are strong with Beginning Decoding Skills (often their performance on the BDS proves it), but lack strategies for attacking multisyllable words. These students also struggle to read words with advanced vowels patterns.  

Fast Tracking to Lesson 25 is for students who are confidently reading words with short vowels and closed syllables in both single and multisyllable words, yet they struggle when reading words with advanced vowel patterns. 

Fast Tracking provides several things for students:

  • The procedures and routines needed to succeed in later lessons.
  • A fast-paced review of the concepts taught in certain lessons. (Previous data collections tell us the students are fairly skilled with the basic phonics concepts, but may need a bit or review in certain areas to be successful in later lessons.)

Fast Tracking provides several things for teachers:

  • A narrated PowerPoint to quickly teach students key phonics concepts and terms.
  • A webinar that teaches them how to run the Fast Track program.

We invite you to view our webinar to develop an understanding of how to implement the Fast Track crash course with just a few hours of systematic instruction. Once completed, you are able to move into the appropriate lessons where direct, explicit, and multi-sensory instruction is needed.

Fast Track 1–10 or 11–25 is an efficient way to help students close the gap in their phonics knowledge.