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TExES STR 293 study materials
TExES STR 293 study resources

TExES STR 293: Reading Pedagogy: Research-Based Instruction and Instructional Design

TExES STR 293 · Work through your exam, one topic at a time.

All guide sections

Reading Pedagogy: Research-Based Instruction and Instructional Design

What the domain asks

Reading pedagogy items test whether you can justify instructional decisions with research rather than habit. Know the Simple View of Reading (comprehension = decoding × language comprehension) and Scarborough's Reading Rope, whose upper strands (background knowledge, vocabulary, language structures, verbal reasoning, literacy knowledge) weave into the lower word-recognition strands (phonological awareness, decoding, sight recognition) until reading becomes fluent and strategic.

Practices to name

Structured literacy: explicit, systematic, cumulative, diagnostic, and responsive instruction in both the code and language. Gradual release ("I do, we do, you do") with modeling, guided practice, and independent application. MTSS/RTI tiers: Tier 1 core for all students, Tier 2 small-group targeted support, Tier 3 intensive individualized intervention, each driven by data. Differentiation by content, process, product, and pacing; flexible grouping; culturally responsive text selection; family partnerships. Know the TEKS strand language well enough to match an objective to a standard.

Traps

  • Treating "balanced literacy" and "structured literacy" as synonyms; balanced literacy historically leans on incidental, meaning-first instruction, while structured literacy is code-explicit and sequentially organized.
  • Using "systematic" (organized scope and sequence) and "explicit" (direct explanation with modeling) interchangeably.
  • Treating the Simple View as additive: it is multiplicative, so a near-zero in either factor caps comprehension.
  • Assuming a struggling reader needs more phonics when data show accurate decoding and weak language comprehension.

Rule of thumb

Diagnose the bottleneck before choosing the method. If a student decodes grade-level text at 97% accuracy but answers 1 of 6 comprehension questions, the constraint is language comprehension; the plan should build vocabulary and background knowledge with scaffolded discussion, not add another phonics drill.