Relative effects of whole-word and phonetic-prompt error correction on the acquisition and maintenance of sight words by students with developmental disabilities.

Five students with developmental disabilities practiced sight-word drills. After each error, the teacher used one of two fixes. Half the time she gave the whole word and had the child repeat it. The other half she gave phonetic cues like "The first sound is /k/."

The team flipped the two fixes across trials to see which one helped the kids learn faster and remember the words later.

Whole-word correction won. Kids read more words correctly during the drills. They also kept the words after the lessons stopped. Phonetic prompts took longer and the gains did not stick.

The result lines up with Jaffe et al. (2002). That study also used an alternating-treatments design and found textual prompts beat echoic prompts for teaching a boy with autism to answer questions. Both papers show that simpler, direct prompts often win.

It may look like the finding clashes with McIntyre et al. (2002). That team mixed antecedent and consequence packages and saw mixed results. The key difference is focus: M et al. tested only the error-fix moment, while L et al. changed the whole lesson. When you isolate the correction step, whole-word still comes out on top.

Markham et al. (2020) repeated the same design style in 2020. They compared three prompt types during discrete trials and again found one clear winner. The pattern is stable across decades: run a quick alternating probe and let the data pick the prompt.

If a child misses a sight word, just say the word and have them repeat it. Skip the sound hints. This single change can cut practice time and boost retention. Try it in your next reading drill: after an error, give the whole word once, then present the card again. Track for one week and see if the words stick better.