Literacy

Course Description

At Cove, we provide a comprehensive literacy program that includes phonemic awareness, sight word instruction, word study (spelling, decoding, syllabication, word origins, and vocabulary), fluency, and comprehension. Multi-sensory instruction and strategy building are incorporated in all literacy programs. Each student's literacy program is unique to match his or her learning needs. We will be using the following curriculum in our class:


READING!

Making Connections

Making Connections is a reading comprehension program that focuses on the explicit teaching of strategies that good readers use during reading to comprehend the material. Units that we will cover include:

Book 5

  • Main Idea
  • Compare and Contrast
  • Drawing Conclusions/Predicting Outcomes
  • Fact and Opinion
  • Cause and Effect
  • Figurative Language


Book 6

  • Main Idea
  • Compare and Contrast
  • Drawing Conclusions/Predicting Outcomes
  • Cause and Effect
  • Figurative Language
  • Bias and Prejudice


The strategies in each unit are taught through modeling, scaffolding, and repetition. The students are taught to use their prior knowledge and experiences, their awareness of vocabulary and language structure, and their knowledge of comprehension strategies to help them construct meaning as they read.

Comprehensive Orton-Gillingham

All Cove Literacy teachers and Speech and Language Pathologists participated in a 30 hour Orton-Gillingham Training last summer. This program is what our school was founded on. It is a multi-sensory approach that includes sight, hearing, touch, and movement. It is highly structured and teaches the connection between sounds and letters. Many reading programs are influenced by the Orton-Gillingham approach. Some examples include the Wilson Reading System and SLANT. Even though the sequence of concepts may vary, these programs are all highly structured, systematic and cumulative.


Novel Study

Students will have multiple opportunities to read different novels as a class. These novels will give the students the opportunity to apply strategies learned in Making Connections, along with other comprehension strategies. Students will be exposed to a variety of writing styles through the different genres we will be reading. They will also identify a variety of literary elements throughout their readings.



WRITING!

Self-Regulated Strategy Development (SRSD)

Our literacy class will be using the Self-regulated strategy development (SRSD) approach to writing. It is an instructional approach designed to help students learn, use, and adopt the strategies used by skilled writers; one that adds the element of self-regulation to strategy instruction for writing. As with other types of strategy instruction, SRSD is explicit, direct, and guided so that strategies become integrated into the overall learning process. Instruction begins as teacher-directed but with a goal of empowering students to be self-directed. The self-regulation element addresses negative self-talk or perceptions of self-as-learner through replacement with positive self-talk, self-instructions, and new habits with which to approach learning tasks.

HOMEWORK!


Reading Log- Students are required to read a novel for at least 20 minutes, Monday through Friday (weekend).



New Practice Readers- Students will complete a two worksheet assignment Monday through Thursday that consists of three parts:

1.) Vocabulary questions to help them get ready to read the story

2.) A short story that they will read

3.) Questions to answer to show how well they understood the story