• Our literacy program is designed to meet the components of balanced literacy which means two things: we devote time to all of the literacy components--reading; writing; speaking; and, listening with explicit attention to comprehension, phonics, and vocabulary skills and strategies. We also balance it to make sure students are working with texts at their independent reading level, their instructional reading level, and their grade level.
• This year we will be using a standards-based, comprehensive resource called Into Reading.
• Students will participate in close reading. Students will read, annotate, reread, and respond to each text. This process helps students fully comprehend and engage in complex texts.
• The work we do in both phonics and vocabulary is taught through the texts. In addition to our text-dependent vocabulary, students will be learning the skills and strategies necessary to decode and determine the meaning of unfamiliar words that they may encounter in any given text.
• The skills and strategies that are taught each unit spiral. Students will learn these skills several times throughout the year. Students will complete guided and independent practice so that they can achieve mastery by the end of the fourth grade year.
• The most important thing you can do to foster your child's literacy skills is make sure they read every evening. Fourth Grade Literacy teachers require 20 minutes of reading each night in a book of their choice that they feel is comfortable and interesting.
Writing projects will relate to their reading and will often require students to integrate and cite information from the texts we read in class. Each unit also has a marking period writing assignment.