English Language Arts

Grade 1

Overview

Through the use of the Balanced Literacy workshop model, students learn strategies to help them read and write. This balance encourages children to foster a love of reading and writing and gives them opportunities to practice these skills independently and with guidance. First graders take part in whole class mini lessons, small group instruction, partnerships, and individualized conferences.

unit 1

Reading: Launching the Reading Workshop- Building a Reading LIfe

This first unit is all about building a reading life. Readers choose “just right” books that they enjoy and spend their workshop time reading to build stamina. Students learn how to take care of their books and follow the reading workshop routines and structures. Reading partners help us solve tricky words, understand books, and enjoy our books even more!

Writing: Launching Workshop with Personal Narratives

Students will be exposed to the process of writing a personal narrative. Writers will generate ideas, story-tell, and produce personal narratives in sequential order. During this unit we are building a writing community where partners support one another. Students will learn routines and structures of Writing Workshop. At the conclusion of the unit, students will edit their work to add details, use conventions, and publish their work for others to enjoy.

Unit 2

Reading: Reading for Meaning

This second unit is all about teaching readers to use strategies within their workshop time to solve tricky words and make meaning out of their books. Good readers may need to use more than one strategy to solve a tricky word. Reading strategies are like tools being put in a toolbox. Each tricky word may need a different tool to solve it! This unit will focus on teaching students to use these strategies and learning how to use different strategies when one doesn’t work.

Writing: Nonfiction "All About" Books

In this unit, students will write informational books ("All About") based on topics of personal expertise, as well as self-assess and revise. The unit begins with writing informational picture books and culminates in multiple chapter books filled with elaboration, text features, and intentionally crafted wording, all while increasing command of conventions.

Unit 3

Reading: Reading with Fluency and Comprehension

In this unit, students will be able to recognize patterns in their reading and increase their fluency. They will use strategies to become stronger readers and identify story elements. Through making and revising predictions, students will become actively engaged in their reading. Reading partners will share ideas with one another, engage in conversation and ask questions about their texts.

Writing: Reviews

In this unit, writers will write reviews to share their opinions on many things from best in show to book reviews. They consider an audience and write to convince others to agree or disagree. Writers will be able to choose from a variety of strategies to give reasons to support their opinion statement and structure their writing in a way that is most persuasive. First graders will write many pieces and, where possible, share their pieces with the intended audience.

Unit 4

Reading: Informational Text

Readers read nonfiction to gain information about the world around them. Readers use test features to understand the new information they are learning. They challenge themselves to locate new and interesting facts, share newly gained knowledge, and continue to ask questions about their texts.

Writing: How To

Feeling like an expert on a topic is empowering. In this unit, students have the opportunity to use writing to teach others. Students enjoy creating informational how-to’s. Because students are already knowledgeable about vast and diverse topics, they can rely on their personal expertise to determine what information is important to share with others. Students learn to generate topic ideas in a new genre while strengthening their knowledge of and fluidity with the recursive writing process used across units. As students try on different topics, their how-to’s become stronger and stronger. A strong emphasis is placed on sequence, detail, and reader understanding.

Unit 5

Reading: Character Clubs

Readers will get to know characters in their texts. They will pay attention to characters' growth, change, and interactions with others. Students will work in partnerships and engage in accountable talk in order to grow ideas and develop theories beyond the pages of the book.

Writing: Fiction

First grade writers are eager to make up stories from their imagination and this unit fits squarely with this desire. Writers will create stories that have characters that encounter trouble and find ways of working through that trouble. They will do this through imagining stories, sketching those stories across pages, and then writing across those pages, often employing the craft of an author they have studied. Writers will use all they know (and learn some more things) about polishing writing so that readers can understand. Students often produce multiple pieces within the unit taking one or two through the entire process to publication.

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