120 MINUTE LITERACY BLOCK
Written By:
Cathy White
Reading Specialist, Hill-Roberts Elementary School
There are many ways to divide a literacy block. Depending on the grade and the level of difficulty for the concept being taught, some areas will take more time, others less. The curriculum provides many examples of words, skills, and strategies that we can use to teach and provide practice for students at any one time, however, it is not always clear what, how, or how much to select. What we know for sure is that if you try to do every word and every question you block will look like 200 minutes of instruction.
Oral Language
So let’s look at the lesson components. Our lessons start with Oral Language and in Grades 1 & 2 we have our Amazing Words. For Grades 3 & 4 it is called Concept Vocabulary. These words are important to the theme for the week and you should take the time to introduce all of them and using the routine to present them.
Word Work
Word Work begins with Phonemic Awareness in the younger grades, then Phonics for all grades, High Frequency Words, and Spelling. The spelling comes at the front of your lesson plan because it often represents an opportunity to practice and apply the skills learned in the phonics lesson. In addition to the words, you will mostly likely introduce a spelling rule. When you are teaching Phonemic Awareness and Phonics it is not necessary to do every word outlined in the Teachers Edition. It is better to select fewer words, go slowly, and teach the concept or strategy thoroughly. Use your good judgement to select a cadre of words that best represent the nuances in skill/strategy you are teaching. Save the remaining words to use in a mini-lesson for your strategic
intervention group, or as a re-teach to the class or small group later on in the week. High Frequency Words have to be taught as presented in the Teachers Edition. When you are conducting the student Spelling Pretest in your heavily loaded Day 1, don’t dictate all 20 words. Pick those words that represent the skill you will be teaching that week or include a word that is a review of a past skill that you still have concerns about. Can you dictate 8 words and 2 challenge words and still get a good assessment? Sure! Send home the Family Times at the beginning of every week in the Practice Book. It lists the spelling words for the week. The students must still study for them. On Friday you can test 20 words, or, if time is of the essence, you can select from the list.
Group Time
All students are the responsibility of the classroom teacher but you may be wondering how best to use special education teachers and ILA support staff. While the classroom teacher is always going to be responsible for every student regardless of whether the student is on an educational plan, planning can incorporate co-teaching with the special education teachers that are assigned to your room during the ELA block. ILA’s can support your on-level and advanced students during small group instruction or they can assist groups in the rotation of centers and staying on task. Tier I & II instructional support is part of the core that every student receives regardless of their progress or lack of progress. Tier III is a 30-minute intensive intervention plan that will happen at the very end of the ELA
lesson, or in another 30-minute block outside the ELA lesson. As we struggle to schedule everything in, there will be times when a student may miss some of the grammar and writing portion of ELA instruction. However, if they are qualifying for Tier III instruction, they are less apt to be using grade level grammar and writing skills. Getting them to function on grade level is the goal and the curriculum is written in tandem with the one being taught in the classroom.
Structure for the small groups that meet in Tier II can happen in a variety of ways. Some teachers like the “center approach” where the SI group begins with the classroom teacher while the other two groups rotate through two stations. Other teachers prefer to have a quieter small group session and use that time to have students complete unused practice pages from the Practice Book, the Spelling and Phonics Book, or the Grammar Book. Because the curriculum spirals, many skills will be taught over and over again. Taking papers from earlier weeks in the unit that students have not used is perfectly fine. My personal favorite is using the time to launch some writing activities. Because writing is the weakest part of this curriculum, small group time can be a variety of short writing exercises that lead
up to a larger project. Ten Important Sentences can be used for students to play a quick sequencing game and then use them as the template for process writing or summarizing the story they have read. Post some transition words that they can add for panache. You can launch a writing piece that goes for a week or longer until the piece is completed or considered published. For younger students I like to do a simple “draw a picture – write two sentences.” It’s all about what kind of environment works for your students and you as the teacher. What is most important is that whatever you prepare, the students must be able to handle the work and the transition from one station to the next (if you are center based) as independently as possible. Having a group chart that students can refer to may help make your transition to small groups less hectic.
Reading and Comprehension
Over the course of the week your students will be exposed to a variety of stories. They will read from the Anthology, from the leveled readers, and from the decodable readers. There will also be a small, related story from another genre so that the skills and strategies you are teaching are ones that the student has application time across a variety of texts. The Audio Text is an important tool in your teaching kit. Sometimes, because of the level of difficulty, the SI group will not read from the anthology but “listen” to the story as they follow along the text. This gives them the same exposure and allows them to use their comprehension strategies in the whole group instruction part of the lesson. It is also good for the On-Level and Advanced group to listen to the Audio text for that “2nd read.” Audio text can be a center-based activity for all students. Most stories are 10 minutes or less. For on-level and advanced students you can ask them to fill out a graphic
organizer as they go along, or to answer a couple of comprehension questions at the end of the story. For the SI group you can ask them to sequence or fill out a time line with the 10 most important sentences at the end. A writing task can be hooked onto this center or it can stand-alone.
When we are going through and doing a read aloud, of course, you are all presenting the material using the same routines for picture walk etc. The anthology gives us dozens of questions to stop and ask. We do not have to ask them all. You should be using your before reading activities to gauge their prior knowledge and then pick those comprehension questions that stretch their thinking skills to the next level of complexity.
Tier III
Tier III takes place after the 120 minutes block. Sometimes, especially when the student’s skills are very low and very slow, some of the grammar and writing time in the language arts portion of the curriculum is sacrificed to help coordinate the 30 minutes needed for intensive instruction. While it may not be optimal, it is one way to accommodate the demands of our daily schedules. Tier III intervention will be provided by the special education teaching staff. Tier III instruction will coincide directly with the week and the day the teacher is instructing in the classroom. That way, the neediest students get the full benefit of 150 minutes of instruction on the same concepts and skills. When a student misses a day of school, it is not a concern. The spiraling curriculum will come around again and
again to the concept throughout the week, throughout the unit. My Sidewalks instruction will always be the same week, same day, as regular classroom instruction
for that class. Although we have not made it an issue as teachers gain comfort with their delivery and pacing, in the future, it will be important for all of the classrooms that comprise one grade to always be on the same day, the same time. Tier III students may come from four or five
classrooms to a single Tier III instructor. Why? Because we know from experience that there will be only a very small amount of students who will not make genuine progress in the Strategic Intervention group.
Grammar and Writing
Take advantage of your Daily Fix It’s. Use them on overhead or copy them for student distribution. How about using it for a transitional exercise, a pre-test, or a post test after you have taught the skill in question?
The writing piece needs more time that our block allows. Think of creative ways to introduce the writing piece such as Center Time, tagged on to cross curricula activities or on Day 5 after a short review.
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