EDRD 314: Reading Instruction and Assessment for the Primary Grades
Prerequisites: 2.5 GPA overall GPA
Credit Hours: (3)
Students will learn developmental reading skills and abilities for emergent and beginning readers. The course specifically focuses on teaching strategies and activities in the areas of word recognition and decoding, spelling, fluency, and comprehension.
Detailed Description of Content of Course
Course Goals:
In the course described above, students will:
•Begin to understand the developmental nature of learning to read.
•Understand that balanced literacy consists of listening, speaking, reading, writing, and viewing, and that effective instruction includes the integration of these components.
•Understand and recognize the different stages (and the experiences & instruction that support them) of reading development.
•Model and provide guided support for students as they learn to apply word identification strategies such as syntactic, semantic, and graphophonemic relations.
•Effectively design small group literacy lesson plans targeted to students’ instructional reading levels.
•Conduct effective, interactive read-alouds that build students’ vocabulary and listening comprehension.
•Assess students’ developmental spelling skills and knowledge.
•Apply Virginia’s Foundation Blocks for Early Learning in English and the Standards of Learning for Language Arts to individual lesson plans and instructional activities.
•Become inducted into the profession of teaching by participating in professional development programs and becoming familiar with local, regional, and state organizations that promote literacy.
Detailed Description of Conduct of Course
This course includes but is not limited to lecture format with class discussion, audio/visual presentations, guest speakers, lesson demonstrations, involvement in online experiences, , university and/or professional organization events, reading reflections, and limited participation in elementary school classrooms. Students will develop a small group reading lesson plan for a leveled text and conduct an interactive read-aloud with open-ended questions with a group of elementary-aged students.
Goals and Objectives of the Course
Goals, objectives, and assignments in this class address the Virginia Department of Education requirements for teacher preparation and the International Literacy Association competencies for classroom teachers. This course is designed to enable students to:
Having successfully completed this course, the student will:
1.Demonstrate an understanding of the content, knowledge, skills and processes for teaching Virginia’s Foundation Blocks for Learning: Comprehensive Standards for Four-Year-Olds and the Virginia Standards of Learning for English, including communication and reading
2.Use formal and informal assessment as screening, diagnostic, and progress monitoring measures for the components of reading: phonemic awareness, letter recognition, and decoding
3.Develop and assess primary grade students’ phonological awareness skills
4.Be proficient in explicit and systematic phonics instruction, including an understanding of sound and symbol relationships, syllables, phonemes, morphemes, word analysis, and decoding skills
5.Demonstrate knowledge of how to create a positive, literacy-rich learning environment
6.Understand the stages of spelling development, how to promote the generalization of spelling study to writing, and be proficient in systematic spelling instruction, including awareness of the purpose and limitations of “invented spelling”
7.Demonstrate knowledge of evidence-based instructional practices related to pre-K/primary reading development (i.e., concepts of print, phonological awareness, phonics, word recognition, fluency, vocabulary, comprehension)
8. Identify, plan, and adapt developmentally appropriate instructional approaches that develop reading processes related to foundational skills for pre-K/primary learners.
9.Design instructional practices that are responsive to primary grade students’ diverse strengths and needs.
10.Incorporate texts and experiences designed to differentiate and enhance primary grade students’ language, literacy, and the learning environment
11.Assess and analyze primary grade students’ developmental spelling skills and knowledge.
12.Build accountable talk and ask open questions during interactive read-alouds.
13.Reflect on their ability to engage primary grade students in meaningful interactions that encourage comprehension during a read-aloud.
14.Build accountable talk and ask open questions during interactive read-alouds.
15.Reflect on their ability to engage primary grade students in meaningful interactions that encourage comprehension during a read-aloud.
16.Understand the characteristics of primary grade students with dyslexia and high-achieving readers and identify evidence-based instructional practices that meet their needs.
Assessment Measures
Assessment Measures may include, but are not limited to:
•Quizzes and final exam
•Participation in class discussions and activities and graded reading reflections
•Designing, delivering, and reflecting upon a read-aloud for elementary-aged students
•Designing small group reading instruction that targets students’ instructional reading needs
•Scoring and analyzing primary grade students’ spelling inventories.
Other Course Information
None
Review and Approval
Revised April, 2009