Throughout the materials, there is some explicit instruction in phonemic awareness with repeated teacher modeling. In some lessons there is teacher modeling, but in other lessons, the teacher explains the activity, and students complete it without teacher modeling. Materials include minimal guidance for corrective feedback in phonemic awareness. 

Materials include some explicit instruction in sounds (phonemes). Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Distinguish long from short vowel sounds in spoken single-syllable words.

  • In Unit 3, Week 21, Lesson 1, students complete a picture sort, categorizing pictures that have a short o versus pictures that have a long o. The materials state, “Pick up a picture and have students all say the name of it aloud. Then, have them tell you where to sort it”. This activity does not include explicit instruction or modeling. This type of sort is also seen in other lessons, but no instruction or modeling occurs. 

  • In Unit 3, Week 21, Lesson 2, the teacher says a word and students say the vowel sound and identify if its a long or short vowel. The materials do not include explicit instruction or modeling for this activity. This type of activity occurs in later lessons when other vowels are introduced. 

• Orally produces single-syllable words by blending sounds (phonemes), including consonant blends.

  • In Unit 1, Week 1, Lesson 2, the teacher introduces a blending game. The teacher models by saying the sounds /d/ /ā/ and blending them to say day. Students repeat this with the words row, bye, me, and say.

  • In Unit 2, Week 10, Lesson 1, the teacher introduces s blends like /st/. The teacher shows students the Let’s Blend poster and shows that the sounds /s/ and /t/ get blended together to say /st/ like in the word stop. 

  • In Unit 2, Week 14, Lesson 4, the students practice blending words with the consonant blend -mp. The teacher models blending the sounds /r/ /ă/ /m/ /p/ into the word ramp.

• Isolate and pronounce initial, medial vowel, and final sounds (phonemes) in spoken single-syllable words.

  • In Unit 1, Week 2, Day 2, during the Transition Activities, the teacher models how to isolate the initial sound in a spoken word. The teacher says, “If I say ‘luck’, you say /l/. Then, students practice.

  • In Unit 1, Week 4, Day 4, during the Transition Activities, the teacher models how to isolate the medial sound in words before students practice. The teacher models with the word dog. The teacher models by saying, “If I say dog, the sound is /ŏ/.

• Segment spoken single-syllable words into their complete sequence of individual sounds (phonemes).

  • In Unit 1, Week 2, Day 4, the teacher models how to segment words before students practice. The teacher models by saying, “For example, if I say shut, you say /sh/ /ú/ /t/.”

  • In Unit 1, Week 4, Lesson 1, the teacher models segmenting words by saying, “The first word is lot. Repeat. (Students say the word lot). We have a lot of books in our classroom. Lot. Let’s segment it: /l/ /ŏ/ /t/.”

  • In Unit 3, Week 21, Lesson 1, the teacher models segmenting words while the students listen and say the mystery word. The teacher models the words lake, white, team, and goal. Then, the teacher says a word, and the students segment the words. The teacher gives the students the following words to segment into individual sounds: poke, tape, peek, light, and tube. 

Materials provide the teacher with examples for instruction in sounds (phonemes). Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Each week includes target skills in phonological awareness with explicit instruction during multiple lesson segments, including during the Transition Activities and components within the lesson. For example, in Unit 1, Week 2, the Transition Activities include instruction in blending phonemes. 

• In the Unit 1 Overview and End of Unit Assessment videos, there are examples of instruction in syllables, sounds, and spoken words. The instructional routines for these skills are consistent throughout the program and include words to use for phonological awareness skills, but not specifically the phonemic awareness skill aligned to the phonics skill.

Materials include minimal teacher guidance for corrective feedback when needed for students. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Materials include ways to support students when needed, such as in Unit 1, Week 1, Lesson 2, it says, “If students struggle with any of the letter sounds today or another day, discuss where your tongue and lips are when they form the letter sound,” but guidance to give corrective feedback is not provided. 

Students have regular opportunities to practice phonemic awareness skills. During the Phonics portion of the lesson, materials generally introduce a sound card and students practice using sound cards in a Blending Routine. The lessons include support on pronouncing each phoneme, but directions to the teacher for demonstrating how to pronounce each phoneme based on mouth formation do not exist.  

Daily phonemic awareness instruction correlates to the phonics portion of the lesson (phoneme-grapheme correspondence). Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• In Unit 1, Week 3, materials focus on short a and i. During Lesson 2, the Phonological Awareness component has students play a game where the teacher says a word, and students segment it. All of the words have a short a or i. During Word Building, students use magnetic letters to build words with short a. During Lesson 3, students do the same word-building activity but with words with short i.

• In Unit 2, Week 1, the Phonological Awareness focus of the week is identifying matching blends, and the phonics focus is l-blends and r-blends. In Lesson 4, during Word Building, students sort words with r-blends and l-blends. 

• In Unit 3, Week 23, the lesson plan Target Skills include CVCe, silent e words with long a, and silent e syllable type. In Lesson 1, during the Phonological Awareness section, the teacher says phonemes for students to blend. All words are CVCe. Then, in Lesson 2, the teacher gives a CVC word and tells the student to turn the short vowel into a long vowel. All words go from short a or i to long a or i. 

Materials include opportunities for students to practice connecting sounds to letters. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• In Lesson 2, students use sound cards to complete a blending drill.  Students read the whole word by saying each sound and then reading the word. 

• In Lesson 19, students use sound cards to complete a blending drill.  Students read the whole word by saying each sound and then reading the word. 

Materials include directions to the teacher for demonstrating how to pronounce each phoneme (articulation/mouth formation). Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• No evidence found.

The materials include a Placement Test and End of Unit Assessments that evaluate students’ phonemic awareness skills, among other foundational reading skills. There are no interim assessments within each unit to provide regular and systematic assessment opportunities. There is minimal guidance on what to do with assessment results or how to support teachers with next steps toward mastery in phonemic awareness.

Materials provide limited assessment opportunities over the course of the year to demonstrate students’ progress toward mastery and independence in phonemic awareness. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Materials include a Placement Test for teachers to administer at the beginning of the year and again at the end of the year to measure growth.

• There is an End-of-Unit Assessment for all four units, but there are no interim assessments provided within each unit.

• The Unit 1 End of Unit Assessment includes assessment items on phonemic awareness skills such as phoneme blending, phoneme segmentation, and syllable manipulation. 

• The Unit 3 End of Unit Assessment includes assessment items on phoneme blending, phoneme segmenting, and phoneme manipulation.

• Within each unit, in the Overview & End of Unit Assessment section, the materials provide a downloadable Excel spreadsheet for teachers to keep track of data electronically if they choose.

Assessment materials provide teachers and students with information limited concerning students’ current skills/level of understanding of phonemic awareness. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• The materials include a Level 1 Placement Test, which provides information concerning students’ current skills/level of understanding of phonemic awareness skills. Skills assessed are phoneme blending, segmenting, and manipulation. 

• Within the End of Unit Assessment documents, the materials indicate that if a student performs a task with 80% accuracy or better they are ready for the next unit, but otherwise, the assessments do not provide teachers and students with information concerning students’ current skills/levels of understanding of phonemic awareness. 

Materials support teachers with instructional suggestions for assessment-based steps to help students to progress toward mastery in phonemic awareness. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• No evidence was found of instructional suggestions for assessment-based next steps to help students progress toward mastery in phonemic awareness.

The materials include systematic and explicit in phonics instruction. The lessons include direct instruction, modeling, practice, and repetition. Students have the opportunity to blend and segment one- and two-syllable words and have opportunities to practice writing words and sentences. However, the materials do not include opportunities or guidance for the teacher to give corrective feedback. The materials do not provide guidance to the teacher on how to support students who make mistakes through the use of corrective feedback. 

Materials contain explicit instructions for systematic and repeated teacher modeling of newly-taught phonics patterns. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Know the spelling-sound correspondences for common consonant digraphs.

  • In Unit 1, Week 6, Lesson 1, the teacher introduces the consonant digraph th, including the sounds and how to pronounce the sounds. After introducing it, the teacher directs students to trace the letters for the unvoiced sound /th/ and the voiced sound /th/. 

  • In Unit 1, Week 7, Lesson 1, during Concept Introduction, the teacher says, “Say the word lock. Now let’s say the sounds in lock /l/, /o/, /k/.” Then, the teacher asks for the last sound again and writes the word, asking what students notice. The teacher then explicitly explains that because lock has one syllable and a short vowel, they use ck at the end of the word. The teacher then explains that it is a digraph because it makes one sound. 

• Decode regularly spelled one-syllable words.

  • In Unit 1, Week 6, Lesson 1, during Blending Practice with New Concept, the teacher sets up letter sound cards and tells students they will practice blending words that begin with /th/. The teacher reminds students that when they see th, it makes one sound because it is a digraph. Students then practice reading words. 

  • In Unit 2, Week 11, Lesson 1, during Blending Practice with New Concept, the teacher sets up letter sound cards and tells students they will practice consonant blends. The teacher models with the word clap. Students then practice reading one-syllable words with the l-blends.

• Know final -e and common vowel team conventions for representing long vowel sounds.

  • In Unit 3, Week 23, Day 1, students watch a video on the story of Silent E or Magic E. After watching the video, the teacher gives students a “Magic E puppet,” and the teacher models how to use it to read words with magic e. The teacher first reads the word with the short vowel, and then they use their magic e puppet at the end of the word to read it with a long vowel sound. 

  • In Unit 3, Week 25, the phonics target skill is silent e words with long o. In Lesson 1, the teacher begins by reviewing the sounds of a_e and i_e and then explicitly teaches o_e. After modeling how to read words when magic e is added, students build words with magic e.

  • In Unit 4, Week 29, Lesson 1, the teacher introduces students to the vowel team ay by explaining that when a and y play together, a likes to go first, so we hear the long a sound.

• Use knowledge that every syllable must have a vowel sound to determine the number of syllables in a printed word.

  • In Unit 1, Week 8, Lesson 2, during the Syllabicating Words activity, the teacher shows students the word rabbit and instructs the students to count and circle the vowels and explains that because there are two vowels, there are two syllables. The teacher continues, “In English, there are rules that help us divide words into syllables....” and explains the rules. 

  • In Unit 3, Week 22, Lesson 1, students practice breaking up words with open and closed syllables. The teacher reminds students first to cut apart the word and locate the vowels, marking the vowels and consonants between them. Then, the teacher explains, “If there is only one consonant between the vowels, we divide it before the consonant to see if that helps us read the word.” The teacher continues modeling and thinking aloud what the vowel will say and whether it is an open or closed syllable and why.

  • In Unit 4, Week 29, Lesson 4, the teacher uses a routine to help students determine the number of syllables in a word. Steps include circling the vowel in red, underlining the consonants between the vowels, marking the vowels (V) and the consonants (C), determining which syllable rule to use, dividing between the syllables, and coding each syllable by writing the appropriate letter about it such as O for open and CL for closed.

• Decode two-syllable words following basic patterns by breaking the words into syllables.

  • In Unit 1, Week 8, Lesson 1, the teacher introduces compound words, modeling this concept with the words cannot, upset, bathtub, and catfish. The teacher then guides students to practice reading two-syllable compound words. 

  • In Unit 1, Week 8, Lesson 3, students are introduced to a Word Sort activity, where they sort words based on the number of syllables it has. The teacher first reminds students that when a word has one vowel sound, it has one syllable, and if it has two vowel sounds, it has two syllables. 

  • In Unit 3, Week 28, Lesson 1, the teacher has students cut two syllable words and leads them through the syllabication process. 

• Read words with inflectional endings.

  • In Unit 3, Week 16, Lesson 1, the teacher introduces the inflectional ending -s. The teacher explains that when s is at the end of the word, it signals it is plural. The teacher then models how to do this by covering up the -s with a hand, reading just the base word, and then adding the s back at the end. Students then practice with the teacher.

  • In Unit 3, Week 16, Day 4, the students sort words by -s or -es ending. The teacher reminds students that “if a word ends with -s, you’re going to hear /s/ or /z/ at the end. If it ends with -es, you’re going to hear /iz/.” Then, students engage in the word sort as a whole class, with the teacher modeling it correctly as they go along. 

  • In Unit 3, Week 17, Lesson 1, the teacher displays the -ed phonics poster and explains that the -ed at the end of a word actually makes different sounds, such as /t/ at the end of the word jumped, /d/ and /id/. Then the teacher holds up a word card, and students read the base word, then the word with -ed, and discuss what sound the -ed makes. 

Lessons include blending and segmenting practice using structured, consistent blending routines with teacher modeling. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• In Unit 1, Week 9, Lesson 1, students engage in blending practice with new concepts, which is the bonus letter. The teacher builds several words with bonus letters at the end. Students then blend the phonemes together and determine if it’s a real word or a nonsense word. 

• In Unit 3, Week 16, Lesson 2, the materials direct teachers to “Go through the blending drill as you did in previous units, having students practice reading words with blends, glued sounds, etc. Have students blend and read between 5 - 10 words.” 

• In Unit 3, Week 28, Lesson 3, students write two-syllable words with long e. Students practice by saying the word, pounding the syllable, segmenting each syllable, and then writing the word. Students also check each syllable and draw a line to show where the word is divided. 

Lessons include dictation of words and sentences using the newly taught phonics pattern(s). 

• In Unit 1, Week 9, Lesson 5, during the Dictation activity, the teacher passes out copies of dictation paper and dictates words for students to write, such as off, yell, pass, buzz. The teacher also gives the sentence, I will call her.

• In Unit 3, Week 22, Lesson 1, the students write two-syllable words. The students repeat the word, pound the syllables, and then spell each syllable by segmenting each sound. 

• In Unit 4, Week 30, Lesson 2, the teacher provides students with dictation paper and sound boxes. The teacher models by saying the word aloud, pounding the syllables, segmenting the word, and then writing it on the board. The students then practice with a variety of words, and then the teacher provides sentences for students to write as well.

Materials include teacher guidance for corrective feedback when needed for students.

• No evidence found

The materials include decodable texts that align with the weekly phonics skill. Students have the opportunity to read and reread the texts each week. However, the materials do not guide the teacher on using the decodable text until students can accurately read single-syllable words. There is no explicit instruction on how to use these texts, and instead, the program provides suggestions based on student needs, such as the option to choral read, echo read, or whisper read. 

Decodable texts contain grade-level phonics skills aligned to the program’s scope and sequence. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• In Unit 1, Week 1, there are two decodables that focus on the phonics skill of the week, which are consonant digraphs ck and qu. One of the texts is “Chuck and the Ducks,” and students can highlight or circle words with digraphs ck and qu before reading. 

• In Unit 1, Week 11, students read the decodable “Sam and the Clam,” which is aligned to the phonics skill of the week, l-blends and r-blends. Words in the text include plan, slap, plum, clam, flip, flop, and fled. 

• In Unit 2, Week 15, students read the decodable “The Long Ring,” which is aligned with the phonics skill of the week, glued sounds -ing, -ang, -ong, -ung, -ink, -ank, -onk, -unk. Words from this text include king, ring, think, clung, gong, bring song, and sang. 

• In Unit 3, Week 22, the materials include the decodable text “Possum Picnic.” The grade-level phonics skills for the week include two-syllable words with open and closed syllables and V/CV syllable division rules. The decodable texts align with these skills and include words such as possum, muffin, rabbits, picnic, tulip, and napkin. 

• In Unit 4, Week 30, the target skill is the long e spelling pattern with words containing ee or ea. The students read several decodable texts including “How to Make a Feast,” and the words in the text contain the ee and ea spelling pattern. 

Materials include detailed lesson plans for repeated readings of decodable texts to address acquisition of phonics skills. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• In Unit 2, Week 13, Lesson 2, students read the text “Meg likes Candy,” and the guidance suggests the teacher allow students to start reading or to choose additional supports to help students be successful with reading the text. Some of the additional support includes repeated readings such as echo or choral reading all or part of the text and whisper reading. 

• In Unit 3, Week 22, Lesson 2, students read “Possum Picnic.” Students begin by echo or choral reading part or all of the text and then whisper read the text independently. In Lesson 4, students echo or choral read “A Robot Contest” and then whisper read independently. In Lesson 5, students reread the decodable texts from the week independently or with a partner.

• In Unit 4, Week 29, Lesson 2, students read the text “Fun on a Gray Day.” The instruction for teachers is to review the words gray and day and highlight or circle all the ay words if it is anticipated that students may struggle. Students read the text in a whisper and then reread it chorally or as a small group. The passage should go into the child’s folder for future readings, but the materials do not provide guidance on when to do this.

Reading practice occurs in decodable texts (i.e., an absence of predictable texts) until students can accurately decode single-syllable words. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• There is no evidence found regarding regular opportunities for the teacher to guide students in the reading of decodable texts to ensure students are accurately decoding single-syllable words.

The materials include assessment opportunities for phonics that occur during the Placement Test at the beginning and end of the year, as well as the End-of-Unit Assessments. There are no interim assessments throughout the units to regularly and systematically assess students. In addition, there is minimal evidence of guidance for the teacher on what to do with the evidence once it is collected to help students progress toward mastery in phonics. There are weekly dictation activities that the teacher is expected to use to determine if the class is ready to move on to the next target skill. This data is analyzed whole-class as opposed to individual students. 

Materials regularly and systematically provide a variety of assessment opportunities over the course of the year to demonstrate students’ progress toward mastery and independence in phonics. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• The Level 1 Placement Test Overview is an assessment that is given at the start of the program and upon finishing the program to measure student growth throughout the school year or to determine where to start in the program. A student summary sheet is included to record the components of the assessment, including CVC words, digraphs, blends, r-controlled vowels, long vowels with silent e, vowel teams, and multisyllabic words. The sheet is provided for both reading and spelling. 

• Materials include end-of-unit assessments to collect data about student progress. 

• The Level 1 Placement Test can be administered several times throughout the year, and there is a suggested order of components for administering the assessment, determined by the student group or time of year. For example, there is a different order based on the time of the year or if you are using this whole class, small group, or tutoring situation. 

• The materials include weekly dictation aligned with the target phonics and spelling pattern of the week. These results are recorded and implemented systematically in alignment with the scope and sequence of the units.

• The materials include a Placement Test and an End of Unit Assessment for all four units. 

• At the end of the week, a dictation activity is given to students to assess their ability to spell words containing the phonics target skill of the week. This is the only assessment opportunity within a unit to determine progress toward mastery; however, the analysis of results is for the entire class as opposed to individual student progress. 

Assessment materials provide teachers and students with limited information concerning students’ current skills/level of understanding of phonics. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• The Level 1 Placement Test provides information concerning a student’s current skill level and current understanding of each phonics skill. Guidelines are provided to assist in the placement of where teachers should begin with a student in the materials. 

• The weekly dictation includes guidance for the teacher on interpreting the results. However, the interpretation is for the entire class (i.e., “if most students spelled five or more of the words correctly, that is a good indicator that you can move on to the next week’s target skill”) as opposed to understanding each student’s current skill level. 

Materials support teachers with limited instructional suggestions for assessment-based steps to help students to progress toward mastery in phonics. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• In Unit 3, Week 22, limited evidence was found for instructional suggestions of assessment-based steps to help students progress toward mastery of phonics. The materials state that “students’ ability to decode 2-syllable words is more important than their performance on the dictation. You will continue practicing this skill in weeks to come.” 

Students learn new high-frequency words every week beginning in Week 5. Students learn two to six new words per week with explicit instruction and modeling; however, materials do not consistently include teacher modeling of the spelling and reading of high-frequency words that includes connecting the phonemes to the graphemesStudents review Kindergarten high-frequency words at the beginning of the program, and there is an opportunity to review all of the high-frequency words at the end of the program. However, there is no explicit instruction on how or what to review in Unit 4, which is left to the teacher’s discretion. 

Materials include systematic and explicit instruction of high-frequency words with an explicit and consistent instructional routine. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• In Unit 1, Week 11, students learn the high-frequency words was, his, and from. The explicit instruction focuses on meaning, sounds, and spelling. For example, for the word was, the teacher puts each letter in a box and asks students what sound surprises them.  The teacher then engages in a conversation about the sound of the letter a. 

• In Unit 2, Week 15, students learn the high-frequency words by, what, and but. In Lesson 2, the materials provide a systematic and explicit routine for teaching high-frequency words using the components focusing on meaning work, sound work, and spelling work. In sound work, the teacher writes the word on a whiteboard and draws sound boxes around the letters: “Point to each box, one at a time, and have students say the sounds. What sounds surprise you?” The teacher then discusses how to say /ú/. 

• In Unit 3, Week 20, Lesson 2 students learn about the high-frequency words or, more, and other. Students learn these words through meaning work, sound work, and spelling work. The meaning of work requires students to use the word in a sentence. The sound work includes identifying each of the phonemes and boxing the graphemes that represent the phoneme. The spelling work includes tapping out the word on their arm, naming each letter. This three-part instruction happens for each word. 

• The materials instruct teachers to do a review of high-frequency words taught in Kindergarten over the course of the first four weeks. In Unit 4, Weeks 34 and 35, there are no new high-frequency words taught, and materials state, “Review as Desired.” The materials do not include explicit instruction for spiraling review. 

Materials do not consistently include teacher modeling of the spelling and reading of high-frequency words that includes connecting the phonemes to the graphemes. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• In Unit 1, Week 1, the teacher reviews the word the. The teacher spells the word on the board and draws sound boxes around it. The teacher tells students the first two letters come together to say /th/, and the e sometimes says /ŭ/ or /ē/. Then, the teacher models tapping out the word to spell it by keeping one arm outstretched and gently touching a spot on the arm for each letter of the word. 

• In Unit 2, Week 18, Lesson 2, the materials include High-Frequency Word Introduction, a section of the lesson that includes meaning, sounds, and spelling work for the high-frequency words boy, girl, and him. During Spelling Work, the teacher models tapping out the word on their arm and then slides their hand down their entire arm while saying the word. Students write the word, creating a “bumpy word” using a crayon over a knitting screen to create tactile letters to trace and feel. Then, students write high-frequency words on paper or in a notebook. 

• In Unit 3, Week 16, the words were and your are introduced. In Lesson 2, the materials include a High Frequency Word Introduction section of the lesson. The materials include three components to this portion of the lesson, which instruct the teacher to start with meaning work, then sound work, and finally spelling work for each of the high-frequency words. 

Materials include a sufficient quantity of high-frequency words for students to make reading progress. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• The Level 1 Yearlong Scope and Sequence includes an overview of the high-frequency words taught each week. There is a range from two to six words taught in a week. High-frequency word instruction begins in Week 5 of Unit 1, with Weeks 1 - 4 being review words from Kindergarten. 

• The materials include multiple resources that provide opportunities for students to use and practice the newly learned two to six words each week. Examples include decodable texts, high-frequency word worksheets, and games. For example, in Unit 3, Week 23, the high-frequency words are make, made, and came. Students have various opportunities throughout the week to practice this word through whole group and small group instruction and activities.

Throughout the materials, students take an end-of-unit assessment that measures their progress in word recognition, but there is no evidence of word analysis assessment. In addition, interim formative assessments throughout the program do not exist. The program’s end-of-unit assessments measure students’ ability to read and spell high-frequency words and read and spell words with prefixes and suffixes. However, there are no additional word analysis assessments. The materials include the guidance that if students score 80% or better on the assessment, they are ready for the next unit, but do not provide additional guidance and instructional next steps.  

Materials regularly and systematically provide a variety of assessment opportunities over the course of the year to demonstrate students’ progress toward mastery and independence of word recognition and analysis. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• In each unit, there is an end-of-unit assessment that includes assessment of word recognition. However, there are no regular and systematic assessments throughout the program besides these four end-of-unit assessments. There are multiple activities for word recognition and analysis throughout the lessons, but no formal assessment is present in the lessons. 

• In Unit 3, the End of Unit Assessment measures students’ ability to read and recognize high frequency words such as yes, put, came, and words that target the phonics skills of the unit, such as mope, harp, and rule. Words in this unit also include ones that have suffixes such as bumping, dusted, and sinks. 

Assessment materials provide the teacher and students with information concerning students’ current skills/level of understanding of word recognition and word analysis. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• The end-of-unit assessments provide general information on students’ current skill level. According to the information that accompanies the end-of-unit assessments, “If a student gets 80% or more of the assessment items correct, this is a good indication that they are ready to continue in the scope and sequence rather than continue working on Unit X concepts.” 

• The End of Unit Assessments provide teachers with questions to think about to look for patterns in students’ individual and class results. For example, in Unit 3, questions include, “Are suffixes -ing or -ed difficult?” 

• In the Overview & End of Unit Assessment section, the materials include a spreadsheet to record results from the end-of-unit assessments. The spreadsheet is delineated by phonics skills, such as mastery of digraphs, but does not include word recognition. 

Materials support the teacher with instructional suggestions for assessment-based steps to help students to progress toward mastery in word recognition and word analysis. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

• In Grade 1, students take a Placement Test, and the materials include a Placement Guide for teachers to use when utilizing the assessment as a placement test. However, the recommendations indicate where to begin the material, and it does not include instructional suggestions. 

• Besides indicating that students are ready to move on to the next unit if they receive an 80% or higher, the materials do not provide instructional suggestions to help students toward mastery in word recognition and word analysis.