1st Grade - Gateway 2

The materials reviewed for Grade 1 partially meet the criteria for scope and sequence clearly delineate the sequence in which phonological awareness skills are to be taught, with a clear, evidence-based explanation for the expected hierarchy of phonemic awareness competence (K-1).

The Puzzle Piece Phonics First Grade Level Teacher’s Guide provides an overview of phonemic awareness and a list of outcomes for students. There is a clear hierarchy of a scope and sequence for phonemic awareness, noted on page I-15 of the Teacher’s Guide. A more in-depth description of the skills to be taught and a rationale for their inclusion is presented in an article, “Puzzle Piece Phonics Research Base Alignment,” published on the program's companion website. The program provides a detailed scope and sequence chart for the introduction of letter-sound correspondences but does not delineate, in a similar fashion, the scope and sequence for phonemic awareness skills to be taught. Phonemic awareness skills are briefly referenced in the list of outcomes with no other delineation of the sequence of introduction or amount of review and practice provided. 

Materials contain a clear, evidence-based explanation for the expected hierarchy for teaching phonological awareness skills. Examples include, but are not limited to:

• In the Teacher’s Guide, page I-15, a definition of phonemic awareness, the purpose of phonemic awareness, the learning outcomes, and a basic routine for teacher phonemic awareness is provided.
• Grade 1 Learning Outcomes for Phonemic Awareness include:
• segment initial sounds in words
• segment medial sounds in words
• segment final sounds in words
• orally break words into syllables
• listen for consonant sounds
• listen for short and long vowel sounds
• listen for irregular vowel sounds
• On the Companion Website an article entitled “Puzzle Piece Phonics Research Base Alignment” provides a clear definition for phonemic awareness (page 3) and a detailed description of the research-base supporting the routines (pages 9-11) used in the Puzzle Piece Phonics program to teach phonemic awareness.

Materials contain a phonemic awareness sequence of instruction and practice based on the expected hierarchy. Examples include, but are not limited to:

• In the Teacher’s Guide, pages I-49 through I-52, materials provide a scope and sequence chart that delineates 35 weeks of instruction, organized under 11 concepts, with each week focusing on specific letter/sound correspondences. However, the scope and sequence does not reference the sequence of phonemic awareness skills. 
• In the Teacher’s Guide, page I-15, while the “learning outcomes” listed on page I-15 correspond to the level of tasks for phonemic awareness, there is no actual scope and sequence chart provided for the introduction of the different phonemic awareness tasks (i.e., rhyme, sound comparison, phoneme segmentation, phoneme manipulation). 

Materials have a cohesive sequence of phonemic awareness instruction based on the expected hierarchy to build toward students’ application of the skills. Examples include, but are not limited to:

• A phonemic awareness exercise, which provides oral/aural practice, is included in each lesson throughout the program. 
• In the Teacher’s Guide Contents pages, there is a sequence of phonemic tasks. Concept 1 is consonants. Concept 2 is short vowels. Concept 3 focuses on  digraphs. Concept 4 is blends, and Concept 5 is controlled vowels. Concepts 6-10 focuses on Vowel_e, Vowel Teams, Open Syllables, Consonant Help Syllables, and Irregular Vowels. Concept 11 is a long vowel review.  

The materials reviewed for Grade 1 partially meet the criteria for materials regularly and systematically offer assessment opportunities that measure student progress of phonics (as indicated by the program scope and sequence). (K-2) 

The Teacher’s Guide provides three pre-assessments and four post-assessments throughout the 35-week instructional program. Assessments measure letter-sound relationships and spelling pattern knowledge but with limited applicability. Spelling Checks administered on a weekly basis provide feedback on student’s encoding abilities. Assessments include limited opportunities for encoding within context. The program states that the results will be used to group students by word lists, but there are no other suggested interventions.

Materials provide resources and tools to collect ongoing data about students’ progress in phonics. Examples include, but are not limited to:

• In the Teacher’s Guide, page 113, students complete the Partner Spell Routine, and the teacher walks around the room. Students take a word out of their their partner’s bag and then read it. The partner writes the word. Then, the other student says whether the partner spelled the word correctly or not. 
• In the Teacher’s Guide, page 135, students write the words metal, shovel, jingle, pickle and her, during the Dictation Routine. 
• In the Teacher’s Guide, page 361, students complete the Spelling Check. The teacher says a word and students write the words based on their list, irregular vowels oi, oy.
• In the Teacher’s Guide, page 3, the Pre-Assessment 1, Initial Spelling Check, is given at the beginning of the program. According to the Guide, it measures one-to-one letter-sound correspondences, knowledge of consonants, digraphs, blends, short vowels, and long vowels. There are no items that measure phonemic awareness through oral formats. 
• Pre-assessments One and Two (Teacher’s Guide, page 129 and Teacher’s Guide, page 257) state that the pre-assessments are spelling checks that focus on spelling patterns, knowledge of short, long and r-controlled vowels, and knowledge of syllable breaks. None of these checks provide direct assessments of encoding in context of sentences.
• The Teacher’s Guide provides four post-assessments. The post-assessments are labeled as a spelling check to test knowledge of letter-sound correspondences, knowledge of consonants, digraphs, blends, short and long vowels, r-controlled vowels, and knowledge of syllables. 

Materials offer limited assessment opportunities to determine students’ progress in phonics that are implemented systematically. Examples include:

• Students complete spell check assessments on a regular basis during each week of the concepts. In the Teacher’s Guide, page 194, students write the words with the spelling pattern, vowel_e words. There are two different groups of words based on the students’ levels.

Limited assessment opportunities are provided regularly for students to demonstrate progress toward mastery and independence with phonics. Examples include:

• The Concept 9 post-assessment is administered to evaluate the students’ needs concerning knowledge of consonants, irregular vowel spelling patterns, syllable breaks, and the understanding that each syllable contains a vowel. 
• Besides the spelling checks, which include a limited sample of words and one sentence in dictation, there are no regular assessments of encoding skills or for generalization to words not previously taught. Some activities provide opportunities to practice but no data is recorded to indicate whether students are mastering the skills being practiced.

Assessment materials provide teachers and students with limited information about students’ current skills/level of understanding of phonics. Examples include:

• In the Concept 5 post-assessment, students demonstrate knowledge of short vowels, digraphs, blends, and controlled vowels during a spelling check. The last two words contain the focus pattern for the week. The teacher is prompted to tell the students they should spell words on the post-assessment correctly because these are words from previous weeks. 
• There is no data collected and analyzed based on the spelling assessments given each week. 

Materials provide limited opportunities to measure students’ progress to support teachers with instructional adjustments to help students make progress toward mastery in phonics. Examples include:

• The Guidelines for Concept 9 post-assessments tells the teacher that if students can quickly meet the first grade standards for irregularly spelled words, they should be moved to Group 2. 
• Results of the assessments are not used to make instructional decisions regarding progression or reteaching.
• Students are not required to apply knowledge of syllables and letter-sound relationships to encode lists of words; therefore, teachers would not be able to collect any running records or complete miscue analysis of student work.

The materials reviewed for Grade 1 partially meet the criteria for materials regularly and systematically offer assessment opportunities that measure student progress of word recognition and analysis (as indicated by the program scope and sequence). (K-2) 

The Teacher’s Guide provides three pre-assessments and four post-assessments throughout the 35-week instructional program. Assessments measure letter-sound relationships and word recognition skills but with limited applicability. Assessments do not provide immediate information on when concepts need to be retaught or reviewed and do not provide any direct measures of decoding skills. Opportunities are missed for students to be assessed on high frequency words or students’ ability to utilize word analysis skills in writing words. 

Materials provide limited assessment opportunities over the course of the year to demonstrate students’ progress toward mastery and independence of word recognition (high-frequency words or irregularly spelled words) and analysis. Examples include:

• In the Teacher’s Guide, page 3, the Pre-Assessment 1, Initial Spelling Check, is to be given at the beginning of the program. According to the Guide, it measures one-to-one letter-sound correspondences, knowledge of consonants, digraphs, blends, short vowels, and long vowels. 

Assessment materials provide teachers and students with limited information concerning students’ current skills/level of understanding of word recognition and word analysis. Examples include:

• In the Teacher’s Guide on page 128, during Concept 5, teachers give a pre-assessment to students in which the teacher says the word and students write what sounds they hear. The intent of this assessment is to determine which long vowel sounds  students know prior to Concept 6 to adjust their word list. 
• In the Teacher’s Guide, page 286, the teacher gives a post-assessment to determine students’ knowledge of long vowels prior to moving into the next unit. 

Materials provide limited support to teachers with instructional suggestions for assessment-based steps to help students to progress toward mastery in word recognition and word analysis. Examples include:

• Pre-assessments are included throughout the materials and "are given prior to the start of a new concept." After students have taken the pre-test, there are suggested word lists for the teachers to use with students, based on what they did during the assessment. 

The materials reviewed for Grade 1 partially meet the criteria for materials include publisher-produced alignment documentation of the standards addressed by specific questions, tasks, and assessment and assessment materials clearly denote which standards are being emphasized.

There is a document on the companion website for Puzzle Piece Phonics that identifies the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) (print concepts, phonological awareness, phonics and word recognition, fluency, conventions of standard English, and vocabulary acquisition and use) that align with Grade 1 of Puzzle Piece Phonics. However, there is no alignment to CCSS provided by the publisher to indicate which standards are being addressed by specific questions, tasks, assessments, or routines. 

Alignment documentation is not provided for all tasks, questions, and assessment items.  Examples include, but are not limited to:

• In the Teacher’s Guide, page I-4q, during Concept 2 in Weeks 2-4, there is a scope and sequence which states which concept, such as short i, short o, or short u, will be covered in that section.
• In the Teacher’s Guide, page 3, on the Pre-Assessment Initial Spelling Check, in order to evaluate the assessment, the teacher looks for one-to-one letter correspondence, knowledge of consonants, digraphs, blends, short vowels and long vowels.

Alignment documentation does not contain specific standards correlated to specific lessons.  Examples include, but are not limited to:

• The alignment document provided on the companion website for Grade 1 Puzzle Piece Phonics lists the standards addressed but does not connect them to a specific lesson, task, or instructional routine included in any of the lessons.  
• The Teacher’s Guide, Introduction, pages I-1 through I-71, does not reference CCSS in terms of specific tasks or routines.

Materials do not include denotations of the standards being assessed in the formative assessments. Examples include, but are not limited to:

• In the Teacher’s Guide, page I-13, the materials delineate three pre-assessments used as formative assessments throughout the program. They are given prior to the start of a new concept and challenge students to write words with patterns that have not yet been formally taught. The guide states that the information can help teachers form student groups for word sorting , etc., and help determine the focus of lessons for each group; however, the materials do not identify which standards are being addressed in these formative assessments.
• In the Teacher’s Guide, page 3, the materials provide the first pre-assessment which covers one-to-one letter-sound correspondence, knowledge of consonants, digraphs, and blends, and short and long vowel sounds. The instructions tell teachers what to look for and provide tips for scoring but do not link this assessment to any standards.
• In the Teacher’s Guide, page 129, the materials provide the second pre-assessment which covers one-to-one sound correspondence and knowledge of consonants, long vowel spelling patterns, syllable breaks, and that each syllable contains a vowel. The pre-assessment is not correlated to any standards.
• In the Teacher’s Guide, page 257, the materials provide the third pre-assessment, and this assessment evaluates the same skills as the second pre-assessment. It provides what to look for, tips for scoring, and suggestions on how students can be grouped based on the assessment, but it does not specify correlation to specific standards. 

Materials do not include denotations of standards being assessed in the summative assessments. Examples include, but are not limited to:

• In the Teacher’s Guide, page I-14, the materials delineate four post-assessments used as summative assessments throughout the program. The Teacher's Guide states that the information can help teachers determine if students have mastered the spelling patterns that have been formally introduced. While the Teacher's Guide states that each post-assessment tests the Grade 1 spelling patterns, it does not identify which standards are being addressed in any of the assessments.
• In the Teacher’s Guide, page 155, the materials provide the first post-assessment which covers knowledge of short vowels, digraphs, blends and controlled vowels. The instructions tell teachers what to look for and provide tips for scoring but do not link this assessment to the standards being assessed.
• In the Teacher’s Guide, page 287, the materials provide the second post-assessment which covers vowel teams used in the middle of a syllable, open vowels/open syllables, and consonant help syllables, but the post-assessment is not correlated to any standards.
• Post-assessments 3 and 4 are structured using the same format as post-assessments 1 and 2. The materials provide what to look for, tips for scoring, and suggestions on how students can be grouped based on the assessment but do not specify correlation to specific standards. 

The materials reviewed for Grade 1 partially meet the criteria for materials regularly provide all students, including those who read, write, speak, or listen below grade-level with extensive opportunities for reteaching to meet or exceed grade-level standards. 

During Step 3 of each lesson's Fluency portion, the teacher is prompted to pull a small group. Some scaffolding occurs within a lesson and across the weeks’ lessons from sounds first being introduced in the phonemic awareness section of the lesson, moving into Supported Blending and Formation: Writing of Letters, followed by sorting activities, and finishing in Fluency Notebook readings. Skills introduced on Day 1 are practiced through Day 5 of a concept week providing some opportunities for reteaching and review. Fluency Notebook reading passages are repeatedly practiced over the five day period; however, all students receive the same level of instruction. 

Materials provide some opportunities for small group reteaching.  Examples include, but are not limited to:

• In the Teacher’s Guide, pages I-9 through I-48 describe the teaching routines and practice activities that make up each day’s lesson. There is no mention of modifications that could be made for students who might need extensive opportunities for reteaching in order to meet grade-level standards.. 
• In the Teacher’s Guide, page 92, when students are engaged in the fluency passages, the teacher should circulate and pull small groups, if needed. 
• At the beginning of each week’s lesson plan, the Teacher’s Guide provides a section called Tips for Management and Differentiation. The tips provide broad guidelines for accommodating students who might need additional practice:
• In the Teacher’s Guide, page 27, the materials include a section called Tips for Phonemic Awareness, which instructs the teacher, “If you notice your students need additional practice with identifying initial sounds, you can extend the activity with similar words. If students are proficient at identifying initial sounds, then challenge them to segment full words. Use these phonemic awareness activities to assess your students’ mastery of these consonants and extend the activities in whole or small group as needed.” 
• Throughout the lessons for Days 1-5, there is no specific mention of modifications, extended practice, extended modeling, or remediation for students who are experiencing difficulties in mastering grade-level standards. During the Fluency section of lessons, teachers are told that they should “circulate and listen to students read” or “gather a small group of students who need additional support.” 

Materials provide some guidance to teachers for scaffolding and adapting lessons and activities to support students who read, write, speak, or listen below grade-level in extensive opportunities to learn foundational skills at the grade-level standards. Examples include, but are not limited to:

• In the Teacher’s Guide, page I-29, Fluency Routines, the materials state there are two poems per week in the Fluency Notebook. Two of the poems are geared toward Group 1, and two of the poems are geared toward Group 2. 
• In the Teacher’s Guide, page I-39, in the modifications section of the Glue Words activity, the materials state that the teacher can create the glue line to help the students.
• Modifications in the Super Sentence activity include giving students a cloze sentence. The materials provide a list of sentences where there is one word missing. Students look at their weekly words, and insert the word that is missing.
• Differentiated instruction comes at the end of the lessons during the independent practice word sorting activity and the fluency passages. 
• Beginning in Teacher’s Guide, page 54, practice activities in the Learner’s Notebook and the Fluency Notebook introduce differentiated words lists and passages for Group 1 and Group 2. 
• Focus elements are the same for each group with different words included in their sorting activities or reading selections.
• Other than generalized statements as to how group membership can be flexible depending on student performance, there is little information that would lead to extensive opportunities for reteaching that could assist students who are falling below grade-level and failing to master the standards. 

The materials reviewed for Grade 1 partially meet the criteria for materials regularly provide extensions and/or more advanced opportunities for students who read, write, speak, or listen above grade-level. 

There are opportunities for students who are advanced to engage in activities; however, they complete the same activities as their peers with a different list of words. The whole group routines that students complete every day, including the Blending Routine and the Dictation Routine, are completed with the same words for all students. The fluency passages, spell checks, and the independent weekly sorts are completed with the student word list that is representative of where individual skill levels indicate. There are minimal extension activities embedded in the other routines for students. There are two sets of weekly sorts for each week, but there is very little difference in difficulty level between the two sets.  While there are also two sets of fluency passages for each week, there is little difference in difficulty.

Materials provide some opportunities for advanced students to investigate grade-level foundational skills at a greater depth. Examples include, but are not limited to:

• In the Teacher’s Guide, page I-39, on the extension part of the Glue Words Routine, the materials state students are to create a plan for practicing the words at home. 
• In the Teacher’s Guide, page I-42, during the Read It, Hide It, Write It, Check it Sort, students in the extension section are encouraged to recall words from their weekly sort that are not included in the activity. 

There are some instances of advanced students simply doing more assignments than their classmates. Examples include, but are not limited to:

• In Fluency Passages, page 15, students have options from two different poems depending on which word list they are utilizing. Students who are reading Group 1 words, read the poems, “Pancake” and “Cat!” and students who are reading Group 2 words, read the poems, “The Red Hen” and “Bedtime.”
• In the Teacher’s Guide, page 253, students complete the spelling check. The teacher reads the words from each group's list. The materials state that students should only write down the words from their group. 
• In the Teacher’s Guide, page 120, Tips for Sorting Routine, the teacher discusses the vocabulary words that are included in the student sort. Sort 1, includes drag, drift, trap, trust, and crunch. Sort 2  includes draft, dread, drank, trinket, trumpet, credit, and crop. 
• There is no indication that advanced students are given more or different assignments from their classmates.