The materials reviewed for Grade 2 partially meet the criteria of Indicator 1b.

The Grade 2 Units of Study materials do not include a balance of informational and literary texts. The materials focus mostly on fictional texts and also include one poem, two songs, one informational video, and one painting.  No historical, scientific, or technical texts are included in the materials.  

• Materials do not reflect the distribution of text types/genres required by the grade-level standards. For example: 

  • In Reading Unit 1, Mercy Watson to the Rescue by Kate DiCamillo is a fictional story chapter book. The unit also includes a song, “There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly.” Those Darn Squirrels by Adam Rubin is a fictional story picture book. 

  • In Reading Unit 2, Tigers by Laura Marsh is an informational text. Knights in Shining Armor by Gail Gibbons is an informational text. Unit 2 on digital access has a link to a video, “A Day in the Life-Museum Curator.”

  • In Reading Unit 3, Happy Like Soccer by Maribeth Boelts, is a realistic fiction text. Owl Moon by Jane Yolen is a realistic fiction story. Minnie and Moo Go Dancing by Denys Cazet and Houndsley and Catina by James Howe are fiction stories. The teacher uses the realistic fiction text Katie Woo Has the Flu by Fran Manushkin to guide students in setting up routines for partner reading. Unit 3 on digital access has one song, “The Rereading Song,” which is not used for knowledge building, and several news bulletins, which are writing examples not published works. 

  • In Reading Unit 4, Days with Frog and Toad by Arnold Lobel is a fiction story. The Stories Julian Tells by Ann Cameron is also fiction. Unit 4 on digital access has one song, “Magic Penny,” and a link to one painting, A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte by Seurat.

  • In Reading Unit 4, The Magic Tree House: Polar Bears Past Bedtime by Mary Pope Osborne is a historical fiction text.

• Materials do not reflect a 50/50 balance of informational and literary texts. For example: 

  • In Reading Unit 1, there are three anchor texts. All three are literary texts.

  • In Reading Unit 2, there are three anchor texts. All three are informational texts. Informational texts do not appear in any other unit for this grade level.  

  • In  Reading Unit 3, there are five anchor texts. All five of them are literary texts.

  • In  Reading Unit 4, there are two anchor texts. Both are literary texts.

The materials reviewed for Grade 2 partially meet the criteria of Indicator 1e.

The Grade 2 materials give general guidance about supporting students in reading a variety of texts and engaging in a volume of reading. Since sessions are designed around suggested texts, there is no guarantee as to the variety and volume of texts students would engage with in a unit. Similarly, the materials offer some general guidance and suggestions on establishing routines for independent reading and partner reading. Much of the recommendations are in the supporting material, The Guide to the Reading Workshop. There is not a clearly proposed schedule for independent reading. Rather, there is a recommended structure for students’ reading time during Readers Workshop. Each unit also includes a model plan for read alouds. The supporting material offers a sample schedule for the school day, but notes that the schedule would vary according to grade level. Some sessions include specific guidance to foster independence. Some sessions also include procedures for managing independent reading. The materials offer multiple suggestions for an independent reading tracking system in the form of individual student book logs.  

• Instructional materials provide limited opportunities and supports for students to engage in reading a variety of text types and genres. For example: 

  • Students engage with anchor texts through recommended demonstration texts daily. Students also have independent reading time daily in which they read books in their Zone of Proximal Development. 

  • Each unit includes one read aloud with suggestions for before, during, and after reading. Materials recommend that the teacher select multiple texts to repeat the given strategies throughout the unit. “In most units of study, there are a few books threaded through the sequence of the unit. You could decide to substitute another book for any of the suggested demonstration texts (The Guide to Reading Workshop, 51).  

  • In The Guide to the Reading Workshop, page 51, the authors recommend that students have bags or boxes for storing their books for independent reading and work time during the Readers Workshop. The authors recommend that students fill their book bags or boxes with about ten books. It is these texts that students work with during their reading time; when a reader finishes one book, they move on to another book from their selection rather than immediately returning to the classroom library to swap out a book. Once a week, students should refresh their selections with books from the classroom library. The text states, “Throughout the week, children read and reread their collection of books. Reading volume is key, and it’s important to supply children with enough reading materials, including not just books, but also copies of shared reading texts, word wall words, and so on, to keep early readers going across longer stretches of time, both in school and at home.” Materials include a stamina chart for Grade 2. This chart shows the goal of 45 minutes of independent reading in one session. The guide does not include guidance on exposing students to a variety of texts.

  • In The Guide to the Reading Workshop, page 146, the authors indicate that teachers may select texts other than literary works for the Read Aloud, noting that the read aloud could be a meaningful way to bring content-area texts to life. The text states, “You can bring this magic to expository nonfiction as well as to narrative nonfiction. Reading aloud is one of the most effective ways to demonstrate that expository and narrative texts sound sound and feel different and are structured differently.”

  • In Reading Unit 2, An Orientation to the Unit, the authors recommend taking one or two days to expose students to informative text features such as graphs, charts, maps, models, and diagrams. The teacher does this by setting out examples of these text types, rather than whole books. Later, the students fill their book bins with informative texts from the classroom library.

• Instructional materials identify opportunities and supports for students to engage in a volume of reading. For example: 

  • Students pick 10 new books a week. In The Guide to the Reading Workshop, Chapter 6, a stamina chart is included. This chart shows the goal of 45 minutes of reading in one session. 

  • In The Guide to the Reading Workshop, page 51, the authors recommend that students have bags or boxes for storing their books for independent reading and work time during the Readers Workshop. The authors recommend that students fill their book bags or boxes with about ten books. It is these texts that students work with during their reading time; when a reader finishes one book, they move on to another book from their selection rather than immediately returning to the classroom library to swap out a book. Once a week, the students are to refresh their selections with books from the classroom library. The text states, “Throughout the week, children read and reread their collection of books. Reading volume is key, and it’s important to supply children with enough reading materials, including not just books, but also copies of shared reading texts, word wall words, and so on, to keep early readers going across longer stretches of time, both in school and at home.” 

  • In Unit 2, An Orientation to the Unit, the authors identify the teacher’s classroom library as a way to encourage students to engage in a volume of reading. The teacher is to ensure that the classroom library has enough informative texts so that each student can fill their book baggies with eight to ten informative texts each week. The author’s note that they wrote this unit, hoping that teachers would have classrooms with well-curated classroom libraries, stocked with plenty of informative texts for all students. However, the authors offer other options for teachers whose classroom libraries do not have enough informative texts. Options include: suggesting that students read both fiction and informative texts, encouraging that students share texts, and proposing that classrooms share collections of informative texts.

  • In Unit 1, the teacher encourages students to engage in a volume of reading by teaching students that they can become stronger readers by setting goals and striving to read more everyday. The teacher guides the students in setting reasonable goals for their reading time. The teacher shows students that it usually takes about five minutes to read shorter, easier books; longer, more complex books usually take about 45 minutes to read. The teacher asks the students to estimate the number of books they should be able to read during a 25 minute independent reading session. Students reading shorter books should be able to read five each day, while students who choose longer books should be able to read one each day. The teacher says, “Readers remember that today, our class goal is to read for not just twenty minutes, but for twenty-five minutes. Remember, you are the boss of your reading. You can decide not just how to read, but also, how much to read. To get stronger as a reader, set a goal. How many books will you read today? Then, work toward that goal.”

  • In Unit 1, the authors recommend implementing student book logs as a way to track students’ reading and encourage volume and stamina. The sample book login Session 3 includes the date and title of the text. There are also columns where students are to indicate whether they read the text at school or at home, and check boxes to indicate that they finished the book and reread the book.

  • In Unit 4, An Orientation to the Unit, the authors recommend that the teacher monitor students’ volume and engagement during the reading workshop. The teacher is to take care to observe and monitor the volume, stamina, and engagement levels of students who may be reading below grade level.

• There is limited teacher guidance to foster independence for all readers. (eg. Proposed schedule, racking system for independent reading, independent reading procedures are included in the lessons.) For example: 

  • In The Guide to the Reading Workshop, Chapter 5, there is a sample schedule for the day including Reading Workshop. The entire reading workshop is 45 minutes which includes a 10 minute mini lesson. The other 35 minutes is for independent reading, partner reading, small group lessons, and individual conferences with the teacher. Shared Reading and Read-Aloud are not included in the Reading Workshop time. There are separate allotted times on the schedule for these. 

  • Students pick 10 new books a week. The Guide to the Reading Workshop, Chapter 6, includes a stamina chart. This chart shows the goal of 45 minutes of reading in one session. 

  • Teachers track independent reading growth by doing running records. An independent reading level is determined by the running record and teachers differentiate reading texts based on these levels. The Guide to The Reading Workshop, Chapter 6, informs how to assess using running records and Chapter 14 gives information on how to differentiate for students.  

  • In The Guide to the Reading Workshop, page 51, the authors recommend that students have bags or boxes for storing their books for independent reading and work time during the Readers Workshop. The authors recommend that students fill their book bags or boxes with about ten books. It is these texts that students work with during their reading time; when a reader finishes one book, they move on to another book from their selection rather than immediately returning to the classroom library to swap out a book. Once a week, the students should refresh their selections with books from the classroom library. The text states, “Throughout the week, children read and reread their collection of books. Reading volume is key, and it’s important to supply children with enough reading materials, including not just books, but also copies of shared reading texts, word wall words, and so on, to keep early readers going across longer stretches of time, both in school and at home.” 

  • In The Guide to the Reading Workshop, page 52, the authors recommend having students in Grade 2 engage in both independent reading and partner reading during each independent work time, but with more emphasis on independent reading. 

  • In Reading Unit 1, the authors recommend implementing student book logs as a way to track students’ reading and encourage volume and stamina. The sample book login Session 3 includes the date and title of the text. The book log also contains columns where students indicate whether they read the text at school or at home, and check boxes to indicate that they finished the book and reread the book.

  • In Reading Unit 2, An Orientation to the Unit, materials identify the teacher’s classroom library as a way to encourage students to engage in a volume of reading. The teacher should ensure that the classroom library has enough informative texts so that each student can fill their book baggies with eight to ten informative texts each week. The author’s note that they wrote this unit, hoping that teachers would have classrooms with well-curated classroom libraries, stocked with plenty of informative texts for all students. However, the authors offer other options for teachers whose classroom libraries do not have enough informative texts. Options include: suggesting that students read both fiction and informative texts, encouraging that students share texts, and proposing that classrooms share collections of informative texts.

  • In Reading Unit 3, the teacher introduces a new book log to students. The teacher tells students that they can decide whether they would like to keep track of page numbers or just when they begin and finish texts. The sample book login Session 1 includes columns for the date, title, number of minutes read, and parent’s initials. The book log also contains a box to indicate whether the students read at school or at home.

  • In Reading Unit 4, An Orientation to the Unit, materials recommend that the teacher monitor students’ volume and engagement during the reading workshop. Guidance directs the teacher to take care to observe and monitor the volume, stamina, and engagement levels of students who may be reading below grade level.

  • In the Reading Unit Guides, for each lesson, there is a “Link” that tells what the teacher says to start independent reading time. There is a reminder of what the students learned in the lesson and to use it when reading. Often, the teacher reminds students to use the anchor chart from the lesson while independently reading. 

  • In The Guide to Reading Workshop, page 51, independent reading is part of the reading workshop model. After the mini lesson, “You say those all-important words, ‘Off you go!’ and then students turn to their ongoing reading work”  For Grade 2, this “means that readers get their self-chosen, just-right books out of their book baffies or their table tubs, and they settle down to read.”

  • In The Guide to the Reading Workshop, pages 96–98, the authors describe a variety of ideas and strategies for managing reading time during Reading Workshop. For example, the text states, “Sometimes you may disperse children by saying, ‘If you are going to be doing (one kind of work), get going. If you are going to be doing (another kind of work), get going. If you are not certain what goals you can work toward today and what strategies you can try using and need some help, stay here and I’ll work with you. Soon you’ll be leading a small group of children who’ve identified themselves as needing more direction.”

  • In Reading Unit 1, the unit book recommends that the teacher assign reading partners for practice time during the mini lesson. The students also sit with their partners during independent reading time. They first read on their own, back-to-back, and then read together, shoulder-to-shoulder.

The materials reviewed for Grade 2 partially meet the criteria of Indicator 1i.

Materials include process writing; however, materials include limited opportunities for on-demand writing. When on-demand writing is included in a session, it is usually a suggestion or choice, not a requirement. The on-demand prompts in Writing Pathways are the same across K-2. Additionally, on-demand writing prompts are not text-based. During process writing, students write about topics and ideas they choose within that genre throughout the units. The Guide to the Writing Workshop states, “Children will especially invest themselves in writing if they write about subjects that are important to them. The easiest way to support investment in writing is to teach children to choose their own topics most of the time.”  The digital resources include anchor charts and checklists for student references during the writing process. The resources are meant for the teacher to project and are not accessed directly by students. 

• Materials do not include on-demand writing opportunities that cover a year’s worth of instruction. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

  • The Writing and Reading Units do not contain on-demand writing tasks. The focus in the Writing Units is on process writing.

  • The Guide to the Writing Workshop, pages 5-6, explains that baseline and benchmark assessments for each type of writing are on-demand writing tasks.

  • In Writing Pathways, an example of an on-demand prompt for opinion writing includes: “Think of a topic or issue that you know and care about, an issue around which you have strong feelings. Tomorrow, you will have forty-five minutes to write an opinion or argument text in which you will write your opinion or claim and tell reasons why you feel that way. When you do this, draw on everything you know about essays, persuasive letters, and reviews. If you want to find and use information from a book or another outside source, you may bring that with you tomorrow. Please keep in mind that you’ll have forty-five minutes to complete this, so you will need to plan, draft, revise, and edit in one setting.”

  • In Writing Pathways, an example of an on-demand prompt for informational writing includes: “Think of a topic that you’ve studied or that you know a lot about. Tomorrow, you will have forty-five minutes to write an informational [or all-about] text that teaches others interesting and important information and ideas about that topic. If you want to find and use information from a book or another outside source to help you with this writing, you may bring that with you tomorrow. Please keep in mind that you’ll have only forty-five minutes to complete this. You will only have this one period, so you’ll need to plan, draft, revise, and edit in one sitting. Write in a way that shows all that you know about information writing.” 

  • In Writing Pathways, an example of an on-demand prompt for narrative writing include: “I’m really eager to understand what you can do as writers of narratives, or stories, so today, will you please write the best personal narrative, the best Small Moment story, that you can write? Make this be the story one time in your life. You might focus on just a scene or two. You’ll have only forty-five minutes to write this true story, so you’ll need to plan, draft, revise, and edit in one sitting. Write in a way that allows you to show off all you know about narrative writing.” 

• Materials include process writing opportunities that cover a year’s worth of instruction. Opportunities for students to revise and edit are provided. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

  • In Writing, Unit 1, Session 3, the teacher demonstrates how to plan a narrative that tells the story of a small moment. The teacher tells students that writers rehearse the parts of a story by planning each part. The teacher models how to plan a story by naming the main events and listing them on their fingers and then by jotting down a few key words on each page of the draft. The teacher models planning their narrative across five pages of the model draft. The teacher also models writing the first page of the model draft, including a beginning, middle, and end of that page. Next, the students work in pairs to practice planning their own narrative across their fingers. They also tell their partners what key words they would write on paper. At the end of the mini-lesson, the teacher reminds students that they can use any of these strategies when planning their own narrative texts.

  • In Writing, Unit 1, Session 10, the teacher shows students that writers can study mentor texts for an author's craft and then practice imitating the author's strategies. In the previous lesson, the teacher and students analyzed the author’s craft in Owl Moon by Jane Yolen. The teacher reviews the class-created anchor chart, noting some of the descriptive language that Jane Yolen used. The teacher models adding rich descriptions and comparisons to the model draft, noting how the revisions help the reader better imagine the setting. Next, the students help the teacher add more descriptions to the model draft, working to emphasize feelings. At the end of the mini-lesson, the teacher instructs students to examine their own narrative drafts, identifying places where they might add descriptions and comparisons in order to help the reader feel like they are present in the story. The teacher instructs the students to work on their revisions during their independent writing time.

  • In Writing, Unit 2, Session 4, the teacher guides students in learning how to write a conclusion for a model lab report. The teacher displays and reads aloud the conclusion of an exemplar text and asks students to discuss their observations. The teacher charts the students’ observations, resulting in an anchor chart that lists the characteristics of conclusions for lab reports. At the end of the mini-lesson, the teacher instructs students to revise and extend the conclusions of their own lab report drafts.  

  • In Writing, Unit 2, Session 12, the teacher shows students how to rehearse and plan an informative draft. The teacher models how to list ideas across fingers, jot notes on pages, and make quick sketches. The teacher also models listing aloud the ideas that should be included on each page before moving on to the next. In the Active Engagement portion of the lesson, the students work in partners to rehearse planning the sections of their own informative booklets. At the end of the mini-lesson, the teacher instructs students to start sketching or jotting notes to record their plans. 

  • In Writing, Unit 3, Session 10, students edit their writing by adding capital letters. 

  • In Writing, Unit 3, Session 11, the students publish their opinion letters about books they have read. In the mini-lesson, the teacher and students study parts of the mentor text, Mercy Watson to the Rescue by Kate DiCamillo, to look for extra features that the students could include in their own published pieces. 

  • In Writing, Unit 4, Session 3, the teacher shows students how to brainstorm the topic of a poem by thinking about big ideas or feelings, and then thinking about specific small moments that give them that feeling. Next, the students and teacher work as a group to write a shared class poem on the topic of listening to a book. The teacher first guides students in thinking of the feeling they have about listening to a book, and then guides the students in describing the details associated with their feeling, and records them on a chart. The result is a class poem featuring the students’ own words and phrases. At the end of the mini-lesson, the teacher reminds students that they can write new poems or revise other poems using details about small moments that connect to big feelings. 

• Materials include digital resources where appropriate. For example:

  • Online materials include a suggested scope and sequence for writing, as well as Anchor Charts and paper choices for student writing. 

  • The digital resources include anchor charts and checklists for student references during the writing process. The resources are designed for the teacher to project and are not accessed directly by students.

The materials reviewed for Grade 2 partially meet  the criteria of Indicator 1j.

The Grade 2 materials provide multiple opportunities across the school year for students to learn, practice, and apply different genres/modes/types of writing. In Grade 2, there are four core units addressing narrative, opinion, and informative writing. Grade 2 students write poetry, lab reports, procedural writing, book reviews, and narratives. However, the genres are not distributed throughout the school year as students will only practice each for a few weeks at a time. While the Grade 2 suggested scope and sequence does have narrative, informative, and opinion writing spread out across the year, this sequence does include one unit from Grade 1.  There is only one Opinion Writing Unit if teachers do not include the second If/Then Unit. Grade 2 has an emphasis on writer’s craft, details, and explanations. Additionally, the materials do not indicate how many sessions to teach in a week. Many lessons do include a text as a model or example. Other lessons use teacher or student writing as the model. 

• Materials provide multiple opportunities across the school year for students to learn, practice, and apply different genres/modes/types of writing that reflect the distribution required by the standards. However, different genres/modes/types of writing are not evenly distributed throughout the school year. Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

  • Students have opportunities to engage in opinion writing. 

    • Writing Unit 3 is focused on opinion writing and contains 19 sessions. In Unit 3, students write opinions about book characters, their favorite parts of books, and lessons of the stories. Students provide reasons for their opinions and evidence from the text. Students also write persuasive essays about their favorite books, explaining why that book should win an award. 

    • In Writing Unit 3, Session 11, students publish their opinion letters about books they have read. In the mini-lesson, the teacher and students study parts of the mentor text, Mercy Watson to the Rescue by Kate DiCamillo, to look for extra features that the students could include in their own published pieces. For example, the students notice that the mentor text includes decorations, illustrations, maps, and interesting fonts that help show meaning.

    • In Writing Unit 3, Session 12, students begin writing award nominations for their favorite books. In the mini-lesson, the teacher guides students in the steps of writing a book award nomination. Next, the students work with partners to rehearse plans for their own book nominations. At the end of the mini-lesson, the teacher instructs students to begin drafting their book award nominations, reminding them to support their opinions with reasons and details. 

    • In Writing Pathways, materials include the following on-demand prompt for opinion writing: “Think of a topic or issue that you know and care about, an issue around which you have strong feelings. Tomorrow, you will have forty-five minutes to write an opinion or argument text in which you will write your opinion or claim and tell reasons why you feel that way. When you do this, draw on everything you know about essays, persuasive letters, and reviews. If you want to find and use information from a book or another outside source, you may bring that with you tomorrow. Please keep in mind that you’ll have forty-five minutes to complete this, so you will need to plan, draft, revise, and edit in one setting.”

  • Students have opportunities to engage in informative/explanatory writing. 

    • Writing Unit 2 is focused on informative writing and contains 19 sessions. Lessons in this unit focus on writing about science, procedural writing, and writing lab reports. In Unit 2, students write lab reports recording the steps in science experiments, procedural writing, and information books. 

    • The If/Then Writing unit “The How-To Guide for Nonfiction Writing” contains 19 sessions. In this unit, students write different types of nonfiction books. 

    • In Writing Unit 2, Session 4, the teacher guides students in learning how to write a conclusion for a model lab report. The teacher displays and reads aloud the conclusion of an exemplar text, and asks students to discuss their observations. The teacher charts the students’ observations, resulting in an anchor chart that lists the characteristics of conclusions for lab reports. At the end of the mini-lesson, the teacher instructs students to revise the conclusions of their own lab report drafts.  

    • In Writing Unit 2, Session 5, the teacher teaches students that scientists conduct research and revise their writing based on what they learn. The teacher models how to synthesize information from two brief texts about Forces and Motion. The teacher guides students in selecting information that applies to their own drafts of lab reports. The students work in partners to discuss how to add this information to their drafts. The teacher also prompts the students to discuss which specific parts of their drafts where they would add the new information.

    • In Writing Pathways, materials include the following on-demand prompt for informational writing: “Think of a topic that you’ve studied or that you know a lot about. Tomorrow, you will have forty-five minutes to write an informational [or all-about] text that teaches others interesting and important information and ideas about that topic. If you want to find and use information from a book or another outside source to help you with this writing, you may bring that with you tomorrow. Please keep in mind that you’ll have only forty-five minutes to complete this. You will only have this one period, so you’ll need to plan, draft, revise, and edit in one sitting. Write in a way that shows all that you know about information writing.” 

  • Students have opportunities to engage in narrative writing. 

    • Writing Unit 1 is focused on narrative writing and contains 19 sessions. In Unit 1, students study mentor texts to improve writer’s craft such as focusing on small moments, powerful endings, imagery, tension, and literary language.

    • Writing Unit 4 is focused on poetry writing and contains 17 sessions. In Unit 4, students learn to write poetry that evoke feelings, reflect moods, have patterns, and make comparisons. Students experiment with different poetry structures. 

    • In Writing Unit 1, Session 3, the teacher demonstrates how to plan a narrative that tells the story of a small moment. The teacher tells students that writers rehearse the parts of a story by planning each part. The teacher models how to plan a story by naming the main events and listing them on their fingers and then by jotting down a few key words on each page of the draft. The teacher models planning their narrative across five pages of the model draft. The teacher also models writing the first page of the model draft, including a beginning, middle, and end of that page. Next, the students work in pairs to practice planning their own narrative across their fingers. They also tell their partners what key words they would write on paper. At the end of the mini-lesson, the teacher reminds students that they can use any of these strategies when planning their own narrative texts.

    • In Writing Unit 4, Session 9, the teacher demonstrates including comparisons in poetry in order to make meaning. The teacher guides students in revising a selection of ordinary phrases by including comparative language. The students also work with partners to revise the selections. At the end of the mini-lesson, the teacher reminds students that they can include comparative language in anything they write, including poetry, in order to help readers feel, see, and hear what they are saying.

    • In Writing Pathways, materials include the following on-demand prompt for narrative writing: “I’m really eager to understand what you can do as writers of narratives, or stories, so today, will you please write the best personal narrative, the best Small Moment story, that you can write? Make this be the story one time in your life. You might focus on just a scene or two. You’ll have only forty-five minutes to write this true story, so you’ll need to plan, draft, revise, and edit in one sitting. Write in a way that allows you to show off all you know about narrative writing.” 

• Where appropriate, writing opportunities are connected to texts and/or text sets (either as prompts, models, anchors, or supports). Examples include, but are not limited to, the following:

  • In Writing  Unit 1, Session 10, the teacher shows students that writers can study mentor texts for an author's craft and then practice imitating the author's strategies. In the previous lesson, the teacher and students analyzed the author’s craft in Owl Moon by Jane Yolen. The teacher reviews the class-created anchor chart, noting some of the descriptive language that Jane Yolen used. The teacher models adding rich descriptions and comparisons to the model draft, noting how the revisions help the reader better imagine the setting. The teacher also reminds students that they are not copying exact comparisons from Owl Moon, because those would not make sense in the model draft about discovering that the class goldfish had died. Rather, they are using Jane Yolen’s strategy of descriptive language in order to make the draft feel more realistic. Next, the students help the teacher add more descriptions to the model draft, working to emphasize feelings. At the end of the mini-lesson, the teacher instructs students to examine their own narrative drafts, identifying places where they might add descriptions and comparisons in order to help the reader feel like they are present in the story. 

  • In Writing Unit 2, Session 2, the teacher and students study a mentor text in order to learn about procedural writing. The text is “Floating and Sinking” in Forces and Motion (Hands-on Science), by John Graham. The teacher reads the text aloud, and students consider the guiding questions and think about the text’s structure. The students share their observations with partners, and then the teacher charts their observations. The result is an anchor chart that lists the characteristics of scientific procedural writing. At the end of the mini-lesson, the teacher instructs students to rewrite a draft of their own procedures page, this time incorporating characteristics from the mentor text.  

  • In  Writing Unit 3, Session 9, the teacher models how to gather evidence to support an opinion about the text, Pinky and Rex and the Bully by James Howe. The teacher shows how to locate details in the text in order to support the opinion that Pinky is unsure of himself. The teacher also models adding evidence to the model draft. Next, the teacher and students practice searching for more evidence in an excerpt of the text. Then, the students and teacher work together to add the evidence to the model draft. At the end of the mini-lesson, the teacher reminds students to use text evidence to support their opinions in their own drafts.

  • In Writing Unit 4, Session 6, the teacher demonstrates revising a poem in order to make its language more precise. The teacher uses a draft of a model poem to demonstrate rereading and thinking aloud about word choice, circling words that seem too vague. The teacher also models substituting more precise words. The teacher debriefs students, listing replicable steps they can take to use more precise language in their poems. Next, the teacher reads another model poem. The students work in pairs to practice brainstorming alternative words or phrases to substitute for vague words in the poem. The teacher charts the students’ ideas. At the end of the mini-lesson, the teacher reminds students that they can try using precise words in their own drafts of poems.

  • In Writing Unit 4, Session 11, the teacher and students study two mentor poems, “Maples in October” by Amy Ludwig VanDderwater and “Destiny” by Kristine O’Connell George, with different structures in order to learn new strategies for writing their own poetry.

The materials reviewed for Grade 2 partially meet the criteria for materials including explicit instruction of the grammar and conventions standards for grade level as applied in increasingly sophisticated contexts, with opportunities for application both in and out of context. 

Materials include limited explicit instruction in grammar and convention standards. Some grammar and usage conventions lack explicit instruction, i.e., using reflexive pronouns. Other conventions, i.e., choosing whether to use an adjective or an adverb and using commas in greetings and closing of letters are not fully addressed. Based on the description of the Reading and Writing Workshop provided in each Unit of Study, the teacher and individual students may address some of the grammar concepts not explicitly taught in the materials during conferring guided by student writing samples. Students work individually and meet with partners and groups to investigate their writing to determine where and if a standard can be integrated into their writings. Students are encouraged to modify or expand their personal writing to include the standard. Some standards are addressed in the Small Groups to Support Phonics sessions; however, these are not necessarily taught to all students. Additionally, some grammar concepts evident in the reading, writing, or phonics materials are not evident across the materials. There are some opportunities for students to write sentences in and out of context; however, these opportunities do not relate to all grammar and convention standards.

Materials do not include explicit instruction of all grammar and conventions standards for the grade level.

• Materials contain one example of explicit instruction designed to teach students to use collective nouns. 

  • In Phonics, Small Groups to Support Phonics, Small Group 34, the teacher uses sample collective nouns such as choir, flock, pack, cast, and class to introduce the idea of collective nouns. The teacher reminds students to use the same action words used to tell what one person is doing when they tell what a whole group is doing. Students practice using collective nouns by editing a sample piece of student writing 

• Materials contain one example of explicit instruction designed to teach students to form and use frequently occurring irregular plural nouns. Instruction occurs in a small group, so it is not guaranteed that all students will receive instruction in this standard. 

  • In Phonics, Small Groups to Support Phonics, Small Group 18, the teacher tells students there are words that cannot add -s or -es to make them plural. Students use word cards that show matching singular and plural nouns. These cards include the irregular plurals fish, mice, children, and moose. Students group the cards into similar categories and work with the teacher to create a “Tips for Making Plurals” chart that includes, “Sometimes there’s no change,” and “Once in a while, the word totally changes.”

• Materials do not contain explicit instruction designed to teach students to use reflexive pronouns.

• Materials contain limited explicit instruction designed to teach students to form and use the past tense of frequently occurring irregular verbs. For example: 

  • In Phonics, Unit 2, Session 13, the teacher writes the words write, give, and freeze and models adding ed to write. The teacher displays the sentences, I gived you the note, and The puddle freezed in the winter. Students work with partners to read the sentences and decide how to make the words sound right. Students make corrections to the words. 

  • In Phonics, Small Groups to Support Phonics, Small Group 35, the teacher explains there are irregular verbs that do not change to past tense with the addition of -ed. The teacher models the word get and asks how the word changes in past tense. Students work with a partner to sort regular and irregular words.

• Materials contain limited explicit instruction designed to teach students to use adjectives and adverbs. However, materials do not contain explicit instruction designed to teach students to choose between them depending on what is being modified. For example:

  • In Phonics, Unit 2, Session 17, the teacher models the ending -ly by reviewing words containing -ly and using each in a sentence. The teacher explains that words ending in -ly describe how an action happened. Students read through their nonfiction writing to find examples of where the use of an -ly word could be used. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 4, Session 5, the teacher uses adjectives with similar meanings to model the creation of a word thermometer to provide examples of words with varying meanings, e.g., grouchy, mad, angry, furious. Students receive packs of similar words to rank and justify why each should go in a specific order.

• Materials contain limited explicit instruction designed to teach students to produce, expand, and rearrange complete simple and compound sentences. For example: 

  • In Writing, Unit 1, Session 9, the teacher uses an excerpt from Jane Yolen’s Owl Moon to teach building sentences with repetition. The teacher reads three pages aloud that repeat the sentence beginning “When you go owling. . .” Students share observations. The teacher guides students to notice that each sentence starts the same way, then ends differently. The teacher tells students that repetition highlights the big idea of the book. Students talk with partners about the big idea of their writing and how they could use repetition to build sentences. 

  • In Writing, Unit 2, Session 6, the teacher models combining many short sentences into a list and using commas to make a longer sentence. Students check their writing to see if they have any possible lists. 

• Materials contain some explicit instruction designed to teach students to capitalize holidays, product names, and geographic names. For example:

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 10, students compare the way a kindergartener uses capital letters and the way a principal uses capital letters. The teacher highlights the comparison as a way to point out the different uses of capital letters. The teacher creates a chart of when students use capital letters: start of sentences, start of a name of person or place, start and end of a letter, the word I, start of dates, and titles and names of products. Students review their writing to revise their use of capital letters. 

  • In Writing, Unit 3, Session 10, the teacher shares a letter with students and poses questions to students on why the writer uses capital letters in the places that the writer does. The teacher and students make a chart called We Use Capitals in our Writing. Students go back to their writing during the Writing Workshop and edit their writing for use of capital letters.

• Materials contain one example of explicit instruction designed to teach students to use commas in greetings and closings of letters.

  • In Writing, Unit 3, Session 1, students write letters about a favorite book to a different class. The teacher models letter writing, then students work independently. While writing, the teacher pauses work to notice a student who has included a greeting and a closing. The teacher reads the greeting and closing aloud and points out the commas after the greeting and closing. Students add greetings and closings with commas to their letters. 

• Materials contain limited explicit instruction designed to teach students to use an apostrophe to form contractions and frequently occurring possessives. For example:

  • In Writing, Unit 2, Session 18, the teacher shares an editing checklist for students to use when preparing a piece of writing for publication. The checklist includes, “When I use words such as can’t and don’t, I put in the apostrophe.” The teacher models using the checklist to edit a piece of writing that includes misspellings of you’re and it’s. Students use the checklist to edit their own writing. 

  • In Phonics, Small Groups to Support Phonics, Small Group 10, the teacher provides an overview of the use and overuse of the apostrophe. Students sort word cards based on how the apostrophe is used in the word, i.e., contractions, possessives, plurals. The teacher shows examples of words using apostrophes. Students talk to a partner about whether the apostrophe was used correctly in the word. Students then look at their own writing for the appropriate use of apostrophes.

• Materials contain explicit instruction designed to teach students to generalize learned spelling patterns when writing words. For example:

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 2, the teacher models using the name Nate and changing it to the word nat by taking away the silent e. Students practice identifying and writing words with short and long vowels. Students use say and spell cards to identify words and practice making words that end with e and do not end with e. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 2, Session 10, the teacher reviews the ice pattern with a page from a previous lesson’s text, “Knight School.” Students read the page with a partner and find ice words. The teacher introduces another powerful pattern, soft ge. The teacher displays a page of the lesson text, “Camouflage” and reads the word advantage while pointing under it. The teacher makes a list of other age words, including message, luggage, courage, age, page, and cage. The teacher points out that some -age words have a long a sound, while others do not. Students work with partners to write the words stage, village, and savage. 

• Materials contain limited explicit instruction designed to teach students to consult reference materials, including beginning dictionaries, as needed to check and correct spellings. For example:

  • In Phonics, Unit 2, Session 5, the teacher reviews strategies for students to check their spellings. The teacher tells students that “when all else fails, you look it up by asking a friend, using a dictionary, or search engine.” Students are challenged to use a dictionary quickly and efficiently to find the words they need. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 3, Session 5, the teacher demonstrates how to use guide words to quickly find words in the dictionary to check spelling. The teacher models one word, and table groups practice a second word. 

• Materials contain limited explicit instruction designed to teach students to compare formal and informal uses of English. For example:

  • In Reading, Unit 3, Session 7, the teacher models thought prompts to help students understand and use formal English. Thought prompts include “The author could have just written....but instead s/he wrote…” or "I think the reason s/he wrote it this way is to show..." Students turn and share their thinking with a partner noting the need to be alert to instances when the author used special language. 

  • In Phonics, Small Groups to Support Phonics, Small Group 11, students study troublemaker contractions to work on spelling difficult contractions. Students write a script that uses their troublemaker contractions. The teacher tells the students that using contractions will make the language sound more casual, “like real friends are talking.” 

• Materials include some opportunities for students to demonstrate application of skills both in- and out-of-context. For example: 

  • In Writing, Unit 1, Session 18, students use the “How Did I Make My Writing Easy to Read?” checklist to edit a piece of their own writing for publication. The teacher models how to use common spelling patterns to correct misspelled words. Students practice with the word restaurant, and the teacher verbalizes the process as they spell the word on whiteboards. Students edit their writing for spelling errors. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 3, Session 11, the teacher “discovers” the class mascot eating pie. The teacher writes the word pie, and students observe that it has a long i sound at the end of the word. They notice that the long i sound is spelled ie. Students name words that rhyme with pie, and the teacher records them on a chart, sorting them into -ie, -y, -igh, and -i words. The teacher tells students that most words with long i have a y at the end, but there are other spelling patterns that can help spell words. Students write silly poems using long i words that rhyme with pie, practicing using the correct spelling pattern. 

The materials reviewed for Grade 2 partially meet the criteria for materials, questions, and tasks directly teach foundational skills to build reading acquisition by providing systematic and explicit instruction in phonological awareness (K-1) and phonics.

Materials provide explicit instruction in many areas of phonics presented in a sequence of skills that begins with a review of short and long vowels and transitions into more complex phonics skills such as varied vowel teams, multisyllabic words, and use of prefixes and suffixes. While the materials provide opportunities for the teacher to model all of the grade level phonics standards, the sessions are designed in an implicit narrative format in that the students are provided with information related to grade-level phonics standards. Session lessons begin with a mini-lesson on a specific skill and concept. Instruction is explicit; however, materials lack repetition and systematic opportunities for students to hear, say, encode, and read words with the newly taught phonics patterns. Instead students are encouraged to use a newly presented strategy when they encounter words in their books or want to use a word in their writing. While these opportunities may naturally surface in the context of reading and writing workshop, the writing and reading units do not explicitly support the development of the specific phonics skills through targeted instruction and practice. 

• Materials contain limited explicit teacher modeling designed to teach students to distinguish long and short vowels when reading regularly spelled one-syllable words. For example:

  • In Phonics Unit 1, Session 2, the teacher reviews how silent e changes vowel sounds. The teacher writes the name Nate and models reading the word letter by letter, exaggerating the short a sound. The teacher thinks aloud about the final e and models how it changes the sound to a long a. The teacher shows students the vowel chart that contains picture clues for the long and short vowel sounds of a, e, i, o, u. In partners, students write the name Mike and make observations about the long i sound. The teacher says the words easel, face, nose, chin, cheek, thumb, and elbow. Students use designated hand signals to show whether the vowel sound is short or long. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 3, the teacher rereads the first two pages of a previously read book called Those Darn Squirrels. The teacher cues the students to look at how words work in the book by identifying different word types, i.e., long vowel and short vowel words. The teacher emphasizes that students can practice phonics by analyzing the words within the text. 

• Materials contain limited explicit teacher modeling designed to teach students to know spelling-sound correspondences for additional common vowel teams. For example:

  • In Phonics, Unit 2, Session 7, the teacher models spelling the same word using two different spellings and choosing the spelling that looks right. The teacher says and records the words rain and plane. Students observe that they make the same vowel sound but are spelled differently. The teacher makes rain and plane headings for a list of long a words and models spelling crain under rain, and crane under plane. The teacher thinks aloud to choose the correct spelling based on which one looks right, then crosses out the incorrect spelling. The teacher continues the process with explain, and models checking the correct spelling with a dictionary.

  • In Phonics, Unit 2, Session 13, the teacher tells students that long o can be spelled different ways. The teacher shows students word cards with the words joke, boat, grow, and robot, points out the long o spelling in each, and posts the cards as heading words in a pocket chart. The teacher “discovers” a basket of long o word cards left by the class mascot and distributes a word card to each student. Students sort themselves into four groups based on the common long o pattern on their word cards. Students read and study the word cards in groups, noticing where the long o sound occurs in the word. Students generate and share a spelling tip for their long o pattern based on its location in the word. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 3, Session 16, the teacher shares with students the importance of decoding tricky words to keep vowel teams together. The teacher cues students that when words are extra long, they should chip away at it one little part at a time. The teacher states students have to be extra careful not to break apart the vowel teams. The teacher reviews all of the possible vowel teams from the 2nd-grade vowel team chart. The students first work with the teacher and then with partners to methodically snip apart big words, keeping vowel teams together. 

• Materials contain limited explicit teacher modeling designed to teach students to decode regularly spelled two-syllable words with long vowels. For example:

  • In Phonics, Unit 2, Session 15, the teacher tells students they can use vowel patterns to read words. The teacher builds and displays the word meanwhile and models trying to decode it letter by letter. The teacher thinks aloud that the way to read this word is to break the word into bigger parts and look for vowel patterns, then models decoding mean and while, then putting them together. 

  • In Phonics, Small Groups to Support Phonics, Small Group 25, the teacher shares how reading long words is like solving a puzzle cube in that you try a lot of vowel sounds to figure them out. The teacher and students together look at word cards with long words and practice trying to read them in different ways with different vowel sounds. The teacher models with the word release.

• Materials contain limited explicit teacher modeling designed to teach students to decode words with common prefixes and suffixes. For example:

  • In Phonics, Unit 4, Session 13, the teacher presents the word unfair. Students are asked to think about whether unfair is a compound word or not. The teacher then shares that prefixes are word parts that attach to the beginning of words. Students read sentences with and without prefixes, acting out both versions. The teacher emphasizes how adding a prefix changes the meaning of the word. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 4, Session 17, the teacher models how suffixes such as -ing, -ly, -ed, and est change the meaning of words. Students use cards with suffixes and base words to spell a new word and then generate a sentence with the new word.

• Materials contain limited explicit teacher modeling designed to teach students to identify words with inconsistent but common spelling-sound correspondences. For example:

  • In Phonics, Unit 3, Session 16, the teacher builds and displays the word ready. Students make observations about the word, and the teacher highlights that the ea pattern makes a short e sound in this word. The teacher tells students that vowel teams usually make a certain sound, but readers need to be flexible and try both the long and short vowel sounds. Students study the words ceiling and guitar. The teacher posts the word ready on the word wall with a reminder note to try vowel teams in many ways.

  • In Phonics, Unit 3, Session 18, the teacher tells students that the word part -ture is found at the end of many big words, usually representing the sound /chər/. The teacher posts the word card adventure, reads the word, and leads students through studying the word parts. Students use the -ture ending to spell the word nature. The teacher places word cards for furniture, creature, miniature, and sculpture in a pocket chart. Students read the words in partners, then think of other words with a /chər/ ending. The teacher guides students to notice that words that end in -ch, like teacher, will usually add -er rather than use the -ture ending. 

• Lessons provide teachers with limited systematic and repeated instruction for students to hear, say, encode, and read each newly taught grade-level phonics pattern. Although the lessons provide the teacher with instructions related to teaching students to hear, say, encode and read each newly taught grade-level phonics pattern, there is limited repeated instruction. Students are encouraged to use a newly presented strategy when encountering words in their books or using a word in their writing. For example:

  • In Phonics, Unit 3, Session 6, the teacher reviews the process of learning how to spell the words you love step by step. The teacher instructs students to choose a word, write it, clap it, study the parts and zoom in on the troublemaker parts, ask, “do I know something about phonics to help with hard parts?” and then spell it without thinking. Finally, students should check it. 

The materials reviewed for Grade 2 partially meet the criteria for Indicator 1n.iii.

Grade 2 materials include a limited scope and sequence of skills. Although there is no clear scope and sequence related to the standards addressed, A Guide to the Phonics Unit of Study provides an overview of the philosophy principles undergirding the phonics curriculum and an explanation of the skills presented. While the materials cite other programs, there is a lack of a research-based rationale for the order of phonics sequence. The instructional sequence of phonics skills, including digraphs, final e and vowel teams, decoding multisyllabic words, and inflectional endings, is not explicit due to the narrative structure of the daily lessons. Additionally, the materials lack repetition and systematic opportunities for students to hear, say, encode, and read words with the newly taught phonics patterns. Practice is usually guided by the teacher with students directed to try the same thing in their independent reading, which does not guarantee that the students will encounter the newly taught skill. The phonics units are loosely paired with the reading and writing units. While these units provide opportunities for application, the transfer of phonics skills to lessons in the reading and writing units is not explicit. The use of a given phonics skill may naturally surface in the context of the Reading and Writing Workshop, but the writing and reading units do not explicitly support the development of the specific phonics skills through targeted instruction and practice. 

• Lessons provide students with limited opportunities to decode (phonemes, onset and rime, and/or syllables) phonetically spelled words. For example:

  • Decode regularly spelled two-syllable words with long vowels. For example:

    • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 2, the teacher reminds students that words can be divided into syllables. Students first read a copy of “Fantastic Spiders” and then decode and encode regularly spelled words with long and short vowels.

    • In Phonics, Unit 2, Session 4, the teacher explains that double consonants in the middle of a word helps readers break the word into parts. The teacher tells students that if you break a word between double consonants, the vowel in the first part of the word usually makes a short sound. The teacher models dividing the word dinner into syllables and using a short i sound. The teacher posts the word diner and models using a long i sound. The teacher repeats the process with the words hopping and hoping. Students practice in pairs with supper, super, tapping, taping, nodded, tiger, letter, later, penny, tiny, puppet, and robot. 

    • In Phonics, Small Groups to Support Phonics, Small Group 25, the teacher shares how when reading long words, it is like solving a puzzle cube that you try a lot of vowel sounds to figure out. The teacher and students together look at word cards with long words and practice trying to read them in different ways with different vowel sounds. The teacher models with the word, release. They continue practicing saying the longer words with varying vowel sounds, e.g., opening, unfrozen, loose, rattling, scattered, remember, magnificent. Students then read a poem a few times using their vowel knowledge to figure out tricky words. The teacher coaches students while reading the poem. 

  • Decode words with common prefixes and suffixes. For example:

    • In Phonics, Unit 2, Session 3, students name word endings they know. The teacher generates a “Common Word Endings” chart containing -ing, -ed, -s, -es, and -er. The teacher tells students to pay attention to word endings when breaking words into parts to decode them. Students practice reading the words buttoning, customer, galloped, happening, signaled, publisher, borrowed, and entertaining. 

    • In Phonics, Unit 4, Session 13, the teacher directs the students’ attention to a new word, unfair, and discusses the meaning of the word and other words that begin with -un. The teacher then explains that non also means not, the opposite of, or reversal of. The students play a prefix mix and match game using -un and -non. 

    • In Phonics, Small Groups to Support Phonics, Small Group 3, the teacher introduces the idea of creating words with prefixes and suffixes by sharing a picture of William Shakespeare and highlighting that hundreds of words we use today were invented by him. The teacher provides word cards of words that were created by Shakespeare, e.g., overgrown, unhelpful, lonely, fashionable, distrustful, unreal, eventful, and comfortable. Students and the teacher read the words and define them together. Partners cut the words into parts separating the prefixes and suffixes from the root words. 

  • Identify words with inconsistent but common spelling-sound correspondences. For example:

    • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 14, students read a letter and identify powerful patterns. The teacher references an anchor chart with the steps of how to find powerful word patterns. “Step 1: Find some words that rhyme. Step 2: Zoom in on the rhyming words. Step 3: Test if this is a powerful pattern that will help with other words. Step 4: If so, study its spelling so you can use it often.” 

    • In Phonics, Unit 2, Session 9, the teacher tells students that when a silent e follows c or g at the end of a word, those consonants usually make a soft sound. The teacher displays a nonfiction passage about animal camouflage and models decoding the words challenge and camouflage, focusing on the soft g sounds. Students read the rest of the text to practice decoding the words chance, distance, patience, silence, appearance, change, surface, and advantage. 

    • In Phonics, Unit 2, Session 17, the teacher tells the students that when -tion at the end of a word, it is pronounced /shun/. The teacher models the word destruction. Students then practice pronouncing words: caption, section, option, station, contribution, instruction, construction, and pollution. 

• Lessons provide students with opportunities to read complete words by saying the entire word as a unit using newly taught phonics skills. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 15, students complete a shared reading to demonstrate that powerful patterns can come from poems and any text that rhymes. Students identify rhyming words and search for patterns in the following pages as they read the book. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 2, Session 7, students read word cards containing consonant combinations. Students look for more consonant combination pairs by searching for them in books. 

  • In Phonics Unit 2, Session 2, the teacher tells students that when they tackle a big word by breaking it into parts, it is important to blend the word back together. The teacher displays word cards with picnic, tennis, chipmunk, and dentist divided into syllables. The teacher models reading the word parts smoothly as a whole word. Students work in partners to practice, using the word cards basket, volcanic, umbrella, public, fantastic, pretzel, helmet, and transform. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 2, Session 5, the teacher shows students how to break apart a word that contains a consonant followed by -le. The teacher shows the students word cards with candle, battle, dribble, title, cradle, and staple separated into syllables. Students read the words as a complete unit. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 4, Session 11, the teacher reviews the strategy on how to learn compound words: study the word, chant the letters, write the word, and use the word. Students practice using the strategy with the words somewhere, anyone, everything, nobody, and outside. Students practice saying, reading, and writing compound words by making scrapbooks, reading words in a super-speedy voice, and collecting compound words as they read.

• Lessons provide students with limited opportunities to decode words in a sentence. For example:

  • In Phonics, Unit 2, Session 1, the teacher shares an animal fact card with students that says, “The lowland streaked tenrec rubs its quills together to tell other tenrecs about danger nearby.” The teacher models tackling the sentence word by word. In partners, students read three additional cards that contain animal facts written in sentences. 

• Lessons provide students with limited opportunities to build/manipulate/spell and encode words using common and newly-taught sound and spelling patterns phonics.

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 2, students make words to help them remember what they have learned about words with the silent e. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 2, Session 10, after the lesson on soft g and c sounds, the teacher tells students that if a word ends with the /j/ sound, it is usually spelled -ge. The teacher models encoding the word damage. Students practice encoding the words surge and huge. The teacher dictates the sentence, “Strong winds can make large amounts of garbage plunge into the sea.” Students write the sentence on whiteboards, then trade with a partner and give feedback. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 3, following a mini-lesson, students look for long and short vowel words in a previously read book called Those Darn Squirrels. In the daily class schedule, the teacher provides students a new tool called a word window. The word window has a copy of a page from the read-aloud between the plastic sheets. Students use a marker to mark up the page showing how they identify long vowel words and short vowel words. Students work together and discuss why they marked the words they did. Then, the teacher gives students sets of word cards from the text, and they sort them by long vowel words and short vowel words.

• Materials contain some methods to promote students’ practice of previously taught grade level phonics. For example:

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 1, students play “I Spy” using phonics feature clues in students’ names. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 2, during a session about words with silent e and how they have a long vowel sound:

    • Students write their first and last names on a whiteboard. They analyze the names and discuss what phonics concepts they recognize in their names. 

    • The teacher says many words and has the students show with hand gestures if they think the word said is a long vowel word or a short vowel word. 

    • Students use Say Spell Cards to identify the picture and write the word on their whiteboards to determine if it is a short vowel word or a long vowel word. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 3, Session 16, during a mini-lesson focusing on the importance of keeping vowel teams together when decoding tricky words:

    • The teacher uses the dragon puppet, Gus, to assist in word demolition. The teacher models with the word autograph. 

    • Students practice word demolition work in context while reading their books. 

    • Students sing a song that highlights the importance of keeping vowel teams together.

• Materials delineate a limited scope and sequence with a sequence of phonics instruction and practice to build toward application of skills. 

  • In Phonics, A Guide to the Phonics Units of Study, Chapter 1 provides a research-based explanation of the program’s focus on teaching phonics skills in order of utility for use in authentic reading and writing. 

  • In Phonics, A Guide to the Phonics Units of Study, Chapter 1, the materials cite “decades of research” used as the base of the phonics sequence. The materials explain that instruction moves from consonant blends and digraphs to trigraphs to long vowel patterns, diphthongs, r-controlled vowels, and inflected endings in the first and second grades. 

  • In Phonics, A Guide to the Phonics Units of Study, Chapter 2 delineates the sequence of phonics instruction and provides a rationale for the timing and approach to each element. 

  • There are five units in the Grade 2 Phonics Units of Study:

    • Phonics, Unit 1, contains 19 lessons. “Growing Into Second Grade Phonics” focuses on spelling snap words more conventionally and “teaching students how to be more accurate spellers of all their words.”

    • Phonics, Unit 2, contains 18 lessons. “Big Words Take Big Resolve: Tackling Multisyllabic Words” focuses on moving methodically across multisyllabic words from tip to tail, camouflaged consonants across words, and tails: spelling words with endings. 

    • Phonics, Unit 3, contains 20 lessons. “Word Builders” focuses on becoming word builders by writing bigger words, becoming vowel experts by using long vowel patterns to build words and becoming experts in word demotion by using vowels to help decode big words. 

    • Phonics, Unit 4, contains 19 lessons. “Word Collectors” focus on fostering word consciousness, growing word collections with compound words, and growing word collections with affixes. 

• Materials have a limited research-based explanation for the order of the phonics sequence. For example:

  • In Phonics, A Guide to Phonics Units of Study, Chapter 1, materials state the sequence of study of phonics in the materials follows research. Materials reference Bear’s Words Their Way, Cunningham’s Phonics They Use, Fundations, Fountas and Pinnell’s Phonics Lessons, or “many other programs.” 

  • In Phonics, A Guide to the Phonics Units of Study, Chapter 1, materials list the strands of early phonics development followed by a detailed section explaining each strand. 

• Materials provide some opportunities for students to develop orthographic and phonological processing.

  • In Phonics, A Guide to the Phonics Units of Study, the introductory materials explain that each phonics unit is designed to be taught concurrently with a writing and a reading unit of study. The writing and reading units of study use a Writer’s and Reader’s Workshop structure to create daily opportunities for students to apply phonics lessons to authentic reading and writing; however, these opportunities are not explicit in the materials, and students may not have opportunities to develop orthographic and phonological processing skills fully. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 2, the teacher conducts a review lesson on words with silent e. The teacher cues students to remember to look all the way across a word to see if there is an e at the end. Students engage in a making words spelling activity in which they have a whiteboard, and the teacher guides them in writing different words with varied short and long vowels, e.g., pin, pine, mine, mane, man, can, cane, came, cave, shave, Dave.

  • In Phonics, Unit 3, Session 10, the teacher conducts a mini-lesson about spelling long vowel e in little words like eat to spell bigger words like cheater. The teacher models how students can add, delete, and substitute letters to make new words and shows how she changed the word cheater to heater. Students practice by writing the word see on their whiteboards and adding or substituting letters to make a new word. Students share words made such as agreed and tree. Students sort words with long e spellings during rug time and then generate a list of tips to be successful in reading and writing bigger words with long e sound.

The materials reviewed for Grade 2 partially meet the criteria for Indicator 1n.iv.

Grade 2 materials include opportunities for students to decode and encode common and additional vowel teams. Students sort words, use picture cards, sing songs, read text, and play games to practice decoding and encoding. Additional opportunities to decode and encode words with vowel teams may occur naturally in the writing and reading units, but systematic opportunities are not present over the course of the year. Students apply their understanding of previously learned common and additional vowel teams in that students are continually writing. During writing time, students review and practice previously learned vowel teams. The teacher encourages students to reference anchor charts and word walls to check spelling patterns. 

Materials do not include multiple opportunities over the course of the year for students to decode and encode common vowel teams. For example:

• Distinguish long and short vowels when reading regularly spelled one-syllable words. For example:

  • In Reading, Unit 1, Session 10, students use whiteboards to create two columns and write the words beach and head at the top of the separate columns. The teacher reviews that vowel teams usually make the long sound of the first vowel, but tells students that sometimes vowel teams are tricky. The teacher underlines ea in each word and points out that the same vowel team makes the long e sound in beach and the short e sound in head. The teacher reads the words reach, dream, death, beast, spread, bread, teach, steam, deaf, and seat, and students record the word in the column with the matching vowel sound. The teacher tells students that readers must be flexible to figure out the vowel sounds in words. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 2, students play “guess my rule” to spotlight different spellings and introduce a new vowel chart. The teacher guides students to put names together that have the same parts. The teacher models with an example using names that end with the long e sound. The students play “guess my rule” using the class list of names. The teacher then introduces the second grade vowel chart. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 2, the teacher explains the second grade version of a vowel chart that includes Y for the long E sound. Students look through books to identify character names and identify the phonics principles in the character’s name. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 3, the teacher tells students they can read a text two ways - for meaning and enjoyment and for learning about phonics. The teacher models with a shared text, noticing long vowel words on the second read, and sorting those words into the following categories: silent e, vowel teams, exceptions. Students use the poems “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” by Robert Frost and “Waiting Room Fish” by Amy Ludwig VanDerwater to practice. They read first for meaning, then again to find words with long vowel sounds. Students sort the words into the three categories. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 16, the teacher provides the students with opportunities to hear and find rimes when reading a page from “Knight School” and leads the students in the creation of a chart of words that end in -ate, and -ait. 

• Know spelling-sound correspondences for additional common vowel teams. For example:

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 3, the teacher reads Those Darn Squirrels and explains that words can be categorized according to the spelling signals. Partners read a poem noticing ways to signal long vowels and then sort the words according to how the long vowel is signaled, e.g., ee, ea, oa, ai, ay, ou, ow, oo, oi, ay, ew, ue, aw, au, igh.

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 5, students use picture cards featuring words with r controlled vowels. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 6, students complete a shared reading of a letter, underlining the r controlled vowels. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 3, Session 13, the teacher reminds students that some long O words are spelled with an O and as silent E, e.g., joke, some are spelled with ow, and others have the long O that stands on its own, e.g., robot. The teacher creates a chart for the class vowel manual. Students sort word cards based on the spelling pattern and then reveviw their own writing to look for long-vowel words and check the spelling using spelling tips in the vowel manual and familiar spelling strategies. 

• Materials include opportunities for students to review previously learned common and additional vowel teams. For example:

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 5, students practice the three sounds the r-controlled vowels make by paying a “toll” for going to lunch by coming up with a word that has the same r-controlled vowel sound. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 7, the teacher provides rug clubs with a variety of familiar phonics tools and coaches them to plan a phonics lesson for Gus using these tools.

The materials reviewed for Grade 2 partially meet the criteria for Indicator 1o.

Materials provide limited opportunities to explicitly teach key concepts about various text structures and text features. Instruction is presented implicitly as students are encouraged to engage with books during unit sessions and the Reading and Writing Workshop. The teacher often uses mentor texts and shared reading to model text structure and text features without specifically and consistently sharing key aspects of narrative and expository text structures and features in a direct, explicit, or consistent manner. Students have opportunities to practice identifying and analyzing text structures and features in independent reading books.

• Students have limited opportunities to identify text structures (e.g., main idea and details, sequence of events, problem and solution, compare and contrast, cause and effect). For example:

  • In Reading Unit 4, Session 10, the teacher uses examples of stories in a series that students know well to analyze the plot structures of the stories. The lesson example uses stories that follow a problem and solution structure in each story in the series. The teacher poses the problem at the beginning of a new story in the series, and students use the recurring text structure to make predictions about what will happen in the story. The teacher tells students that text structures can help readers make predictions and understand stories in a series. Students make and share observations about text structures in their independent reading. 

  • In Reading, If...Then... K - 2 Unit, the teacher tells students they can get ready to read nonfiction books by taking a tour of the book and noticing text structures before they begin reading. The teacher models how to preview a book from cover to cover, looking for clues about text structure. The teacher shares a list of potential text structures, including procedural, expository, lists, categories, timelines, life cycles, pros and cons, cause and effect, and question and answer. Students read independently, focusing on text structures, then share the text structures they encountered. 

• Materials include frequent and adequate lessons and activities about text features (e.g., title, byline, headings, table of contents, glossary, pictures, illustrations). For example:

  • In Reading, Unit 2, Session 7, the teacher models using text features to understand new words. The teacher tells students, “readers can find, and sometimes learn about, keywords from reading the boldface words, the text boxes, the labels, the glossaries - the words!” Students look for text features to understand new words in their books. 

  • In Writing, Unit 2, Session 12, the teacher shows students two sample tables of content from nonfiction books. Students make and share observations about the parts and organization of the table of contents. The teacher points out that both share a similar structure that includes an introduction and conclusion. Students work in partners to create tables of contents for their nonfiction books.

The materials reviewed for Grade 2 partially meet the criteria for Indicator 1p.

Grade 2 materials provide explicit instruction in high-frequency words and regular opportunities in Phonics units for students to engage in practice identifying, spelling, and writing high-frequency words in isolation. The teacher uses a standard process for students to learn more about snap words, “Read it! Study it! Spell it! Write it! Use it!”, and there is a sufficient number of high-frequency words addressed. Students practice automaticity in decoding along with recognition of high-frequency words, and there are opportunities to practice reading fluently with partners and rug groups. Materials indicate that classrooms will need engaging, high-quality books at a range of levels that match the interests of the students and the teaching points of the units of study. A selection of mentor texts for teacher use in lessons is within the materials, but the materials do not include on-level text selections for students. Students practice applying automatic and accurate word reading through Shared Reading opportunities with the teacher using text that is projected using a document camera. However, student reading materials to practice fluency call for students to use books found in their book bags, which may not contain the newly taught words. The materials include some lessons that provide explicit instruction in fluency elements, but instructional opportunities and student practice opportunities are limited. Many of the opportunities labeled as fluency practice in the materials occur in the Shared Reading routines; however, these opportunities take place in the context of repeated readings of previously-read texts, and do not provide students the opportunity to apply phonics skills to fluent reading of unfamiliar text. The materials include a limited selection of decodable texts in the form of poems, songs, and a limited selection of decodable texts. While the materials include explicit instruction in applying phonics knowledge to decode words, there are limited opportunities for students to explicitly practice decoding skills using decodable texts to build toward automaticity and accuracy. The reading units mainly utilize a cueing system for solving unknown words that focus on meaning cues and decoding strategies that encourage students to read the whole word, part by part. 

• Opportunities are provided over the course of the year in core materials for students to purposefully read on-level text. For example:

  • Read grade-level text with purpose and understanding.

    • In Reading, Online Teacher Resources, the materials provide book lists of recommended on-level texts at a range of Grade 1 reading levels. The books listed can be purchased separately but are not included with teacher materials. 

    • In Reading, Unit 1, Session 5, the teacher conducts a mini-lesson on how readers need to think while they read to make sure they can retell the events in a story. The teacher cues students that when they read faster and faster they need to keep tabs on their comprehension. 

    • In Reading, Unit 3, Session 5, the teacher conducts a mini-lesson modeling how readers adjust their pace of reading to ensure they understand what is read. The teacher explains what a “just right” reading pace should feel and sound like. The teacher reads an excerpt from the text, Houndsley and Catina from the document camera. The teacher reads aloud slowly and choppily pointing under each word. The teacher stops and, with the students, discusses how the teacher reads the text and what the teacher should do. Then, the teacher models reading very fast with little expression. The teacher stops the reading to discuss with students how that sounded. Students engage in a choral reading of the text, Houndsley and Catina and stop to discuss the reading rate and expression.

• Limited opportunities are provided over the course of the year in core materials for students to demonstrate sufficient accuracy, rate, and expression in oral reading with on-level text and grade-level decodable words. For example:

  • Read grade-level text orally with accuracy, appropriate rate, and expression on successive readings. 

    • In Reading, Unit 1, Shared Reading, students point out longer sentences in the shared reading text and share where they will take a breath. Students read the text to find a not-too fast, not-too-slow pace. 

    • In Reading Unit 2, Session 10, the teacher tells students that rereading nonfiction text can help them read more smoothly and get more information from their reading. The teacher displays a page from the shared text, “Tigers.” The teacher models skimming the text and reading the keyword territories. The teacher models rereading the page smoothly after unlocking those words. The teacher shares the next page and previews the words carnivores, hooved, and buffalo with students. Students practice reading the text smoothly after unlocking these words. 

    • In Reading, Unit 3, Session 1, the teacher introduces a chart, “Making Your Reading More Fluent.” The teacher tells students that rereading text aloud and in their heads can change the voice inside a reader’s head. The teacher displays a page from the book, Owl Moon by Jane Yolen. The teacher models reading into an imaginary conch shell using their hands.The teacher and students read into their hands, focusing on envisioning the story and matching their voices to the story. Students reread the page aloud, then reread the page silently, making their inner reading voice match their read aloud voice.

• Materials provide opportunities for students to hear fluent reading of grade-level text by a model reader. For example:

  • In Reading, Unit 1, Shared Reading, the teacher reads Mercy Watson to the Rescue in a fluent voice. Before reading, the teacher discusses the action of the chapter with students, and students decide that the chapter should be read in a scary or suspenseful voice. The teacher invites students to join in. The same shared text is read aloud repeatedly over five sessions. 

  • In Reading, Unit 3, Session 4, the teacher conducts a mini-lesson modeling a reading voice to read longer phrases and noticing punctuation. The teacher shares with students that a reader “scoops up” text into longer meaningful phrases and uses punctuation to know when to take a breath. The teacher uses the document camera to model reading phrases using the text, Houndsley and Catina. The teacher engages students in evaluating how the phrase was read and how punctuation was used. 

  • In Reading, Unit 3, Shared Reading, the teacher reads “Happy Like Soccer” aloud “using pace, prosody, and phrasing to showcase fluency.” The teacher encourages students to join by “using tons of excitement and expression.” The same shared text is read aloud repeatedly over five sessions. 

• Materials include systematic and explicit instruction of irregularly spelled words. For example: 

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 6, the teacher explains there are different spellings for /-ir/, /-er/, /-or/, /-ear/, and /-ar/ and identifies the spelling patterns for /air/ sound and for /ear/ sound by pointing out that when this r-controlled sound is heard in a word, a student cannot be sure which vowels to use. As a result the student will need to rely on what, “looks right.”. 

  • In Phonics Unit 1, Session 13 ,the teacher introduces the process for learning “troublemaker” words. The teacher introduces the word about and models using the following steps on the “Tackle a Word” chart: Study the word by trying to spell it and identifying any hard parts of the word; think if phonics rules apply or if they can invent a trick to help them remember it; cover, write, and check the word; practice by chanting it, writing it repeatedly, taking a mental picture of it, or singing and clapping it. 

• Students have opportunities to practice and read irregularly spelled words in isolation. For example:

  • Recognize and read grade-appropriate irregularly spelled words.

    • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 4, students “speed read” from their snap words books for one minute to try and read more words each round. 

    • In Phonics, Unit 2, Session 9, the teacher chooses snap words from the word wall and dictates words to students. Students spell the words on whiteboards. Students add any words that were difficult for them to spell to their personal word books. 

• Materials include a sufficient quantity of new grade-appropriate irregularly spelled words for students to make reading progress. For example:

  • In Phonics, A Guide to the Phonics Units of Study, Chapter 2, the materials indicate that the Grade 2 materials explicitly teach about 50 high-frequency words. The order of words prioritizes high-utility words for emergent reading and writing.

  • Grade 2 materials include:

    • Unit 1:

      • Review high-frequency words from Kindergarten and Grade 1

      • High frequency words with r-controlled vowels

      • Frequently misspelled high-frequency words: said, they, where, first, friend, girl, when, went, your

      • Homophone high-frequency words: hear, here, too, to, two, their, there, they’re, your, you’re

      • Commonly misspelled high frequency words: about, school, with, was, could, what, very

    • Unit 2: 

      • better, follow, happen, different, people, trouble, terrible, answer, special, enough, through, does, goes, question, slowly, suddenly, probably

    • Unit 3: 

      • themselves, maybe, really, favorite, together, several, begin, before, great, either, excited, while, old, usually, again, against, being, ready

    • Unit 4:

      • sometimes, everybody, understand, beautiful, cousin

The materials reviewed for Grade 2 partially meet the criteria for materials, questions, and tasks providing systematic and explicit instruction in and practice of word recognition and analysis skills in a research-based progression in connected text and tasks.

Grade 2 materials provide practice in encoding words in connected tasks. As new word recognition and analysis skills are introduced, both the Phonics and Writing units provide opportunities for students to apply skills to writing sentences. Materials provide opportunities for students to practice phonics skills such as various vowel teams, multisyllabic words, and the use of prefixes and suffixes. After a mini-lesson, student partners engage in short tasks that relate to the concept taught. The materials include student copies of a limited selection of songs, poems, and a few decodable texts to support instruction but do not include sufficient decodable texts for students to learn and practice decoding skills in context. While the materials state that a leveled library with decodable texts is important, the materials do not provide these texts. During Reading Workshop, students are expected to use books from their independent reading collections to apply word recognition and analysis skills; however, since the texts are student-selected from available classroom books, the materials do not guarantee that students have access to on-level connected texts that provide practice in newly-taught skills. 

• Materials do not support students’ development to learn to distinguish long and short vowels when reading regularly spelled one-syllable words in connected text and tasks. 

• Materials support students’ development to know spelling-sound correspondences for additional and common vowel teams in connected text and tasks. For example:

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 3, the teacher models thinking about phonics when reading Those Darn Squirrels. The teacher tells students they choose what they will read and how they are going to read. Sometimes they will need to think about characters, and other times they’ll need to think about how words work. Sometimes they might be on the lookout for silent e and other long vowels. Students look for silent e and other long vowels when reading the classroom. The teacher gives students a page from a familiar read aloud and asks students to mark up the text looking for words with long vowels and silent e. Students read word cards and categorize them on the pocket chart.  

  • In Phonics, Unit 3, Session 11, the teacher shares copies of “Joey’s Story.” The story includes errors in words spelled with the long i sound, including Mike, decide, bright, pirate, slide, nice, line, tight, frightened, ride, cry, lights, beside, smile, high, five, survive, and Friday. The teacher models reading the first page with students and correcting words spelled with the wrong long vowel pattern. Students work with partners to read and correct the following two pages. 

  • In Phonics, Small Groups to Support Phonics, Small Group 1, the teacher reinforces that being flexible is the best way to approach reading. The teacher coaches students to read the word cards and determine which vowel team is part of the word based on making sense and sounding right. The teacher gives students a letter to read and coaches partners to read words accurately with vowel teams. The teacher leads the students through a shared reading of the letter. The teacher reminds students to think about vowel teams when reading independently during Reading Workshop.

• Materials provide limited support for students’ development to learn to decode regularly spelled two-syllable words with long vowels in connected text and tasks. For example:

  • In Phonics, Small Groups to Support Phonics, Small Group 25, the teacher and students together look at word cards with long words and practice trying to read them in different ways with different vowel sounds. The teacher models with the word release. They continue practicing saying the longer words with varying vowel sounds, e.g., opening, unfrozen, loose, rattling, scattered, remember, and  magnificent. Students read a poem a few times using their vowel knowledge to figure out tricky words. The teacher coaches students while reading the poem.  

• Materials do not support students’ development to learn to decode words with common prefixes and suffixes in connected text and tasks. Materials do not provide frequent opportunities to read irregularly spelled words in connected text and tasks.

• Lessons and activities provide students many opportunities to learn grade-level word recognition and analysis skills while encoding (writing) in context and decoding words (reading) in connected text and tasks. For example:

  • In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 15, the teacher displays the decodable book, Knight School and guides students in a shared choral reading of the first two pages. Students reread the pages looking for phonics patterns. Students identify sets of rhyming words and the common word part in those words. The teacher records the word parts on a “Powerful Patterns” chart. Students work in partners to repeat the process with the last two pages of the book. 

  • In Phonics, Unit 3, Session 12, the teacher displays phonics anchor charts, blends and digraphs charts, and the vowel team chart. The teacher asks students to help make a sign for the hallway that says, “Students and Teachers, Please admire our writing and help keep our papers hanging safely in this hallway.” Students use the charts to write each word on whiteboards as the teacher models using phonics rules from the charts to check the spelling of each word. Students take turns sharing the marker to add words to the poster. 

• Materials do not include decodable texts that contain grade-level phonics skills aligned to the program’s scope and sequence.

  • Some Phonics units contain student copies of a limited selection of songs, poems, and decodable texts to support instruction. 

• Materials do not include decodable texts that contain grade-level high-frequency/irregularly spelled words aligned to the program’s scope and sequence.

  • The program does not include a series of decodable texts designed to provide students with many controlled opportunities to read high-frequency/irregularly spelled words aligned to the scope and sequence. 

The materials reviewed for Grade 2 partially meet the criteria for materials, questions, and tasks providing high-quality lessons and activities that allow for differentiation of foundational skills, so all students achieve mastery of foundational skills.  

Grade 2 materials provide some opportunities for the teacher to differentiate instruction for students. In the mini-lessons for phonics instruction, the teacher is often cued to support students by scaffolding their learning through provided prompts during rug time practice. Most rug time and extension activities are completed with a partner or small group. Materials indicate differentiation occurs through students practicing and applying skills and concepts in their independent reading books at their own individual reading level. The teacher directs students to take learning from the lesson for that day and apply it during the Reading and Writing Workshop, where students are reading books from their own book bag and writing independently. It is unclear whether every student has the opportunity to reach mastery before moving on to the next lesson’s concepts. While the reading and writing units provide small group instruction for each lesson that can be used to differentiate and support individual student needs, the phonics unit materials do not include small group instruction within each individual session. The teacher is provided with a resource called Small Groups to Support Phonics Grade 2 book with additional lessons to support students struggling with a certain concept. The first part of the resource reviews Grade 1 foundational skills, and the other chapters provide a single lesson on a specific Grade 2 skill to support students with varying needs for additional learning opportunities. However, the use of these groups is informed by limited assessments at the Grade 2 level. The If...Then….Curriculum is designed for Kindergarten - Grade 2. Because the resource spans grade levels, there are a limited number of lessons for specific concepts. Not all skills are provided an additional lesson to support students with varying needs. The Guides to the Units of Study include limited information on supporting students who are English Language Learners and students with dyslexia, but these supports are not explicitly included in lessons within Units of Study. While opportunities for acceleration for students working above grade level may occur naturally in the Reading and Writing Workshop format, guidance for supporting above-level students is not explicitly included. The materials call for students to have access to texts at their reading level as a means of differentiation, but these texts are not included with the materials. 

Materials do not provide strong strategies and supports for students who read, write, and/or speak in a language other than English to meet or exceed grade-level standards.

• Materials include online Spanish resources, which have teaching points for each session written in Spanish and anchor charts translated into Spanish. 

• In Phonics, A Guide to the Phonics Units of Study, Chapter 4, the materials explain that the teacher will lead small group lessons daily during reading and writing workshop time to give students who need it more practice with foundational skills. The small group lessons are detailed in a Teacher Guide, Small Groups to Support Phonics, and determined by the assessments indicated in the assessment schedule. Materials suggest that, among others, students who are English language learners and students with dyslexia will benefit from small group foundational skills instruction in addition to whole-group instruction. 

• In Phonics, A Guide to the Phonics Units of Study, Chapter 2, the materials state, “The most important thing you can do is listen when your ELL speaks to assess the sounds that he or she is confusing and coach immediately. Ask the child to study your mouth and even the placement of your tongue as you make a sound--invite him or her to copy you and practice isolating the tricky sound. Even a small bout of deliberate, multisensory oral practice, either tucked into a one-on-one conference or as part of small-group work, will reap tremendous benefits in helping with pronunciation.”

Materials provide limited strategies and supports for students in special populations to work with grade-level content and to meet or exceed grade-level standards.

• In Phonics, Small Groups to Support Phonics, Introduction, the materials state that small group lessons are not meant to be progressed through in a chapter by chapter fashion, but to be used for the teacher to “dip in and out of these chapters in ways that respond to your children’s needs and interests.” 

• In Phonics, Small Groups to Support Phonics Grade 2, Orientation, materials state that the provided small group lessons occur during Reading and Writing Workshop, and the main goal of the 5-7 minute small group lessons is to transfer all that the teacher teaches during phonics time into their reading and writing. Small group lessons are also recommended to individualize instruction based on assessments to support phonics learning. 

• In Phonics, A Guide to the Phonics Units of Study, Chapter 1, materials state that “the most important way in which the Units of Study in Phonics support all learners is by building in flexibility and choice. Because children are often applying what they learn in phonics to their reading and their writing, and because that reading and writing work will by definition be at the learner’s just-right level, much of the work that students do during phonics time will already be adjusted so that each child can work within his or her zone of proximal development.” Materials provide an example of students applying taught concepts to books from their bag of books at their just-right levels. Additionally, materials state that during phonics work time, students are invited to take words they know well and apply the concepts to those words. 

• In Phonics, A Guide to the Phonics Units of Study, Chapter 1, the teacher is reminded that it is important to provide students “with many ways to express what they know.” Students may be able to demonstrate understanding using a whiteboard, while others may benefit from working with magnetic letters. Teachers should provide options for physical action “by allowing students to work on the meeting area row or the low to floor table.” Additionally, some students may benefit from using an iPad or voice-activated technology instead of paper/pencil. 

• In Phonics, A Guide to the Phonics Units of Study, Chapter 1, materials state that the whole-group nature of the phonics lessons means that “utterly crucial” differentiation for individual students will take place in small group work during the Writing Workshop, Reading Workshop, “choice time, and other stolen moments throughout your day.” Small group work is guided by the assessment-driven Small Groups to Support Phonics.

• In Phonics, A Guide to the Phonics Units of Study, Chapter 2, the materials state, “there will inevitably be children for whom additional, explicit instruction is needed. If you find that a student, even with much small-group support, is not developing a strong foundation of phonological awareness, you might decide to collaborate with an Orton-Gillingham trained specialist, to provide that student with additional support using specialized techniques such as multisensory instruction.” Materials suggest providing students who have been diagnosed as dyslexic with a small group phonics curriculum that is “especially designed for that youngster instead of participating in your whole class units. Wilson Phonics is one good place to look for help with this.” 

• In Phonics, A Guide to the Phonics Unit of Study, Chapter 3, materials state each lesson session has a specific structure that includes a mini-lesson (including connections, teaching, and active engagement/link); rug time (children work in partners or clubs to practice while you coach); sharing time and optional extension activities. Types of practice activities in sessions include shared reading; word sorts; making words, or interactive writing. The teacher directs students to go to their bag of books and write to apply the previously taught skill during Reading and Writing Workshop.

• In Phonics, A Guide to the Phonics Units of Study, Chapter 4, the materials explain that the teacher will lead small group lessons daily during the Reading and Writing Workshop to give students who need it more practice with foundational skills. The small group lessons are detailed in a teacher guide Small Groups to Support Phonics and determined by the assessments indicated in the assessment schedule. Materials suggest that, among others, students who are English Language Learners and students with dyslexia will benefit from small group foundational skills instruction in addition to whole-group instruction. The materials indicate that students who need more work in foundational skills may benefit from small group lessons from the K-1 Small Groups to Support Phonics manual. 

• In Reading, If...Then...Curriculum, Introduction, it is recommended that the teacher looks across more than one grade level’s curriculum to meet students’ needs. It is also suggested that teachers support students by providing extra reading time each day to provide intervention and extra time for reading for all students. 

• In Reading, Unit 1, Session 10, after a whole-group lesson on vowel teams, the teacher leads a small group lesson for students who need more practice reading words with closed and open syllables. Students create two columns on a whiteboard labeled CVVC and CVV. The teacher reviews how vowel teams work in closed syllables, and students write the word train in the CVVC column. The teacher reviews how vowel teams work in open syllables, and students write the word tray in the CVV column. The teacher says rain, trail, and stray, and students write the words in the correct column. The teacher leads students to notice that the long a sound is spelled differently based on its position in the word. Students look for long a words in the books they are reading. 

• In Reading, Unit 1, Session 12, the teacher models reading the text accurately and realizing when what is read doesn’t make sense. Students practice fixing their own mistakes. The materials include a small group lesson to support students in self-monitoring when reading. 

• In Phonics, Unit 1, Session 5, the teacher conducts a mini-lesson on r-controlled vowel words with ar, or, and er. During rug time, the teacher coaches students by saying prompts provided in the lesson description such as: “Listen to the sound, Is it like the word car, tiger or fork? Touch each word you’ve sorted and say it again. Check if the words in each group have the same trick R sound!”

Materials do not regularly provide extensions and/or advanced opportunities to engage with foundational skills at greater depth for students who read, write, speak, and/or listen above grade level.

• While the materials offer extensions for each daily lesson, extensions are not designated to be for students to engage with foundational skills at a greater depth. Additionally, extensions do not consistently align with the lesson focus and, at times, introduce a new skill. Materials do not indicate how or when to use extension activities.