2nd Grade - Gateway 3
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Teacher and Student Supports
| Score | |
|---|---|
Gateway 3 - Meets Expectations | 100% |
Criterion 3.1: Teacher Supports | 13 / 13 |
Criterion 3.2: Student Supports | 4 / 4 |
Criterion 3.3: Intentional Design |
The Wilson Fundations materials meet expectations for Gateway 3 by providing coherent teacher supports, embedded student supports, and intentional design features that facilitate effective implementation of foundational skills instruction. Materials include point-of-use guidance, detailed instructional routines, and adult-level explanations that support consistent delivery of phonemic awareness, phonics, word recognition, and fluency, including more advanced concepts such as syllable types and multisyllabic word analysis. Lessons follow a structured, research-based design with coordinated whole-group and small-group instruction, embedded review, and structured reteaching to support mastery within the school year. Instructional tools and manipulatives are clearly identified and aligned to specific purposes within lessons, and family-facing resources are written in accessible language to support understanding of foundational skills and reinforce learning at home. Student supports include small-group guidance, embedded differentiation, and visual and oral-language scaffolds, including supports for multilingual learners, while representation in texts is primarily surface-level with limited guidance for incorporating students’ cultural and community backgrounds. Digital tools and visual design features support instruction through teacher-directed and student-interactive resources aligned to the scope and sequence, though some instructional details require navigation across multiple materials. Foundational skills standards are not embedded within lesson-level materials or assessments and are instead provided through separate alignment resources. Overall, the materials provide strong, coherent support for instructional delivery, teacher understanding, and student access, with some limitations in culturally responsive guidance, direct standards alignment, and ease of access to resources.
Criterion 3.1: Teacher Supports
Materials include embedded guidance to support effective implementation of foundational skills instruction and build teacher knowledge of grade-level expectations.
The Wilson Fundations materials meet expectations for Gateway 3 by providing coherent teacher supports, embedded student supports, and intentional design features that facilitate effective implementation of foundational skills instruction. Materials include point-of-use guidance, detailed instructional routines, and adult-level explanations that support consistent delivery of phonemic awareness, phonics, word recognition, and fluency, including more advanced concepts such as syllable types and multisyllabic word analysis. Lessons follow a structured, research-based design with coordinated whole-group and small-group instruction, embedded review, and clearly defined pacing with structured reteaching to support mastery within the school year. Instructional tools and manipulatives are clearly identified and aligned to specific purposes within lessons, and family-facing resources are written in accessible language to support understanding of foundational skills and reinforce learning at home.
However, foundational skills standards are not embedded within lesson-level materials or assessment documents and are instead provided through separate alignment resources. Overall, the materials provide strong, coherent support for instructional delivery and teacher understanding, with some limitations in direct standards alignment.
Indicator 3a
Materials provide teacher guidance with useful annotations and suggestions for how to enact the student materials and ancillary materials, with specific attention to supporting students’ foundational literacy development.
The teacher guidance in Wilson Fundations meets the expectations for Indicator 3a. Materials provide well-defined resources for presenting content and instructional routines, including detailed explanations of learning activities that outline procedures, materials, timing, targeted skills, and expected student outcomes. Daily lessons consistently identify the unit and week and include structured plans with step-by-step instructional guidance and embedded supports such as review and current word lists and corrective feedback. Materials also include point-of-use annotations and suggestions within lessons that support implementation aligned to specific learning objectives. Additional reference tools, such as Activity Cue Cards, provide support for consistent implementation of instructional routines.
Materials provide a well-defined, teacher resources for presenting content and instructional routines.
In the Teacher’s Manual, materials present instructional routines with explanations and rationales for teacher implementation. These explanations can be found in several places:
The Learning Activity Overview provides a list of the Fundations Learning Activities in alphabetical order. The teacher is guided to prepare for an activity by reading the Learning Activity Overview prior to the lesson within which they will present that activity until the students reach automaticity with the Learning Activity routines.
For example, for the Learning Activity Word Talk, the Learning Activity overview provides a suggested time frame for the activity, a synopsis of the activity, the activity procedure, corrective feedback, anddifferentiation to provide students during the activity. The Learning Activity also provides a summary of the activity within a box titled “In a Nutshell.” In this box, the teacher can find a quick snapshot of activity procedures, the materials needed for the teacher and students to implement the activity, and the student outcomes that the activity is meant to support. Finally, the activity also includes a summary of the specific skills this activity targets within the box titled “Skill Focus.” According to the materials, this particular activity focuses on the literacy skills of word recognition and spelling as well as vocabulary acquisition. Each Fundations Learning Activity overview includes similar levels of detail that support the teacher in presenting content and instructional routines with fidelity.
Each daily lesson clearly identifies the unit and week and includes a structured daily plan with student learning goals, required teacher materials, and step-by-step instructional guidance. Lessons outline consistent instructional routines that guide teachers through instruction and targeted practice. For example, in Unit 11, Week 1, Day 4, the lesson includes routines such as Drill Sounds/Warm-Up, Word of the Day, Trick Word Practice, and Dictation (Composition Book). The dictation routine includes Unit Sounds, Unit Words (review and current), Trick Words, and sentence-level practice. Materials also include embedded supports such as review and current word lists, guidance for multilingual learners, and corrective feedback to support instructional delivery throughout the lesson.
Activity Cue Cards can be found in the Appendix and serve as a reference for activities and instructional routines that are presented in each lesson. The materials suggest that the teacher has the Cue Cards available during a lesson for quick reference.
Materials include annotations and suggestions to support implementation, presented in the context of specific learning objectives.
In Unit 3, Week 1, Day 1, Introduce New Concepts, the materials include a note for the teacher that supports implementation of the activity as aligned with the learning objective of introducing closed syllable exceptions of ild, ind, old, olt, and ost. The note reminds the teacher that “when introducing the concept of an exception, reinforce the provided student-friendly definition by connecting this to students’ experiences and background.” The example provided in the materials states that an “exception is something that does not follow the rules.” The materials continue to say that “when there is an exception something unexpected happens, something that does not usually happen.” The activity then goes on to provide the closed syllable exceptions of old, ild, ind, olt, and ost.
In Unit 9, Week 1, Day 5, the materials include a teacher note directing educators to “consider using this activity as observational data to assess students’ ability to decode words accurately and fluently” and to refer to the Fundations Learning Community for an observation data sheet. This annotation provides guidance for leveraging the instructional activity as a formative assessment aligned to the foundational skill objective of accurate and fluent word reading.
Indicator 3b
Materials contain full, adult-level explanations and examples of the foundational skills concepts included in the program so teachers can improve their own knowledge of the subject.
The adult-level explanations in Wilson Fundations meet the expectations for Indicator 3b. Materials contain full, detailed explanations of foundational skills concepts so teachers can strengthen their knowledge of the content as needed. Teacher-facing resources describe the research base of the program, outline key foundational skills components, and explain how these skills develop across instruction. Program resources also explain the linguistic reasoning behind instructional approaches and describe how grade-level concepts such as multisyllabic word reading, syllable types, and vowel teams are introduced and practiced within the instructional sequence.
Complete, detailed adult-level explanations are provided for each foundational skill taught at the grade level.
According to the Teacher Manual Preface under the section “Skills and Procedures Taught in Fundations,” the materials provide adult-level explanations of the foundational skills addressed in Grade 2. These explanations define each skill, explain its linguistic basis, and describe how it is systematically taught within the program. The prefatory sections include the following, but are not limited to:
Phonics and Word Study: Instruction for Decoding, Word Recognition, and Spelling:
The section provides a rationale for systematic phonics instruction, explaining how students progress from simple to more complex word structures and how decoding and encoding are intentionally integrated.
Fluency:
The materials explain the role of accuracy and automaticity in developing fluent reading and describe how connected text reading supports expression and prosody.
Detailed examples of the grade-level foundational skills concepts are provided for the teacher.
According to the Unit Introductions, Learning Activity Overviews, and the Fundations Readers Teacher Guide, the materials provide instructional examples illustrating how foundational skills are enacted in daily lessons.
Learning Activity Overviews:
Each activity includes a detailed synopsis and step-by-step procedural guidance illustrating how grade-level phonics concepts are implemented. For example, in Dictation/Words for multisyllabic words, the procedure directs the teacher to say a word selected from the unit resources and hold up the visual cue for Echo as students repeat the word. Using white syllable frames on their dry erase writing tablets, students segment the word into syllables. For example, when dictating mascot, the teacher touches the first syllable frame as students say mas, and then touches the second frame as students say cot. Students repeat each syllable while touching the corresponding frame, then write mas in the first frame and cot in the second frame. This structured routine reinforces syllable segmentation, supports accurate spelling of multisyllabic words, and strengthens students’ understanding of syllable structure prior to writing the full word.
Unit Introductions:
Unit introductions provide detailed explanations of grade-level phonics concepts and clarify the linguistic reasoning behind instructional decisions. For example, in Unit 3, Level 2, the materials explain that students are taught exceptions to the closed syllable type. The introduction defines closed-syllable exceptions as syllables that follow the closed-syllable pattern but contain a long vowel sound instead of the expected short vowel sound. These patterns are identified as welded or glued sounds, including ild, ind, old, olt, and ost. The materials explain that keywords are used to support students in recalling the sounds of these exceptions. The introduction also directs teachers to use the Vowel Teams Poster to review and practice vowel teams, including ai as in bait representing /ā/, ay as in play representing /ā/, ee as in jeep representing /ē/, ea as in eat representing /ē/, oi as in coin representing /oi/, and oy as in boy representing /oi/. These examples provide teachers with explicit guidance for introducing syllable exceptions and vowel teams within a structured phonics progression.
Fundations Readers Teacher Guide:
The guide explains the instructional purpose of decodable texts and provides a structured Teaching Plan framework for initial and subsequent readings. The materials describe teacher modeling during first reads, including reading fluently with expression and prosody, supporting comprehension, promoting enjoyment, checking vocabulary understanding, and demonstrating concepts of print such as left-to-right tracking and return sweep. Subsequent readings include echo, choral, paired, and independent formats to support fluency development.
Indicator 3c
Foundational skills lessons are well-designed and take into account effective lesson structure and pacing. Content can reasonably be completed within a regular school year, and the pacing allows for maximum student understanding.
The lesson design and pacing in Wilson Fundations meet the expectations for Indicator 3c. Materials use a structured lesson format aligned to foundational literacy skills and guided by principles of explicit, sequential, cumulative, and multimodal instruction. Lessons incorporate both whole-group and small-group instructional components within a defined daily structure. The scope and sequence is designed to be completed within a regular school year and includes clear mastery expectations with structured, time-bound reteaching cycles. These design and pacing structures support completion of all grade-level foundational skills within one school year.
Lesson plans utilize effective, research-based lesson plan design for early literacy instruction.
In the Teacher’s Manual, Skills and Procedures Taught in Fundations, the materials state that each Fundations lesson consists of 2-5 Learning Activities. In Figure 2: Fundations Level 2 Learning Activities and Skills, each Fundations Learning Activity is aligned with at least one Foundational Literacy Skill (e.g. Phonological Awareness and Phonemic Awareness, Alphabetic Principle Review, Word Recognition and Spelling, and Automaticity/Fluency). For example, the Fundations Learning Activity Word Talk is said to align with the foundational skills of word recognition and spelling as well as automaticity/fluency.
In the Teacher’s Manual, Principles of Instruction, the materials state that core instruction is “explicit, sequential, cumulative, and multimodal.” The materials then go on to explain each of these components. For example, as an illustration of what is meant by multimodal instruction, the materials state that “Fundations instruction is highly interactive…the Learning Activities incorporate visual, auditory, tactile, and kinesthetic modalities.”
The effective lesson design structure includes both whole group and small group instruction.
In the Teacher’s Manual, Fundations for Whole Class General Education Instruction, the materials state that the Fundations curriculum “provides all students with a solid foundation for reading and spelling.” The standard lesson occurs daily and consists of 30 minutes of “explicit instruction in foundational skill areas” within a whole-class setting. The materials state that “additional practice of up to 20 minutes for individual students or small groups with aligned Fundations products round out the complete Fundations lesson plan.” Those materials include:
FUN HUB practice, which is an interactive, online platform that provides weekly practice aligned with Fundations lessons;
Fundations Readers, which are at least 95% decodable texts aligned to unit concepts; and
Practice Books, which contain focused exercises aligned to weekly instructional goals.
According to the Fundations Level 2: 50-Minute Implementation Guide, all students should receive a 30-minute whole-class instruction and 20 minutes of small-group, focused instruction that takes place within centers, small-group settings, or independently.
The pacing of each component of daily lesson plans is clear and appropriate.
In the Teacher’s Manual, each unit includes a Student Learning Plan which provides an overview of each lesson within the unit and each Learning Activity that will occur within each lesson.
For example, each lesson within the two-week sequence of Unit 14 includes at least three, and no more than five, Learning Activities. Although the materials do not provide timing suggestions for the Introduce New Concepts section of a lesson, it is reasonable to assume from the other timings suggested in the Learning Activity Overview that each lesson would not exceed 30 minutes. This aligns with the time that the materials suggest for whole-group instruction.
According to the Fundations Level 2 Learning Community, Resource Library, Lesson Planning, Fundations Small Group Instruction Guidelines, in addition to the core lesson, the materials include guidance for an additional 20-minute targeted practice block, which may extend up to 30 minutes, during which the teacher implements small-group instruction and independent practice or centers. The materials direct the teacher to first deliver the 30-minute whole-group lesson, followed by the targeted practice block to provide additional instruction and reteaching based on student needs. This structure outlines a clear daily pacing model that organizes instruction into whole-group and small-group components within a 50-minute instructional block.
The suggested amount of time and expectations for maximum student understanding of all foundational skills content can reasonably be completed in one school year and should not require modification.
According to the Teacher’s Manual, Fundations Scope and Sequence, the Level 2 sequence is distributed as follows:
Unit 1: 2 weeks
Unit 2: 2 weeks
Unit 3: 1 week
Unit 4: 2 weeks
Unit 5: 2 weeks
Unit 6: 2 weeks
Unit 7: 3 weeks
Unit 8: 1 week
Unit 9: 2 weeks
Unit 10: 2 weeks
Unit 11: 2 weeks
Unit 12: 1 week
Unit 13: 2 weeks
Unit 14: 2 weeks
Unit 15: 2 weeks
Unit 16: 1 week
Unit 17: 2 weeks
Each week within a unit includes five days of instruction. Therefore, the Fundations Level 2 sequence is designed to be completed within 31 weeks (155 days) of instruction. The materials suggest that if a class does not achieve mastery on a unit test (i.e. 80% of the class scoring 80% or better), the teacher should extend the time within the unit. The design of the sequence supports this opportunity for extension.
For those materials on the borderline (e.g., approximately 130 days on the low end or 200 days on the high end), evidence clearly explains how students would be able to master ALL the grade-level foundational skills standards within one school year.
According to the Fundations Level 2 sequence, each unit includes five days of instruction, resulting in approximately 155 days of instruction across the year. The materials establish a mastery benchmark in which at least 80 percent of students must score 80 percent or higher on the unit assessment. When this benchmark is not met, the teacher implements a Reteach Learning Plan, using assessment data to target instruction over an additional two to five days.
According to the Fundations Level 2 Learning Community, Resource Library, Lesson Planning, Reteaching Learning Plan, Tier 1 reteaching targets specific skill gaps identified through dictation or unit test errors using a structured set of activities within a lesson block. These activities include a two-minute Drill Sounds warm-up, a ten-minute Introduce New Concepts to Reteach, a five to ten minute Word Talk activity, and a ten-minute Echo/Find Letters and Words activity or a ten-minute dictation/dry erase activity. These structured reteaching routines provide targeted support within a defined timeframe and allow the teacher to address unfinished learning while continuing progression through the scope and sequence.
Indicator 3d
Materials contain strategies for informing all stakeholders, including students, parents, or caregivers about the foundational skills program and suggestions for how they can help support student progress and achievement.
Materials contain jargon-free resources and processes to inform families and caregivers about the foundational skills taught at school. Resources include introductory parent letters describing the program and instructional approach, guidance for family engagement, parent orientation materials explaining foundational literacy concepts, reference materials describing syllable types and phonics terminology, unit-based parent letters outlining current skills, and recommendations for additional family reading resources. Materials also provide stakeholders with strategies and activities to support practice of foundational skills at home. Home support resources include unit-aligned take-home materials and guidance for practicing phonemic awareness, phonics patterns, syllable types, spelling conventions, word recognition, vocabulary development, and fluency. These resources support coordinated home–school communication and reinforce foundational skills instruction.
Materials contain jargon-free resources and processes to inform all stakeholders about foundational skills taught at school.
According to the Fundations Home Support Pack and Parent Orientation materials, the program provides clear, accessible communication to families about the foundational skills taught in Grade 2. Materials include:
An introductory parent letter explaining that Fundations Level 2 provides systematic and explicit phonics instruction combined with reading literature to support literacy development.
Clear explanations that research supports systematic and explicit phonics instruction and that home–school partnership supports student success.
Guidance encourages families to read unit letters, monitor student progress, share concerns, and set aside time for home activities.
A Parent Orientation reference section that includes information about developing oral expression and vocabulary.
A reference page explaining the six syllable types in English to support family understanding of syllable instruction.
Unit-specific parent letters that outline instructional focus areas in accessible language. For example, the Unit 1 letter explains the closed syllable concept, defines a closed syllable, provides examples such as at, mat, mast, and clash, and explains that the short vowel sound is marked by the breve sign.
Clear explanations of foundational terminology, including digraphs, consonant blends, digraph blends, and sound-tapping strategies.
Explicit explanations of spelling conventions, including when to use c, k, or ck in words.
A recommendation for families to access the brochure Helping Your Child Learn to Read: A Parent Guide: Preschool Through Grade 3, which further explains foundational reading concepts in accessible language.
The materials provide structured communication and accessible explanations to inform families about Grade 2 foundational skills instruction and expectations.
Materials provide stakeholders with strategies and activities for practicing print concepts, phonemic awareness, phonics, word recognition, and fluency that will support students in progress toward and achievement of grade-level foundational skills standards.
According to the Fundations Home Support Pack and unit parent letters, families are provided with structured, aligned home practice activities corresponding to current classroom instruction. These supports include:
Unit-based take-home packets aligned to current instruction, including 2–3 writing grid homework sheets per unit.
Activity suggestions attached to unit letters for reinforcing closed syllables, digraphs, blends, and digraph blends.
Guidance for practicing blending and segmenting words with up to six sounds using the sound-tapping strategy.
Practice activities supporting spelling conventions for c, k, and ck.
Reinforcement activities reviewing Level 1 concepts while building new Level 2 skills.
Encouragement for families to practice vocabulary, oral expression, and reading fluency through structured home routines.
The materials emphasize coordinated home–school practice by aligning home packets to instructional units and reinforcing phonics patterns, syllable types, spelling conventions, word reading, and fluency development taught in Grade 2 instruction.
Indicator 3e
Note: Content for this indicator is fully addressed in 3b, which covers adult-level explanations and examples of foundational skills concepts. No separate scoring is required.
Indicator 3f
Materials embed consistent teacher guidance for the use of instructional tools and supports necessary for foundational skills instruction.
The teacher guidance for using instructional tools in Wilson Fundations meets the expectations for Indicator 3f. Materials consistently identify the physical tools used across foundational skills lessons and name them directly within routines so the teacher knows what to use and when. Tools are clearly referenced within lesson plans and daily routines and are aligned to specific instructional purposes across phonological awareness, phonics, decoding, encoding, and fluency. Lesson-level annotations and program resources provide explicit guidance on how and when to use each tool, including directions for incorporating classroom materials and manipulatives within instructional routines.
Materials consistently identify tools (e.g., Elkonin boxes, letter tiles, sound walls, mirrors) within lesson routines and instructional steps.
In Orientation, Day 1, Drill Sounds/Warm-Up, the materials clearly identify how to use the Standard Sound Cards on display to support the warm up activity. The teacher is instructed to point to a Standard Sound Card with the Baby Echo pointer. The teacher says the letter-keyword-sound for the identified Sound Card and students repeat.
In Unit 5, Week 1, Day 3, Storytime, the materials clearly identify the tools necessary to engage in the activity. As part of the Daily Plan box, Teacher Materials are identified. Within the specific activity, two tools are identified and explained within the instructional steps:
Projected version of unit story: as this version shows the phrasing of sentences through visual scoops, this tool is used to support whole-class reading if necessary; and
Student copy of unit story: as this version does not have the visual phrasing cues, this tool can be used to support students’ practice of fluent reading in smaller settings.
Materials provide teacher-facing guidance on how and when to use these tools to support instruction in phonological awareness, phonics, fluency, and encoding.
In Unit 6, Week 2, Day 2, Teach ive Spelling, the materials provide teacher facing guidance for using letter tiles and their Letter Board. The teacher should have students add the green ive tile to their Letter Board before the teacher dictates some words with the /ǐv/ sound. The teacher should remind the students that sometimes, -ive will be a suffix. If /ǐv/ is a suffix, the students should use the yellow, blank suffix tile to represent the sound. If /ǐv/ is not a suffix, students should use the green ive tile.
The Literacy Leader letter, included with the Fundations Sample Kit physical materials, identifies and provides a description, purpose, and explanation of how each of the following items in the Fundations Classroom Set should be used. An example is provided in the list below.
Student Materials
Letter Board 2-3
Magnetic Letter Tiles 2
Dry Erase Writing Tablet
Student Notebook 2
Description: The Student Notebook is a consumable item for students to complete and use as a resource.
Purpose: The Student Notebook is used by students to develop as a resource for sounds, spelling rules, syllable patterns, Trick Words, vocabulary, and sound options.
How it’s used: Students color pictures of key words for letter-sound associations. They add word examples for spelling rules and syllable patterns, Trick Words, and Words of the Day to use as a reference. The Teacher’s Manual indicates when to add information to the Student Notebook.
Teacher Materials
Baby Echo
Word of the Day Cards 2
Fundations Teacher’s Manual 2
Large Sound Cards 2
Standard Sound Cards 3
Trick Word Flashcards 2
Indicator 3g
Materials include publisher-produced alignment documentation of the standards addressed by specific questions, tasks, and assessments and assessment materials clearly denote which standards are being emphasized.
Materials do not include denotations of the foundational skills standards within formative or summative assessment materials. Assessment materials identify the skills being measured but do not label specific foundational skills standards by number or designation within the assessment documents themselves. Publisher-provided alignment documentation is available through separate crosswalk resources, which correlate foundational skills standards to units, activities, and locations within the Teacher’s Manual. However, standards are not embedded within lesson plans, tasks, questions, or assessment items, and alignment is not provided at the level of individual assessment items. Teachers must reference separate alignment documents to determine standards alignment.
Materials include denotations of the foundational skills standards being assessed in the formative assessments.
According to the Fundations Learning Community, Standards Alignment, assessment materials identify skills being assessed; however, specific foundational skills standards are not labeled by standard number or code within the formative assessment items themselves.
Materials include denotations of foundational skills standards being assessed in the summative assessments.
According to the Fundations Learning Community Standards Alignment documents, benchmark and unit assessments identify skills measured; however, specific foundational skills standards are not labeled within the assessment documents themselves. The teacher must reference separate alignment documentation to determine standards alignment.
Alignment documentation is provided for all tasks, questions, and assessment items.
According to the Fundations Learning Community, Standards Alignment, publisher-produced crosswalk documents are provided by state. These crosswalks correlate specific state standards to units, activity names, and page numbers within the Teacher’s Manual. However, alignment is not provided at the individual question or assessment item level. The documentation connects standards to broader units and activities rather than to specific assessment questions or tasks.
Alignment documentation contains specific foundational skills standards correlated to specific lessons.
According to the Fundations Learning Community, Standards Alignment, the state-specific crosswalk documents identify foundational skills standards and correlate them to particular units, activity names, and page numbers within the Teacher’s Manual. However, the Teacher Guide itself does not embed standards within lesson plans, and standards are not listed directly within individual lessons or assessments. Teachers must reference the separate crosswalk documents for standards alignment.
Indicator 3h
This is not an assessed indicator in ELA.
Criterion 3.2: Student Supports
Materials are designed for each child’s regular and active participation in grade-level foundational skills content and include embedded supports for student access, engagement, and differentiation.
The Wilson Fundations materials meet expectations for Criterion 3.2 by supporting students’ regular and active participation in grade-level foundational skills content and including embedded supports for access, engagement, and differentiation. Materials include guidance for organizing small-group instruction and provide structures for reteaching through centers, independent practice, and targeted group instruction aligned to assessment data. Embedded supports within core routines, including modeling, visual and tactile scaffolds, and structured practice, allow students to engage with grade-level skills while receiving targeted support, enabling multiple pathways toward mastery. Materials also include supports for multilingual learners, such as visual scaffolds, sentence supports, oral-language routines, and guidance for making cross-linguistic connections that link decoding and word analysis to meaning.
Materials include visual representation of varied backgrounds through illustrations in decodable and connected texts. Representation is primarily surface-level, as cultural and community contexts are not developed within the text. Guidance for incorporating students’ cultural, linguistic, and community backgrounds into foundational skills instruction is limited. Overall, the materials provide structured supports for differentiation and language development, with more limited emphasis on culturally responsive instructional guidance.
Indicator 3j
Materials provide strategies and supports for students in special populations to work with grade-level content and to meet or exceed grade-level standards.
The strategies and supports for reteaching in Wilson Fundations meet the expectations for Indicator 3j. Materials provide guidance for using small-group instruction, centers, and independent practice to support reteaching of foundational skills. Unit Overviews include recommendations for focused small-group instruction and direct the teacher to program resources that support targeted practice. The materials also include guidance for scaffolding and adapting instruction to support students who need additional support in accessing grade-level foundational skills.
Materials provide opportunities for small group reteaching.
Each unit overview provides recommendations for how to use centers, small groups, and independent practice within the unit, including focused instruction for reteaching. Small group work for focused instruction recommendations “require the teacher to facilitate and guide students through the activities and can be found on the Fundations Learning Community.”
In the Unit 1 Unit Overview, the materials guide the teacher to choose activities for small group instruction that “support students’ mastery of short vowel words with digraphs and blends.” The materials guide the teacher to various resources to support this targeted practice.
In the Unit 10 Unit Overview, the materials guide the teacher to choose activities for small group instruction that “support students’ mastery of the double vowel syllable type (ai and ay) in single syllable and multisyllabic words, using the spelling options procedure for words with the /ā/ sound.” The materials guide the teacher to a variety of resources for this targeted practice.
Materials provide guidance to the teacher for scaffolding and adapting lessons and activities to support students who read, write, speak or listen below grade level in accessing grade-level foundational skills standards.
Each unit overview provides recommendations for differentiating instruction for students who need additional support.
In the Unit 3 Unit Overview, the materials suggest that some students may confuse glued sounds that are visually or auditorily similar (such as ong and ung, or ild and ind). The teacher should encourage these students to use their Student Notebook or the Fundations posters during Fundations activities.
In the Unit 17 Unit Overview, the materials suggest that the Optional Writing Activities suggested in Storytime can be modified to meet the needs of students. These activities can be increased or decreased in length based on students’ level of need.
Indicator 3k
This indicator is not assessed in reviews of K-2 ELA foundational skills supplements.
Indicator 3l
This indicator is not assessed in reviews of K-2 ELA foundational skills supplements.
Indicator 3m
This indicator is not assessed in reviews of K-2 ELA foundational skills supplements.
Indicator 3n
This indicator is not assessed in reviews of K-2 ELA foundational skills supplements.
Indicator 3o
Materials provide a range of representation of people and include detailed instructions and support for educators to effectively incorporate and draw upon students’ different cultural, social, and community backgrounds to enrich learning experiences.
The Wilson Fundations materials include decodable and connected texts that provide representation of people from varied racial, gender, and ability backgrounds. Grade 2 texts include illustrations and informational content depicting individuals from diverse backgrounds participating in fields such as science, technology, and athletics. Some texts include informational content about adaptive sports and the Paralympic Games, providing representation of athletes with disabilities and inclusive athletic participation. Materials also include general guidance acknowledging cultural and linguistic differences and encouraging the teacher to create respectful and supportive classroom environments. However, the program includes limited instructional guidance for the teacher on intentionally incorporating students’ cultural, linguistic, or community backgrounds into foundational skills instruction.
Decodable and connected texts provide a range of representation of people, ensuring a broad range of cultural, racial, gender, and ability backgrounds are accurately and authentically represented.
The Grade 2 connected texts include both visual and informational representation of diverse backgrounds, genders, and abilities. For example:
The text Who Invented That? includes a cover illustration depicting individuals of varying racial backgrounds and genders engaged in fields such as science, aviation, and video game design.
The text Get in the Game includes representation of individuals of different genders participating in sports such as hockey, field hockey, volleyball, and cheerleading, expanding beyond traditional gender associations in athletics.
The text also includes references to Paralympic athletes and describes sitting volleyball as a sport requiring skill and speed.
In the “Did You Know?” section, the materials provide informational content about adaptive sports and the Paralympic Games. The text explains that adaptive sports include rules or structures that make play accessible for athletes of different abilities. It provides examples such as wheelchair soccer played indoors to support participation. The section describes the historical development of the Paralympic Games, including Dr. Ludwig Guttmann’s role in organizing early competitions for athletes who use wheelchairs and the growth of the Paralympics into an international event.
In this text, representation extends beyond illustration to include substantive informational content about athletes with disabilities, the history of adaptive sports, and global participation in inclusive athletic competition.
Materials provide some detailed instructions and support for teachers on incorporating and drawing upon students’ different cultural, social, and community backgrounds to enrich learning experiences.
According to the Fundations Teacher Manual, the Differentiation Support section states that fostering a positive learning environment that reflects awareness of cultural and linguistic differences is an important part of differentiated instruction. The materials explain that:
Students should be provided opportunities to respond in ways that make them feel comfortable.
Students benefit from acquiring language and skills through listening and doing.
The teacher should recognize that errors are a natural part of the learning process.
The more comfortable students feel in the classroom, the more able they are to learn.
The materials further note that some cultures may focus less on verbal interaction with young children. As a result, students may require additional support with vocabulary development or guidance in adjusting to classroom norms such as actively engaging with adults. The guidance directs the teacher to honor students’ backgrounds while helping them navigate school expectations.
This language provides acknowledgment of cultural and linguistic differences and offers general guidance for supporting students respectfully within the classroom context.
Indicator 3p
This is not an assessed indicator in ELA.
Indicator 3q
This is not an assessed indicator in ELA.
Indicator 3.MLL
Materials provide embedded supports to help multilingual learners (MLLs) develop foundational reading and writing skills. Instruction draws on oral and home language resources and reflects the interdependence of language and literacy development.
The Wilson Fundations materials provide language and visual scaffolds to support multilingual learners, including guidance for using pictures, modeling, contextual examples, sentence supports, and visual cues to support access to foundational skills instruction. Materials include guidance for cross-linguistic comparisons of sounds, word structures, and morphological patterns across languages and reference linguistic accommodation resources available through the Fundations Learning Community. Oral language development is supported through structured routines such as read-alouds, discussion prompts, peer interaction, and activities that connect spoken language to print and vocabulary development. Materials include guidance acknowledging that nonsense words may present challenges for MLL students and direct the teacher to clarify when words do not have meaning. Guidance also supports connecting decoding to meaning through prediction, discussion, and comprehension routines during connected text reading.
Materials include embedded language and content, and visual scaffolds (e.g., pictures, graphic organizers, anchor charts) that help MLL students access grade-level foundational skills instruction.
In the Teacher’s Manual, Learning Activity Overview, each activity provides scaffolding suggestions specifically to engage MLLs.
For example, in the activity Trick Words, the materials suggest that MLL students “will need additional support for learning the meaning of many Trick Words…which are function words or less concrete to define (e.g. ‘the’ or ‘what’).” The materials suggest that the teacher provides multiple examples of these words in context and connect to the students’ home language, where possible.
In the Fundations Learning Community, Level 1 Linguistic Accommodations for MLL digital resource, the materials provide examples of verbal, procedural, and instructional scaffolds to support MLL students to access grade-level foundational skills instruction. Activity specific scaffolds are further divided based on a student’s level of proficiency.
For example, during the Storytime activity, if a MLL student is at a beginning level of proficiency, the materials suggest that the teacher provides adapted texts, repetition, and teacher and/or peer modeling. If a MLL student is at an advanced level of proficiency, the materials suggest the teacher have the text broken into smaller parts during the reading, as well as use visual and linguistic support when engaging with the adapted text.
Throughout the curriculum, the materials provide teacher guidance for feedback as well as scaffolds that support MLL students' access to grade-level foundational skills instruction.
Materials include modeling and cross-linguistic comparisons of phonemes, graphemes, and sound-symbol correspondences where English and home language patterns differ.
In the Fundations Learning Community, Cross-Linguistic Connections and Fundations: Level 2 digital resource, the materials provide examples of Fundations activities to make morphological comparisons across languages.
For example, in the Word Talk activity in Units 4, 5, 6, 7, and 17, the materials state that “students learn about suffixes and prefixes and begin to break down multisyllabic words.” The teacher should use these units to make cross-linguistic comparisons about syllabication.
In the Unit 10 Unit Overview, MLL Connections, the materials provide teacher guidance on how to provide vocabulary support to MLLs to learn base words and distinguish homophones.
For example, when introducing homophones, the materials caution that “dictionary look-up practices are less effective for [MLL] learners as it assumes the definitions provided align with their existing vocabulary knowledge.” Instead, the teacher should “use pictures to explain ‘flower’ and ‘flour’ [as an example] and link meanings to familiar concepts.” Whenever possible, the teacher should connect to cognates in the students’ home language “to reinforce understanding and build connections across languages.”
Materials include tasks or routines that develop oral language as a bridge to literacy (e.g., structured speaking, listening, and vocabulary development).
In the Fundations Learning Community, MLL Considerations for Storytime digital resource,the materials provide a modified routine for the Storytime activity that supports MLLs.
For example, in narrative texts, the teacher is encouraged to “use ‘picture notes’ to support MLLs in connecting oral language to events of the story.” These notes are simple images that represent key moments in a narrative text. The teacher should “guide students in sequencing them [the picture notes] to deepen their understanding of the story’s progression.”
In the Fundations Readers Teacher Guide, the materials note that teacher read-aloud during the initial reading is especially supportive for MLL/EB students, as it allows the teacher to activate background knowledge and support vocabulary and comprehension. Materials also recommend strategic peer pairing during echo reading and encourage use of observational and assessment data to monitor MLL progress.
In Unit 14, Week 1, Day 3, Make It Fun, the materials present an activity where students act out words with the /ou/ sound in them. The activity begins by the teacher and students chorally reading the word list together that provides the options for students to choose from. The teacher then asks one student to act out one of the words from the board by giving them an index card with one of the words. The class is then meant to guess which word the student is acting out. The materials provide a note to the teacher that the “activity may be challenging for MLLs depending on their familiarity with the words.” The teacher is encouraged to incorporate these words into vocabulary reviews in a small group session prior to the activity.
Materials avoid the use of nonsense words in instruction or assessment for MLLs and may acknowledge that unfamiliar real words can function as nonsense words for these students.
In the Unit 8, Week 1, Day 2, Make It Fun, the materials provide an activity that reinforces the decoding of r-controlled vowels. The activity begins with the students building a word, such as born, on their Word Boards. Once they have built that word, they are instructed to remove the current r-controlled vowel tile and replace it with another r-controlled vowel tile.
For example, the students could replace the or tile with an ar tile to create barn. If the word that students have created is a real word, it should be written on paper. The materials provide a note to the teacher that MLLs may struggle with the nonsense words in this activity because many of these nonsense words are “word-like.” The materials provide option supports that include “pre-teaching the activity [and] highlighting real words with meanings and nonsense words.”
Although nonsense words are included in assessment and instruction, the teacher is directed to note when a word is a nonsense word.
Materials support meaning-making through early literacy instruction, rather than emphasizing isolated decoding alone.
In Unit 9, Week 1, Day 3, Storytime, the teacher guides students through a reading activity with the story The Red Planet. The teacher is instructed to ask the students to read the title of the story and then engages the students in a discussion of the title. Students are also encouraged to predict what the story might be about and provide background knowledge, if appropriate. The teacher then continues to work through the story with the students, asking the students to “picture or make a movie in their mind” to support meaning-making.
Criterion 3.3: Intentional Design
Materials include a visual design that is engaging and supportively organized, and integrate digital technology, when applicable, with guidance for teachers.
The Wilson Fundations materials include digital technology and visual design features that support foundational skills instruction, with accompanying guidance for teachers. Digital resources, including FUN HUB Practice, provide interactive, lesson-aligned activities that reinforce phonological awareness, phonics, word recognition, and spelling, with features for assigning tasks, providing feedback, and tracking student performance. Additional tools, such as InterActivities and the Unit Test Tracker, support teacher-led instruction and data analysis through interactive materials and reporting features. Student engagement with digital materials occurs through both guided use and independent practice aligned to the scope and sequence.
The visual design of both print and digital materials supports learning without distraction. Consistent layouts, routines, and organizational features help students and teachers navigate lessons and reinforce instructional structures. Materials include guidance for integrating technology that explains how to access and use digital tools for instruction, practice, and data tracking; however, some instructional details require navigation across multiple resources. Overall, the integration of digital resources and visual design supports instructional clarity and implementation, with some limitations in ease of access.
Indicator 3r
Materials integrate technology such as interactive tools, virtual manipulatives/objects, and/or dynamic software in ways that engage students in the grade-level/series standards, when applicable.
The Wilson Fundations materials include digital technology and interactive tools that support foundational skills instruction. FUN HUB Practice provides students with access to interactive, skill-aligned activities that reinforce phonological awareness, phonics, word study, and spelling, along with performance tracking and reporting features. Additional digital tools, including InterActivities and the Unit Test Tracker, support teacher modeling and data analysis through interactive materials and performance dashboards. The platform includes customization features that allow the teacher to assign activities, adjust settings, and monitor student performance based on instructional needs.
Digital technology and interactive tools, such as data collection tools, simulations, and/or modeling tools are available to students.
According to the Fundations Learning Community, FUN HUB digital platform, the materials include integrated digital instructional, practice, and data tools aligned to Fundations Level 2. These include:
FUN HUB Practice, which provides weekly interactive literacy activities aligned to daily Fundations classroom instruction and allows the teacher to choose from four weekly activities to enhance students’ learning experience.
Teacher tools for creating classes and students and assigning digital activities by Level, Unit, and Week.
Real-time dashboards that display student performance on completed activities, including visual summaries of weekly performance by student and by activity.
Itemized Scoring Reports that allow the teacher to review targeted concepts, prompts, correct answers, and class results.
Student-facing login tools, including a teacher passcode and individual student credentials for completing assigned activities.
Student voice recording functionality embedded within specific activities when microphone access is enabled.
The Unit Test Tracker (UTT), a digital tool for entering and analyzing end-of-unit assessment results, including unit-level reports and skills reports that show class and student performance over time.
Fundations InterActivities, a teacher-facing digital app designed for smart board use that includes digital versions of Teacher’s Kit materials and provides interactive, supplemental classroom activities aligned to the Fundations scope and sequence.
These tools provide both student-facing interactive practice and teacher-facing modeling and data tools aligned to Grade 2 foundational skills instruction.
Digital tools support student engagement in foundational skills.
According to Fundations Learning Community, FUN HUB Practice and InterActivities descriptions, digital tools support student engagement through interactive activities and recording features aligned to Fundations Level 2 instruction. These include:
Weekly digital practice activities aligned to the targeted concepts and literacy skills of the selected Unit and Week.
Student-facing activities with performance monitoring that populate teacher dashboards once assignments are completed.
Student voice recording features embedded in designated activities, with recordings accessible for teacher review within student reports.
Interactive smart board tools used during instruction to display and manipulate Teacher’s Kit materials digitally, supporting teacher-led engagement in phonics, word study, and related foundational skills routines.
These tools engage students through interactive practice opportunities and structured teacher review of performance and recordings.
Digital materials can be customized for local use (i.e., student and/or community interests).
According to the Fundations Learning Community, FUN HUB platform guidance, digital materials include multiple customization features that allow the teacher and schools to adjust use based on local needs:
The teacher selects the Fundations Level upon login and access digital materials curated to that level.
The teacher can assign activities by Class, Unit, and Week, selecting specific activities for the whole class or for individual students.
The teacher sets and adjusts assignment start and end dates and can close assignments so students can no longer complete them.
The teacher can enable or disable student voice recording for the entire class or for individual students.
The teacher can manage student credentials, including changing icon-based passwords.
Performance data can be filtered by unit, week, and class, and reports can be exported as CSV files or saved as PDF.
Within Unit Test Tracker, the teacher can view class and student performance over time and use skills reports to identify trends and access reteach supports.
Indicator 3s
This indicator is not assessed in reviews of K-2 ELA foundational skills supplements.
Indicator 3t
The visual design (whether in print or digital) is not distracting or chaotic, but supports students in engaging thoughtfully with the subject.
The Wilson Fundations materials include images, graphics, and models that support student learning and engagement without being visually distracting. Visual tools such as the Syllable Types Poster and Spelling Options Poster clearly represent word analysis concepts and spelling patterns through structured and consistent design. Teacher and student materials maintain a consistent layout and structure across lessons and units, supporting predictable instructional routines. Organizational features are generally accurate and clearly labeled; however, navigation is limited, as key information such as activity timing is located in separate reference sections rather than embedded within daily lessons, requiring teachers to move between materials.
Images, graphics, and models support student learning and engagement without being visually distracting. Images, graphics, and models clearly communicate information or support student understanding of topics, texts, or concepts.
Student-facing images, graphics, and models in the materials support student learning without being visually distracting. The following are some, but not all, of the examples of these materials.
The Syllable Types Poster is a clear reference chart that supports the word analysis methods students learn in various activities throughout Fundations Level 2. The Syllable Types Poster includes the name of the syllable type, how it would be marked for word analysis purposes, and if there are any exceptions to it. For example, in the v-e syllable type (also called “silent e” in some of the materials), the materials show the word cake with a macron over the a (i.e. ā), indicating the long vowel sound. The letter e is also crossed out. The whole word is underlined, and underneath the underline is the designation “v-e” to signal the syllable type. The poster also provides an exception in the word give. The letter e is crossed out, but the letter i has a breve (i.e. ǐ), and therefore is an exception ot the v-e syllable type. Although the teacher is not explicitly guided to use this resource within the lesson plans presented in the Teacher’s Manual, and students are introduced to some of the syllable types in Fundations Level 1, this poster is clearly marked as a Fundations Level 2 resource and could prove supportive of students’ understanding of the concept of syllable types.
The Spelling Options Poster is a clear reference chart that supports students’ spelling and identification of the various ways that the same sound can be represented in English. The Spelling Options Poster is mostly referenced in the context of corrective feedback (see Unit 7, Week 1, Day 4; Unit 10, Week 1, Day 5; and Unit 11, Week 2, Day 1). This poster is not referenced in the Learning Activity Overviews for activities that include spelling options, such as Diction/Words (Spelling Options Procedure) or Echo/Find Words (Spelling Options Procedure). The poster is organized by sound. For example, in the fourth row of the poster, the sound /ī/ is shown as being represented by i-e, i, and y. This resource could provide support for students’ understanding of the various options for spelling the same sound in English.
Teacher and student materials are consistent in layout and structure across lessons/modules/units.
The design and layout of teacher and student materials remain consistent across the Level 2 program. Each unit has a unit overview which provides the teacher with an orientation on the core skills that are targeted within the unit, how to differentiate instruction, and how to engage multilingual learners. Each unit includes a Student Learning Plan that provides a daily snapshot of each lesson within each week of instruction. Finally, most lessons begin with the Drill Sounds/Warm Up routine, demonstrating a general consistency across lessons in the Level 2 program.
Organizational features (Table of Contents, glossary, index, internal references, table headers, captions, etc.) in the materials are clear, accurate, and error-free.
The materials are labeled and free of errors in internal references and captions. However, the physical materials do not include tabs or indexes, making quick navigation to multiple areas of the Teacher’s Manual challenging. For example, Unit 3, Week 1, Day 3 has the Word of the Day activity. If a teacher wanted to refresh their memory on how much time to allot to the activity, they would have to remember to go back to the front of the Teacher’s Manual, in the Learning Activity Overview section, to see that the Word of the Day activity should take between 5-10 minutes. The timing information is not included within the context of the lesson. While it is helpful to have each activity more fully explained in the Learning Activity Overview–and quickly recapped within the Activity Cue Cards–navigating between those sections and the daily lesson within the physical materials may be challenging.
Indicator 3u
Materials provide teacher guidance for the use of embedded technology to support and enhance student learning, when applicable.
The Wilson Fundations materials provide teacher guidance for the use of embedded technology to support and enhance student learning. Guidance includes directions for accessing and navigating FUN HUB, implementing InterActivities for teacher-led instruction, and assigning and managing FUN HUB Practice activities aligned to classroom instruction. Materials also include support for monitoring student performance through dashboards, reports, and student recordings, as well as guidance for using the Unit Test Tracker to analyze assessment data. Additional resources, including the FUN HUB Practice Teacher’s Guide, provide implementation guidance for integrating digital tools into instruction across instructional settings.
Teacher guidance is provided for the use of embedded technology to support and enhance student learning, when applicable.
According to the Fundations Level 2 FUN HUB administration guide, materials provide teacher guidance for the use of embedded technology to support and enhance student learning. Guidance includes:
Step-by-step directions for accessing FUN HUB, selecting Level 2, and launching digital resources.
Guidance for using Fundations InterActivities, a digital instructional app designed for smart board technology that includes digital Teacher’s Kit materials and can be used to engage learners during daily instruction aligned to the Fundations scope and sequence.
Detailed procedures for implementing FUN HUB Practice, including:
Creating and managing classes and student accounts.
Assigning weekly activities aligned to specific units and weeks.
Reviewing targeted literacy skills and pedagogical overviews before assigning activities.
Managing and reviewing student voice recordings when applicable.
Viewing class-level and student-level performance dashboards.
Instructions for accessing and interpreting Fun Hub Practice Assignment Results and Student Reports, including itemized scoring reports that display targeted concepts, prompts, correct responses, and class performance distributions.
Guidance for using the Unit Test Tracker, including entering unit test results, analyzing class averages by skill section, reviewing benchmark indicators, accessing skills reports across units, and viewing student performance trends over time.
According to the Fundations Learning Community, the FUN HUB Practice Teacher’s Guide is provided as a separate resource and includes:
An overview of FUN HUB Practice and its alignment to weekly classroom instruction.
A “Getting Started” section
Detailed activity descriptions for each digital activity, including:
Targeted literacy skills.
Pedagogical overviews.
Estimated time for gameplay.
A monitoring student progress section that includes:
Progress bars.
Student scores.
Class averages.
Itemized scoring reports.
Student-level reports.
Implementation suggestions for integrating FUN HUB Practice into instruction, including:
At-home practice.
Small-group instruction.
Independent work.
Substitute teacher assignments.
Transition activities.
The materials provide structured teacher guidance for implementing embedded instructional technology, monitoring student engagement and performance, and using digital assessment tools to inform instructional adjustments in Grade 2.