Kindergarten Report Overview

The Kindergarten materials meet the expectations for alignment to standards and research-based practices for foundational skills instruction. The program has a well-defined scope and sequence for letter instruction and provides students with frequent opportunities to practice identifying, locating, and naming all 26 letters of the alphabet with clear directions for the teacher related to providing explicit instruction and modeling. Materials provide daily opportunities for students to practice phonological awareness skills through explicit teacher modeling, and students engage in oral practice activities that are reinforced through a variety of multimodal activities. Materials provide teachers with explicit instructional routines, systematic and repeated modeling, and instruction for students to hear, say, encode, and read the newly taught grade-level phonics pattern and provide students with opportunities to decode phonetically spelled words. Materials include systematic and explicit instruction of high-frequency words and frequent opportunities for the teacher to model the spelling and reading of high-frequency words. Materials provide frequent, explicit instruction of word analysis and decoding strategies and frequent opportunities for both teacher explicit instruction and student practice in decoding text with accuracy and automaticity. Materials include a well-defined teacher resource for content presentation, which includes a detailed scope and sequence, a weekly planner, and detailed information and instructional routines that help the teacher to effectively implement all foundational skills content through session-specific teacher-scripted lessons. Materials provide a clear research-based explanation for the instructional sequence of phonics skills that are taught and regularly and systematically provide a variety of assessment opportunities over the course of the year to demonstrate students’ progress toward mastery and independence of print concepts, letter recognition, and letter formation. The Program Implementation resources offer guidance to teachers for scaffolding and adapting lessons and activities to support students who read, write, speak, or listen below grade level in opportunities to learn foundational skills at the grade-level standards and also provide additional opportunities for students who are beyond grade level. The Program Implementation includes a pacing guide with flexible options for whole-group and small-group instruction, along with sample schedules.