I recommend the K-12 reading block skills article By EL Education Curriculum. to my partner and our teacher. I believe that it is fundamental and one of the basic needs of all children is to be able to read. Without the appropriate reading skills how will students be able to comprehend and understand assignments and what they are looking for. This article in its second paragraph states the emphasis and importance of what the goal is for the children. “Because of this widely recognized need, EL Education has created the K–2 Reading Foundations Skills Block (Skills Block). The intent is to ensure that, by the end of Grade 2, students acquire the depth of skills they need in the Reading Foundations standards in order to be able to navigate grade-level text independently. The lessons and assessments explicitly address the CCSS Reading Standards: Foundational Skills, as well as some Language standards associated with spelling and letter formation.”(eleducation.org) There is a huge need for EL education and through this we hope we can adequately prepare students for success. Too many times in today’s world we see children fall by the wayside, this is because they are not equipped with the basic tools for survival. If we focus on fully developing the children’s reading and comprehension skills all the other categories will rise. The skill block is a module for the students to use its an eight-week structure with cycles. It is used to pace the levels that the child is learning. Each cycle becomes more difficult; it challenges the student to take charge and prepare oneself. You may ask what if a student isn’t fully understanding it? Well benchmark testing is used to examine how far along the student is. If they are on track then the benchmark will show, if they are not as a teacher we will step in and try to fill the void in the gap and push the student along in the right direction so they will be able to comprehend fully. This is the ultimate goal, so no child is fully left behind. I believe this will help my teacher dearly.
Citation: EL Education Curriculum
https://eleducation.org/resources/implementing-the-k-2-reading-foundations-skills-block-1
Chris,
Before I can comment on the content of your draft, please review for sentence flow, clearly mention the author and title of the article in your review, and also include the URL with full citation of the peer-reviewed article at the bottom of your review.
I can’t quite tell if your choice of article is relevant for this grade level. Once you determine whether your article is appropriate, consider also tone for your review–how you might shift your language into a direct address to your teacher audience?
I would start with your purpose–the fundamental skill of reading, and then determine why you think this is significant for Ms Dowless? I’m a bit unclear why you are choosing a reading block article for her 6th grade students. You’ve mentioned spelling and letter formation–skills that are typically no longer a focus in a 6th grade classroom, unless we are talking about second-language learners. However, purposeful, content-reading is always a challenge-does the article address that concern? Are you wishing to discuss with her the challenge of supporting struggling readers with science content in their textbooks? Are their questions you could pose about the evidence provided to engage her?
Please review my suggestions and work on revising for Thursday, April 9. We’ll discuss in class, along with assessment reading.
Please let me know if you have questions and I’d be happy to discuss. MAJ Hodde