Welcome to the Barnhart Elementary School Reading Page!

Our school uses the Houghton Mifflin Reading Program in Pre-K through Grade 5.  This program is research based and includes all of the components of reading as identified by the National Reading Panel… Phonemic Awareness, Phonics, Fluency, Vocabulary & Comprehension.

The Pre-K and Kindergarten programs are strong in Phonemic Awareness and Phonics to help build a strong foundation for learning to read. There are Big Books for teachers to share, read aloud books, rhyme activities, audio CDs and a phonics program. The literature is built around themes such as Family, Animals, Seasons and Colors.

The First Grade program uses Big Books, adds a student anthology, leveled texts for small group instruction, vocabulary and phonics readers. The phonics program continues with the strategies learned in Pre-K and Kindergarten. Spelling, vocabulary and comprehension strategies and skills are introduced.

The program in Second through Fifth Grade continues teaching phonics, word study and spelling patterns and has a student anthology, leveled texts, and theme paperbacks. Each grade level revisits skills and strategies that were introduced earlier and introduces new ones.

The 5 Components of Reading:

Phonemic Awareness involves being able to hear and manipulate sounds. Examples:

• Tell me the first sound you hear in the word, dog.
• Tell me the sound that is the same in tell, tag, time.
• Which word does not belong? pit, pin, did .
• The children are asked to listen to segmented sounds of a word and then blend them to make a word… /c/  /a/  /t/ or told to listen to a word –dog- and asked to segment the sounds heard…/d/  /o/  /g/.

Phonemic awareness activities are auditory and so the children are not shown letters or printed words at this time. Picture cards are used for identifying sounds or matching activities. The reading program includes many phonemic awareness activities at the Pre-K, Kindergarten and First grade level to help the children learn the sounds in our language and to practice them.

Parents can help their children by playing games with sounds and rhymes and by making sure children articulate their sounds correctly. It is often cute to hear how children say words when they are learning how to speak, but each time they say a sound incorrectly, they are imprinting it on to their brain.

Phonics is taught once the children have begun to master the sounds and involves learning the letter/sound relationships. Focusing on the letters before the sounds are mastered can create problems later. Phonics in our program is taught through a systematic approach with a planned and sequential introduction of the letters and sounds. Parents can help their children by not introducing the letters of the alphabet too soon and by playing rhyme games and reading books with rhymes.

Fluency is being able to read a text with speed, accuracy and good expression. The reading program includes activities for children to read aloud with teacher guidance and teacher modeling to show students how to use expression. There are teacher read-aloud selections at every grade level so students can hear good oral reading. Students are also given opportunities to read at their independent reading level during Self-Selected Reading and encouraged to read 15-30 minutes at home each day for practice. Children who are experiencing difficulty with fluency may also use a "books on tape" program called New Heights Fluency, where they read along with a tape for practice. Parents can help their children build fluency by reading aloud to model good reading and having children read easy material aloud and silently daily.

Stellar     Universal    bewildered   churning

Vocabulary is extremely important to reading achievement. Our reading program includes vocabulary activities to introduce new words prior to reading the main selection. There are activities to do after reading the selection to practice the new words. In addition, the teacher read-aloud selection introduces new words to students. Parents can help their children learn new vocabulary by reading aloud daily from materials that are a little too difficult for the child to read alone and then talking about some of the new words from the text.

Comprehension is the main goal of reading instruction. It is a cognitive process that involves a variety of skills and strategies working together to help the reader construct understanding. Comprehension is not just a matter of asking children questions about what they have read. It is explicitly taught as a part of our reading program. The program introduces strategies and skills by having the teacher model them and then guiding the children through how to use the skill/strategy to make meaning from the text. Parents can help their children by reading aloud to them, talking about new ideas or words, and sharing your own thinking about the text. (It reminds me of… I liked it when… that word means… I need to read that tricky part again… I wonder why he said/did that… )

Assessment: Children in Pre-K through 5th grade are assessed several times a year to determine their progress in reading. Teachers assess for sound knowledge, letter identification, ability to rhyme, segment, blend sounds, read non-sense words and high frequency words, and for oral reading fluency and comprehension.

The student's scores are analyzed and adjustments are made in instruction to meet their needs. Some children may be invited to our Extended Day Program, Summer Academy, moved to new reading groups, or participate in additional intervention programs to help them succeed.