United States · Common Core State Standards
1st Grade English Language Arts
This curriculum develops foundational reading, writing, and speaking skills through a focus on phonics, text analysis, and narrative structure. Students transition from decoding simple words to analyzing complex story elements and composing their own structured narratives.
The Magic of Reading and Phonics
Students explore the relationship between letters and sounds while building fluency in decoding and basic sentence structure.
Focusing on isolating, blending, and segmenting individual sounds in spoken words to build a base for reading.
Building a bank of high frequency words to improve reading speed and comprehension of simple texts.
Introducing nouns, verbs, and the basic punctuation required to make sense of written thoughts.
Characters and Story Worlds
Students dive into narrative texts to identify story elements and understand how authors use illustrations and words to tell a story.
Analyzing how characters react to events and how their feelings change throughout a plot.
Examining where and when stories take place and how the setting influences the plot.
Learning to summarize stories by identifying the beginning, middle, and end.
Exploring the Real World
Students engage with informational texts to learn how to extract facts and use text features to navigate non fiction.
Identifying headings, tables of contents, and glossaries to find information efficiently.
Distinguishing between the primary topic of a text and the specific facts that support it.
Developing the habit of questioning a text to deepen understanding and find specific evidence.
The Young Author's Workshop
Students apply their knowledge of language and structure to create their own narrative, informative, and opinion pieces.
Writing about personal experiences using a sequence of events and descriptive details.
Learning to express a preference or point of view and providing a reason to support it.
Gathering facts about a topic and organizing them to teach others.