Benchmark – comprehensive early reading plan | Foundational Literacy Skills

Now that you have researched instructional strategies to use when introducing literacy concepts, you will now put those strategies into practice as you decide strategies for instruction and assessment.

For this benchmark, use the case scenario provided to develop a comprehensive, research-based early reading plan.

Part 1

Student: Mark

Age: 6

Grade: 1

Mark is in the first grade and has transferred to a new school in the middle of the school year. Mark’s parents set up a meeting with his new first grade teacher to discuss their concerns with Mark’s reading skills. His previous teacher had wanted to discuss concerns about his reading skills with them, but they moved before they were able to meet and address these concerns.

Mark’s new first grade teacher evaluated his reading skills with various assessments and noted some skill deficits in reading. At this age, most of Mark’s classmates are able to recognize various sight words, such as, “and”, “said”, “has”, “have”, “is”, “to”, “the”, “a”, and “was.”

Mark is struggling each time he comes across these words and his oral reading skills are slow and strenuous. He requires a lot of prompting and sometimes says the wrong letter and sometimes just guesses at words. When listening to a passage read aloud, Mark has difficulty answering simple comprehension questions about the main idea or characters.

Mark’s new first grade teacher has set up a follow-up meeting with Mark’s parents to discuss the results of his assessments and to inform them of the instructional goals he has put in place for Mark to help with his reading skills. 

The following are his instructional goals:

1. After listening to a passage or story, Mark will be able to recall two or three of the sequenced events.
2. Mark will be given a brief reading passage on his instructional level, be able to read it aloud, and recall the main ideas.
3. Mark will say the corresponding sound when provided with a letter or letter combination.
4. When prompted with a word, Mark will be able to say a word slowly (sounding it out) and then faster (reading it as a whole), when given a CVC (consonant-vowel-consonant).
5. When shown sight words, Mark will automatically state the word.

Part 2

Sequence each of Mark’s instructional goals described in the case scenario in the order you would address them with her if you were Mark’s teacher. In 100-250 words, explain your rationale for the sequence.

Part 3

Research and select an early reading strategy for one of Mark’s goals. In 500-750 words, describe the strategy in detail with a rationale that explains how it is designed to help Mark achieve that goal. Provide the learning theories and connections across curriculum to support the developed strategy. Provide the long- and short-term plans for Mark and resources (reading specialist, resource teacher, etc.) you would utilize to implement this plan.

Support your rationale with two scholarly resources.

Part 4

Develop an activity that aligns to the chosen strategy you identified in Step 3 that Mark could do at home. In 250-500 words, describe the activity, as well as how you would establish and maintain a collaborative relationship with Mark’s parents and encourage them to help implement it. 

Submit your sequenced list of goals, their associated reading strategies and rationales, and the at-home activity to your instructor as one deliverable