Grant Wood AEA Literacy consultant's goal is to improve literacy achievement for all students within a strong MTSS system. Consultant support helps to build a school learning community engaged in studying and promoting growth in literacy while focusing on improving student literacy achievement. Grant Wood AEA offers a variety of services in the area of literacy. Literacy consultants provide the following:

  • Consulting and coaching of evidence-based instructional approaches
  • Support in the development of a strong MTSS system within schools
  • Pre-K-12 Professional learning opportunities in the areas of reading, writing, speaking and listening
  • Facilitate the use of standards to drive instruction to ensure a guaranteed, viable curriculum
  • Data analysis and interpretation of screening, progress monitoring, summative and formative assessments
  • Assistance with curriculum development
  • Support for selecting instructional materials
  • Sharing of research and resources connected to current educational developments

Resource Pages

Early Childhood Literacy

Secondary Literacy

Dyslexia


Definitions

Phonological & Phonemic Awareness




Phonological Awareness is the knowledge of sounds within spoken language. It begins with the recognition of phrases within sentences and progresses to successively smaller units (e.g., words within phrases, syllables within words, onsets and rimes, individual phonemes). (Iowa Reading Research Center)

Phonemic Awareness is the ability to isolate and manipulate individual sounds within a spoken word. Phonemic awareness is one of the earliest skills in literacy development, but it is the most difficult skill within the construct of phonological awareness. (Iowa Reading Research Center)

Curriculum

Instruction

Diagnostic Assessment

 

Phonics




Phonics is a teaching and learning process based on applying knowledge of letter-sound correspondences and spelling patterns to learn to read written text. (Iowa Reading Research Center)Advanced Phonics is a teaching and learning process that involves fast recognition and recall of complex spelling patterns and chunks of words that are larger than single phoneme-grapheme correspondences and includes word families, syllable types and morphology. (Moats & Hall, 2010)

Curriculum

  • Iowa Core Foundational Skills, Reading Standards for Literature K-5 are found on pgs. 11-15, Reading Standards for Literature 6-12 are found on pgs. 46-53

Instruction

 

Fluency




Reading text at an appropriate pace/rate and with accuracy and expression to build understanding. (Iowa Reading Research Center)
Fluency is reasonably accurate reading at an appropriate rate with suitable prosody (expression) that leads to accurate and deep comprehension and motivation to read. (Hasbrouck & Glaser, 2012)Curriculum & Instruction

Assessment

 

Vocabulary




Vocabulary refers to the words we must know to communicate effectively. In general, vocabulary can be describes as oral vocabulary or reading vocabulary.

  • Oral vocabulary refers to the words we use in speaking or recognize in listening.
  • Reading vocabulary refers to words we recognize or use in print.

Curriculum

Iowa Core Foundational Skills - Standards for Language begin on pg. 33

Instruction

 

Comprehension




Making meaning from text by using prior knowledge, understanding vocabulary and concepts, making inferences, and forming connections between critical ideas. Some examples of comprehension strategies include predicting, summarizing, identifying main ideas and details, visualizing, and understanding an author’s purpose and perspective. (Iowa Reading Research Center)
Comprehension is the process of simultaneously extracting and constructing meaning through interaction and involvement with written language. (RAND Reading Report, 2002)Curriculum

Instruction

Assessment