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Course Description

This professional development course equips teachers with the knowledge and tools to teach foundational reading skills to kindergarten students. The curriculum focuses on phonemic awareness and letter-sound correspondence, the two pillars of early literacy instruction supported by the science of reading.

Who This Course Is For

Primary Audience: Kindergarten teachers, reading specialists, and instructional aides who work directly with beginning readers.

Secondary Audience: Parents and caregivers who want to support reading instruction at home using research-based methods.

How This Course Works

This course provides two distinct types of resources:

For Teachers: Chapter Content

The 11 instructional chapters provide teachers with:

  • Background knowledge on reading development
  • Explicit teaching strategies for each skill
  • Scope and sequence guidance
  • Assessment approaches
  • Common student challenges and interventions
  • Activities to use in the classroom

Teachers should read the chapter content to understand what to teach, why it matters, and how to deliver effective instruction.

For Students: MicroSims

The interactive MicroSims (micro-simulations) are designed for direct student use. These browser-based activities let children:

  • Practice letter recognition through games
  • Hear letter sounds with audio feedback
  • Build words by blending sounds
  • Master sight words through repetition
  • Track their progress visually

Teachers introduce MicroSims during instruction, then students can use them independently or in centers. Parents can also use MicroSims at home for additional practice.

Prerequisites

For teachers: No prior reading instruction experience required. This course starts from foundational principles.

For students: None. The curriculum is designed for complete beginners with no prior reading knowledge.

Topics Covered

  • Sounds of English (phonemes)
  • Letters of English (alphabet recognition)
  • One-to-one correspondence (print tracking)
  • Sound-letter correspondence (phonics)
  • Blending sounds into words (decoding)
  • High-frequency sight words

Topics Not Covered

This course focuses on foundational decoding and does not include:

  • Parts of speech or grammar
  • Sentence-level reading
  • Verb tenses
  • Reading comprehension strategies
  • Irregular sight words beyond the core 18
  • Spelling instruction
  • Digraphs (sh, ch, th)
  • Consonant blends (bl, cr, st)
  • Vowel teams (ea, oa, ai)
  • Silent E patterns

These topics are typically introduced in first grade after students have mastered foundational skills.

Learning Outcomes

By the end of this course, teachers will be able to:

  1. Explain the role of phonemic awareness in reading development
  2. Demonstrate explicit instruction techniques for letter-sound correspondence
  3. Guide students through blending VC and CVC words
  4. Use the MicroSims effectively for student practice and assessment
  5. Identify students who may need additional support
  6. Implement multisensory learning strategies

Students who complete the curriculum will be able to:

  1. Recognize all 26 uppercase and lowercase letters
  2. Associate consonant letters with their most common sounds
  3. Identify the five short vowel sounds and five long vowel sounds
  4. Blend vowel-consonant (VC) and consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) words
  5. Recognize 18 high-frequency sight words
  6. Demonstrate one-to-one correspondence when tracking print

Bloom's Taxonomy Alignment

The student learning outcomes align with Bloom's Taxonomy cognitive levels:

Remember (Knowledge)

  • Recognize all 26 letters of the alphabet (uppercase and lowercase)
  • Recall the most common sound for each consonant letter
  • Identify the five short vowel sounds and five long vowel sounds
  • Recognize 18 high-frequency sight words

Understand (Comprehension)

  • Demonstrate one-to-one correspondence between spoken and written words
  • Count the number of spoken words in a short sentence
  • Explain that letters represent sounds in spoken words
  • Understand that words are made up of individual sounds (phonemes)

Apply (Application)

  • Associate consonant letters with their most common sounds
  • Match vowel letters to their short and long sounds
  • Blend vowel-consonant (VC) words using learned letter sounds
  • Blend consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) words using learned letter sounds

Analyze (Analysis)

  • Identify the first sound in a spoken word
  • Segment words into individual sounds
  • Distinguish between different vowel sounds in words

Create

  • Form simple words by combining known sounds
  • Generate rhyming words within word families

Assessment Approach

Student progress is measured through:

  • Accuracy of letter-sound correspondence
  • Success rate when blending sounds into words
  • Sight word recognition speed
  • Teacher observation during MicroSim use

Note: Formal percentage scores are not used at the kindergarten level. Assessment focuses on mastery of specific skills and readiness to progress.

Course Structure

Component Audience Purpose
11 Chapters Teachers Instructional guidance and background knowledge
25+ MicroSims Students Interactive practice with immediate feedback
Learning Graph Teachers Visual map of concept dependencies
Glossary Teachers/Parents Reference for terminology
FAQ Teachers/Parents Common questions and troubleshooting

Technical Notes

  1. MicroSims work in any modern web browser (Chrome, Safari, Firefox, Edge)
  2. Audio features use the Web Speech API for letter sounds
  3. No student data is collected or stored
  4. All resources are free and openly accessible
  5. Assumes Webster's (American English) dialect for pronunciation

Time Commitment

  • Teacher preparation: 2-3 hours to read all chapter content
  • Student instruction: 15-20 minutes daily throughout the kindergarten year
  • MicroSim practice: 5-10 minutes per session, 3-5 sessions per week