Literacy Instruction

Teachers in the Xavier University Lab School will adhere to the standards outlined and required by the state of Ohio, Department of Education and Workforce. The phonics and reading program will be well-developed, research-based, and systemic, including: 

• Age-appropriate scope and sequence for teaching alphabetic knowledge, focusing on phonological processing, phonemic awareness, and phonics (grapheme-phoneme correspondences addressing consonants, vowels, digraphs, word ending, spelling patterns, syllables), affixes and morphology. 
• A curriculum that supports children learning to read and reading to learn through decoding and encoding emphasis, connected text, and writing. 

Furthermore, this curriculum will include content that addresses the following: 

• Foundational literacy knowledge for skilled reading 
• Vocabulary 
• Fluency 
• Comprehension 
• Writing 

These areas will encompass a comprehensive language arts program addressing reading, writing, listening, speaking, viewing and visually representing through an age-appropriate scope and sequence framework. High quality instructional materials will assist teachers in providing the tools and strategies students will need to become proficient readers and writers in all subject areas. 

Best practice instructional strategies will be used to teach the curriculum. Multisensory approaches to phonics instruction, reading and writing workshop, children’s literature with a global lens, and project-based learning and inquiry work will be utilized by teachers.