Elementary Language Arts

The Catholic School Center of Excellence has sponsored an initiative, Believe and Read, that brings Groves Academy’s transformative literacy methodology to St. Therese Catholic School (and others) to improve students’ reading skills in grades K-3. All students who participate in Believe and Read will benefit.

• Believe and Read is based on 50 years of research and practical application on what really works.
• The program is designed to improve and enhance the reading teaching methods currently being used in schools.
• Literacy coaches from Groves work with teachers over a three-year period using a “train the trainer” model. The result is sustainability and consistency across participating Catholic elementary schools.
• Groves has been recognized twice for ‘Excellence in Education’ by the U.S. Department of Education. They have taken their successful evidence-based method that benefits students with learning disabilities and applied it to all students through their Institute of Professional Learning.
• In addition to building kids’ vocabulary and comprehension skills through their regular reading lesson, teachers are tasked with incorporating a daily 30-minute phonics-based lesson to ensure that students are grasping the reading rules they’ll need to one day achieve fluency.
• Many of these lesson plans are scripted, so teachers know exactly how and when to introduce leach letter, along with its sounds. And how to build up to words from there.
• Teachers also get weekly check-ins with a literacy coach from Groves Academy, along with support tracking student progress through routine assessments.

Kindergarten through 5th grade classrooms also participate in the Houghton Mifflin reading program, Journeys. Journeys provides an instructional system for reading both literature and informational texts, for acquiring foundational skills, and for developing mastery of speaking, listening and writing. There is also an emphasis of this program on guided reading which allows students to work at their own reading ability using leveled readers. Reading groups are flexible and determined by unit pre-assessments.