Our tutoring sessions for our lower elementary students, generally for 1st to 3rd graders, are two hours long. We place students in groups of 2 to 5. They are grouped by age, but we will also conduct an assessment first to see which groups are best suited for your child.
We strongly recommend twice a week, because we see the most improvement in the shortest amount of time.
Our Lower Elementary Reading and Writing Program is broken up into three units. Each unit is approximately 13 weeks long. All the units are literature based, so each unit revolves around the literature we read. We cover the following units:
1. Expository Texts: Reading informational texts and practicing reading fluency and comprehension strategies. Writing expository paragraphs, learning the parts of a paragraph and the difference between concrete details, elaborations, and commentary.
2. Narrative: Identifying the beginning, middle and end of fictional or autobiographical narratives; identifying the characters, setting, problem, climax, and resolution; distinguishing fantasy and reality; and developing commentary. Sensory detail writing, writing publishable short stories with all the elements of literature, and practicing the writing process
3. Literary Response and Analysis: Response to the elements of literature and author’s purpose through a retelling of their favorite part of the story and through personal reflections.
In each unit, we engage our lower elementary grade students in (a) vocabulary enrichment, (b) reading comprehension and analysis, and (c) the writing process. Our curriculum is a process-based methodology. Therefore, even though the three units cover a variety of subject matters, our students use the same process for vocabulary enrichment, reading comprehension and writing for each unit. We believe that the repetition and practice is essential in helping our students grow and learn.
Please email us at info@brwi.org or call us at (949) 651-1075 to schedule a free assessment!
A typical session for your lower elementary grade child would look something like this:
Vocabulary
1. We start off with vocabulary. The teachers pick 8 to 15 words from the reading material that will be covered in the unit. They are given a pre-test to familiarize themselves with the word list.
2. Students receive a set of flashcards with a color picture representing each word. The students make 3-square flash cards—they write the definition, part of speech, and draw a word association.
3. We want our students to know their words, use them in our sessions and in their writing. So, students engage in different vocabulary games such as Word Scrambles, The Alphabet Search, Syllable Madness, Power Sentence Writing, Add an Ending, and The Synonym/Antonym Game.
4. For the first three weeks of the unit, students are tested on their words. We use the Bridges Open Brain for vocabulary testing. They are simply given a blank sheet of paper and asked to write down as many words and definitions as they can remember. Each Open Brain, students are challenged to break their personal record. Students also play Challenge Games to test vocabulary. One such game is the Lightening Round where students work together as a team to come up with as many words as they can one to two minutes. Students are tested cumulatively up to 30 words.
Reading
After the vocabulary review, we move into the reading. The literature we choose is the most important aspect of our curriculum. We teach the students active reading skills, and to read with a pen in hand. Students often read from page one to page ten without doing anything with it. They lose critical thinking opportunities. And, when it comes time to write, they have no idea where to start. With our active reading strategies, kids learn how to analyze the text they are reading:
For Informational Texts:
What strategies can they use to process and understand a great deal of information on a given topic?
Build prior knowledge through research of related pictures
Explore the textual features such a the title, pictures, bolded words, and subtitles
Practice fluency techniques to chunk important phrases and stress key words
Making mental pictures or drawing symbols for each paragraph
Paraphrase paragraphs
Writing marginalia for each paragraph
Identify the big (main) idea sentences and the concrete details which support them
Techniques for answering comprehension questions
For Literature:
1. What are the elements should I be looking for?
Character’s inside and outside traits
Author’s purpose—The List of 20
Mood and tone—Sensory Detail, Figurative Language, Color
Themes—Lessons and Bigger World Ideas
Problem and Solution—Paraphrase the story
2. What evidence, or concrete details, do I have in the text to prove these things?
3. How do I take this evidence and write them into my own words?
4. What is the difference between commentary and summary?
5. In our literature unit, we continue to stress the same reading strategies listed for informational texts.
Active reading is the core of our curriculum because we want our students to be thinking and analyzing what they read. So, every time they read, our students are taking notes, color-coding, looking for evidence and writing commentary.
Writing
After students finish their reading, they shift gears and begin the writing process. Before the students engage in the entire writing process, we take them through a few mini-lessons to teach basic writing skills. To do this, we use copy changing, writing frames and writing rules. Specifically, they use professional stories and other student work as their samples and starters.
In the Expository Texts Unit, students practice the basic paragraph structure with a topic sentence, concrete details, elaboration, and concluding sentence. They will learn how to formulate a topic sentence and a hook. They will learn to support their ideas with concrete details. They will also learn to elaborate on the details. They will learn to use connectors (i.e., which, when, and, but, while, by) and transition words.
In the Narrative Unit, students will learn to write fictional or autobiographical narratives. Students will incorporate all the elements of a story and will go through the entire writing process. Students will also be given mini-lessons on snap shot writing (sensory detail, color words, power verbs and adverbs) Students will practice revising and will learn how to make their stories better by adding Bridges Quick Changes.
In the Literary Response Unit, students will memorize Bridges’ List of 10, our list of 10 reasons why literature is GREAT. For each picture story we read, they will decide which part of the story was GREAT and pick a reason from Bridges’List of 20. They will then formulate their opinion about the story based on their response. Students will write a paragraph retelling their favorite part, explaining their reason, and adding personal commentary.
Please email us at info@brwi.org or call us at (949) 651-1075 to schedule a free assessment or to register for classes!
Lower Elementary
Reading and Writing Tutoring Program
Our tutoring sessions for our lower elementary students, generally for 1st to 3rd graders, are two hours long. We place students in groups of 2 to 5. They are grouped by age, but we will also conduct an assessment first to see which groups are best suited for your child.
We strongly recommend twice a week, because we see the most improvement in the shortest amount of time.
Our Lower Elementary Reading and Writing Program is broken up into three units. Each unit is approximately 13 weeks long. All the units are literature based, so each unit revolves around the literature we read. We cover the following units:
1. Expository Texts: Reading informational texts and practicing reading fluency and comprehension strategies. Writing expository paragraphs, learning the parts of a paragraph and the difference between concrete details, elaborations, and commentary.
2. Narrative: Identifying the beginning, middle and end of fictional or autobiographical narratives; identifying the characters, setting, problem, climax, and resolution; distinguishing fantasy and reality; and developing commentary. Sensory detail writing, writing publishable short stories with all the elements of literature, and practicing the writing process
3. Literary Response and Analysis: Response to the elements of literature and author’s purpose through a retelling of their favorite part of the story and through personal reflections.
In each unit, we engage our lower elementary grade students in (a) vocabulary enrichment, (b) reading comprehension and analysis, and (c) the writing process. Our curriculum is a process-based methodology. Therefore, even though the three units cover a variety of subject matters, our students use the same process for vocabulary enrichment, reading comprehension and writing for each unit. We believe that the repetition and practice is essential in helping our students grow and learn.
CLICK HERE to see our current Academic Calendar.
Please email us at info@brwi.org or call us at (949) 651-1075 to schedule a free assessment!
A typical session for your lower elementary grade child would look something like this:
Vocabulary
Reading
After the vocabulary review, we move into the reading. The literature we choose is the most important aspect of our curriculum. We teach the students active reading skills, and to read with a pen in hand. Students often read from page one to page ten without doing anything with it. They lose critical thinking opportunities. And, when it comes time to write, they have no idea where to start. With our active reading strategies, kids learn how to analyze the text they are reading:
For Informational Texts:
What strategies can they use to process and understand a great deal of information on a given topic?
For Literature:
Active reading is the core of our curriculum because we want our students to be thinking and analyzing what they read. So, every time they read, our students are taking notes, color-coding, looking for evidence and writing commentary.
Writing
After students finish their reading, they shift gears and begin the writing process. Before the students engage in the entire writing process, we take them through a few mini-lessons to teach basic writing skills. To do this, we use copy changing, writing frames and writing rules. Specifically, they use professional stories and other student work as their samples and starters.
In the Expository Texts Unit, students practice the basic paragraph structure with a topic sentence, concrete details, elaboration, and concluding sentence. They will learn how to formulate a topic sentence and a hook. They will learn to support their ideas with concrete details. They will also learn to elaborate on the details. They will learn to use connectors (i.e., which, when, and, but, while, by) and transition words.
In the Narrative Unit, students will learn to write fictional or autobiographical narratives. Students will incorporate all the elements of a story and will go through the entire writing process. Students will also be given mini-lessons on snap shot writing (sensory detail, color words, power verbs and adverbs) Students will practice revising and will learn how to make their stories better by adding Bridges Quick Changes.
In the Literary Response Unit, students will memorize Bridges’ List of 10, our list of 10 reasons why literature is GREAT. For each picture story we read, they will decide which part of the story was GREAT and pick a reason from Bridges’List of 20. They will then formulate their opinion about the story based on their response. Students will write a paragraph retelling their favorite part, explaining their reason, and adding personal commentary.
Please email us at info@brwi.org or call us at (949) 651-1075 to schedule a free assessment or to register for classes!