Mrs. Boire

AIS ELA Grades 6 - 8

2008-2009

"A child learns 10,000 words by kindergarten. If he reads, by twelfth grade he will encounter about a million words a year and learn about 500,000. If he doesn't read, he will learn only 10,000."  

Frank Smith               

AIS ELA Course Description:

AIS ELA is designed to support and reinforce the growth of reading and writing skills that students need in order to be successful in their ELA class as well as on the NYS ELA exam. The 100 Book Challenge is a program that is implemented in ELA in the middle school and is, therefore, also used in AIS ELA. Students should be reading books at a level that is fun, fast, and easy for them for at least 30 min. for two steps (1 step = 15 min.) each night because it is at this independent level that true reading growth takes place. The more often students read at this level, the more successful they will be. The more often students experience success with reading, the more they will enjoy reading, which is another goal of the challenge: to create lifelong readers.

In addition to working on improving reading skills, we also focus on building vocabulary knowledge, listening skills, and writing skills in the context of what is read independently as well as what is read together in class. Students write journal entries about their lives and their reading.

What can I do to help my child?      

How do I know my child is understanding what he/she is reading?

Comprehension Questions

"Reading is braiding together what we read from the text with what we know from our lives." --Louise Rosenblatt