English Language Arts

Language Arts & Literacy

Language Arts at Park Day focuses on empowering students to read, write, listen, speak, and debate their ideas. We strive to foster intellectually curious, independent thinkers who use literacy to make sense of the world.

3rd Grade Spotlight

5th Grade Spotlight

6th Grade Spotlight

8th Grade Spotlight

Curriculum

In Lower School, through direct and implicit instruction, students develop oral and written vocabulary, learn the decoding and encoding skills needed to construct meaning, and become practiced in how to best communicate their thoughts and ideas. Teachers take a structured literacy approach that places emphasis on phonological awareness with a systematic phonics approach using Fundations and leveled reading assessments along with other regularly scheduled formative and summative assessments.  Writing occurs daily in the classroom through journaling, research reports, learning logs, persuasive paragraphs, descriptive paragraphs, and essay construction.

In Middle School, students engage in multiple types of literary analysis while flexing and improving their writing and persuasive skills. The curriculum is comprised of written responses to literature, character analysis exercises, expository writing, persuasive writing, creative short story, and more. Park Day’s progressive approach also includes mock trials, literary re-enactments, writers workshops, peer review, and the Harkness method for student led class discussions. Hands on projects that require students to dive deeply into the material and develop personal connections to it help spark creativity and connection.

Peer and teacher feedback plays a pivotal role and revising and editing is considered an integral part of the learning process. Throughout the grades, teachers use individual instruction, small discussion groups, individual instruction, small discussion groups, guided annotation strategies, and class activities. Students learn to respond emotionally and intellectually to what they read. Most importantly, they are encouraged to lose themselves in books, and find their passion on the journey to becoming lifelong readers.