Beginning Level Reading & Vocabulary
Curricular Aims
Students build basic literacy skills, starting with the alphabet and basic phonics and ending with decoding texts of 150 words about everyday topics. Students also acquire the vocabulary necessary to survive in an English only environment with a focus on accurate spelling and pronunciation. As students expand their reading skills and strategies, the focus shifts to decoding longer texts and connecting information from texts to their life and world. Students also acquire vocabulary and vocabulary decoding strategies that help them interact with their world.
Learning Outcomes
By the end of the level, students will be able to:
- read texts of approximately 300 words on general and simplified academic topics and understand the main ideas, scan for specific information, and apply the information to complete a task.
- understand and use information provided in simple non-linear texts to complete basic tasks.
- use, spell, and say select words from the Oxford 3000 and Academic Wordlist focusing on general English lexis.
Beginning Level Writing & Grammar
Curricular Aims
Students build basic literacy skills, starting with the alphabet and basic sentence construction and progressing with students producing 8-10 thematically linked sentences about everyday topics. As students gain mastery in writing sentences, they also expand their writing skills by moving from thematically linked sentences to producing academic paragraphs of 80-100 words with a focus on topic sentences and supporting details. Students also study basic grammatical structures to enable their written production.
Learning Outcomes
By the end of the level, students will be able to:
- produce an academic paragraph of 80-100 words on a topic studied in class.
- produce simple and compound sentences.
- connect sentences using basic cohesive devices.
- understand the form, meaning, and function of the “to be” verb, simple present, simple past, present progressive, past progressive, future, can and can’t, models for advice, subject and object pronouns, quantifiers, and count and noncount nouns.
Beginning Level Listening & Speaking
Curricular Aims
Students build their spoken confidence through role plays, modeling and guided practice to enable them to interact with their new environment. As students gain confidence, they expand to participating in class discussions and oral presentations. Students also begin basic listening and note-taking skills through guided practice.
Learning Outcomes
By the end of the level, students will be able to:
- listen to modified recordings of routine speech acts and simulated academic situations of 5-8 minutes to find the main idea and specific information.
- interact with instructors, classmates and community members and express basic needs, wants, opinions and relate biographical information.
- participate in class discussions.
