School Administrative District #4

Unity of purpose

K-12 ENGLISH LANGUAGE-ARTS PROGRAM

Developed: Summer, 1997

Revised: Summer, 1998

Curriculum Team:

Elementary Schools:

Abbie Fowler, Cambridge, Guilford Primary, McKusick, Wellington

David Pratt

Cindy Quimby (1998)

Melissa Stearns

Margaret Templet

Rachel Ulman (1998)

Piscataquis Community Middle School

Peggy Cleaves (1997)

Ellen Haley (1997)

Brenda Monahan (1997)

Thelma Regan

Robyn Rich (1998)

Piscataquis Community High School

Jody DiFrederico

Sue Stewart

Donna Vigue

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School Administrative District #4

Unity of purpose

Department: English Language Arts

ENGLISH LANGUAGE-ARTS PHILOSOPHY, K-12

The K-12 English language-arts program is based on the recognition that language development begins in the home and that the school continues this natural learning process in a stimulating, supportive environment. This learning is developmental and continues at an individual rate throughout the grades.

Traditionally, English language arts includes four strands: reading, writing, oral communications (speaking and listening), and the study of language. Because visual communication requires the same two-way process that oral communication requires and because students today receive so much information audio-visually, the K-12 language-arts program combines the two forms of communication into one strand: oral and visual communications. Although useful in terms of articulating content standards and performance indicators, the strands are artificial and ought to be integrated. Students must be allowed to move back and forth between reading and writing, speaking and listening, viewing and listening, etc. in order to think and communicate effectively. Since effective communication and thinking are keys to human understanding in all curricular areas and are facilitated when students can transfer information from one area of the curriculum to another, language-arts teachers promote reading, writing, speaking, listening, and critical-viewing skills across the total curriculum.

The major purposes of language arts are to make sense of the world and to communicate that sense to others. Students develop language skills most readily when they care about what those skills can help them do; therefore, the primary goal of the language-arts program is to make ongoing connections between acts of literacy and students' personal needs to understand and to communicate. These connections can only be made in an atmosphere that encourages frequent and genuine sharing of ideas. Additionally, the K-12 language-arts program strives to nurture self-directed, self-assessing, life-long learners; creative and practical problem solvers; collaborative, quality workers; and responsible and involved citizens.

The K-12 language-arts program focuses on meaning. Students spend most of their time reading many different kinds of books, writing for a variety of audiences and purposes, discussing and practicing ways to refine and improve their reading and writing, and talking about ways their reading and writing are related to their own lives and to the world around them. Students are expected to apply language conventions to both oral and written work and to know when those conventions can and cannot be effectively modified for given situations. In addition, students are expected to examine what they see and hear in order to recognize when oral, written, and visual language is being used to manipulate or to coerce them.

In an atmosphere that encourages sharing, connecting, and evaluating ideas, process is as important as product. Class time must be used to share ideas about how to work with a text (both fiction and non-fiction) in order to make sense of it; how to find topics for writing; and, once a topic is found, how to develop it. Such sharing always involves talking about thinking and modeling effective thinking strategies. It also demands that teachers share with students the goals and expectations they have and hold students responsible for the way they interpret the assignments and carry out the learning tasks. Because process, not merely product, is valued, errors are viewed as those necessary÷and even desirable÷approximations students make as they struggle toward meaning.

Teachers become facilitators of learning in this language-arts context. As they work with individuals and groups, teachers provide excellent models for both oral and written language through their own reading, writing, speaking, listening, and viewing. In so doing, they support the universal search for meaning through individual experience, the enlargement of each student's understanding of the world, and the importance of language-arts skills. Teachers also encourage students to find personal satisfaction in reading, writing, speaking, listening, and viewing and to make those activities part of their everyday lives.

The K-12 language-arts program is built upon the premises that all students can learn and that all students have a need to become literate. All students are expected to progress along a continuum of learning. In some cases, tasks may have to be modified to fit the individual needs of students, but teachers are encouraged to address these differing needs within the context of heterogeneous groupings as much as possible. To this end, the resources of Chapter I and special education, as well as enrichment activities, become critical components of the total language-arts program; and the result is a true community of learners.

In a balanced approach to instruction, not all assessment will be based on the idea of producing error-free work. While in some cases, assessment will be based on the quality of a product, in others it will also be based on the student's involvement in the process. As a student moves through the grades, therefore, both product and process will be integral parts of the assessment of his/her overall learning.

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School Administrative District #4

Unity of purpose

CORE CURRICULUM: CONTENT STANDARDS

Department: English Language Arts

1. LANGUAGE STUDY

Language study is understood to include grammar, usage, and the mechanics of writing; as well as the history and sociology of language itself. All students are expected to use the conventions of standard written and spoken English to write and to speak correctly.

2. ORAL AND VISUAL COMMUNICATIONS

Oral communication includes skills traditionally referred to as speaking and listening. All students are expected to demonstrate the ability to speak and to listen in order to explore ideas; to present lines of thought; to represent and reflect upon human experience; and to communicate feelings, knowledge, and opinions. Visual communication includes critical viewing skills needed to make sense of the information presented in the media. All students are expected to demonstrate the ability to analyze, interpret, and evaluate what they see and hear in the media.

3. PROCESS WRITING

Process writing includes those steps through which writers move regardless of audience, purpose, focus, or particular mode of writing. All students are expected to use the skills and strategies of the writing process to explore ideas; to present lines of thought; to represent and reflect on human experience; and to communicate feelings, knowledge, and opinions.

4. CREATIVE WRITING

Creative writing is expressive and imaginative writing. All students are expected to use the techniques of creative writing to explore ideas; to represent and reflect on human experience; and to communicate feelings.

5. PRACTICAL WRITING

Practical writing is formulaic writing. All students are expected to be able to use writing skills to conduct personal and career-related business .

6. EXPOSITORY WRITING

Expository writing includes informative and persuasive writing. All students are expected to use the techniques of exposition to explore ideas; to present lines of thought; to represent and reflect on human experience; to communicate feelings, knowledge, and opinions; and to present information gleaned from research.

7. DEVELOPMENTAL (PROCESS) READING

Just as there are stages through which all effective writers pass to one degree or another, there are stages through which all effective readers pass. Developmental reading is characterized by the reader tackling the written language in order to differentiate among letters, words, sentences, and paragraphs. The reader learns decoding skills for recognizing and determining the meaning of unfamiliar words and learns to recognize various text structures and the organization of informational books. All students are expected to use the reading process to comprehend, interpret, evaluate, and appreciate what they have read.

8. FUNCTIONAL READING

Functional reading is characterized by the reader tackling diverse texts and pur-poses for reading. The reader learns to use background knowledge to aid compre-hension and to apply some general strategies for remembering information. All students are expected to use reading strategies (1) to experience, understand, and appreciate literature and culture and (2) to extract meaning from, recognize assumptions and implications within, and evaluate ideas presented in informational texts.

9. RECREATIONAL READING

Recreational reading is characterized by the reader reading for pleasure or for personal purposes, not for purposes prescribed by a course of study or a career. All students are expected to use reading to fulfill personal and social needs.

SOURCE: Poeton, J. (1993). In Sampson, M. and Thomason T. (Eds.), Reading, writing, and LITERACY (p. 95). Commerce, TX: The International Institute of Literacy Learning. 

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