Category: Resources

LANGUAGE! Readability Levels for Text Selections

The Edmark Reading Program Functional Words Series Second Edition teaches 400 functional sight words to students who have a variety of learning differences. Students with autism spectrum disorder, developmental delay, intellectual disability, hearing impairment, reading disability, or learning disability, as well as learners of English as a second language will benefit. The Functional Words Series can be implemented as part of a functional living and community skills program or as a supplement to other reading programs.

The Functional Words Series uses a word recognition method, involving repeated exposure to target words within a variety of engaging learning activities. Students learn 100 new words at a moderate pace in each of four functional areas: Fast food/Restaurant Words, Grocery Words, Job/Work Words, and Signs Around You. The second edition includes new stories, games, word cards, and photo cards.

• Fast Food/Restaurant Words – Teaches 100 words that will help students order a meal form a fast-food establishment or a restaurant menu. Words include pizza, cheese, chicken, biscuit, and salad.
• Grocery Words – Teaches 100 words that will help students read and write grocery lists and find items in a grocery store. Words include tuna, shampoo, flour, sausage, and laundry detergent.
• Job/Work Words – Teaches 100 words related to getting and keeping a job, including such words as Social Security Number, help wanted, hard hat area, Monday, and January.
• Signs Around You – Teaches 100 words that will help students read commonly occurring signs, such as First Aid, Taxi, Do Not Enter, No Smoking, and Poison.

focusMATH Intensive Intervention Math Program for Grades K-7

Focused Math. Intensive Intervention.

focusMATH is an intensive, K-6 math intervention program designed to fit any Response to Intervention (RtI) framework and work with any math program. focusMATH identifies at-risk students early and accelerates their learning with instruction that is intensive, balanced, and individualized. All grade levels consist of three units, each built around a specific NCTM Focal Point.

The Expressive Writing Program is composed of two levels, Expressive Writing 1and Expressive Writing 2. Expressive Writing 1 consists of 50 lessons. Expressive Writing 2 consists of a ten-lesson preprogram followed by 50 regular lessons. The program can be used with students of any age who can read at a third-grade level or above.

Expressive Writing 1 is designed for students who haven’t mastered foundational writing skills. Students learn to construct simple sentences by reporting on what a picture shows. They learn that a sentence has two parts, the part that names and the part that tells more. Students learn to identify sentences and edit short paragraphs, indicating the part of a sentence that names and the part that tells more. Students write sentences by naming a person or thing and telling what that person or thing did. As the program develops, students learn to tell the main thing a person did and to construct paragraphs for a sequence of pictures. A process through which students discuss a writing assignment, then write, then systematically edit for specific points becomes an integral part of the program. At the end of Expressive Writing 1, students can write a paragraph that describes a sequence of related actions using simple declarative sentences, punctuates sentences correctly, write consistently in the simple past tense, and write paragraphs that include sufficient detail and stay on topic.

Expressive Writing 2 is designed for students who can construct a basic paragraph, but who have problems with clarity, are unable to punctuate quotes and other sentence types correctly, and use a narrow variety of sentence forms. Writing exercises begin with simple one-paragraph assignments, then increase gradually to two, three, and more paragraphs. Students learn to infer important detail that must have happened between pictures in a sequence. By the end of Expressive Writing 2, students can write a multi-paragraph narrative that is: written clearly (using clear pronoun referents and including details necessary for clarity) uses a variety of sentence types, and includes correctly punctuated direct quotes.

National Institute for Direct Instruction