Balanced Literacy
Walnut Elementary is a balanced literacy school. Students learn reading and writing strategies and skills by doing authentic reading and writing activities. Research has shown that the more time children spend actually reading, the better readers they will be. In our classrooms you will see children engaged in shared reading, where the teacher and children read the text together, guided reading, which is small group instruction, read aloud, where the teacher is modeling fluent reading and independent reading during which the child is reading books of his choice for enjoyment and to develop fluency.
We also teach word study and phonics. This year we have in place methods of phonics and spelling instruction which will be consistent across all grade levels. We are also excited this year to have alphabet magnets for every child so that they are actively engaged in the word study activities.
The teachers at Walnut are dedicated to providing their students the best education possible and they collaboratively work together to study and implement the most effective teaching methods to achieve that goal. This year the staff will be participating in three book studies. We will begin the year working on setting up effective writing workshops. Following that we will be reading about and implementing literature discussion groups in our classrooms. Then we will be studying effective strategies for teaching non-fiction texts. Our goal is to instill a love of reading in every child.
