Background Essay: Primary Literacy Block

Two videos feature a look inside the literacy block in a multi-age classroom (grades 1-3). The same group of primary students were videotaped at the beginning and end of the school year. In both videos, teacher Kim Slusher (Norton Elementary, Louisville, Ky.) is teaching her students comprehension strategies. The block videotaped in the fall of 2005 is focused around identifying themes in books. The second video from the spring of 2006 is focused on how to infer characters' traits based on evidence they find in a book's pictures and text.

Each lesson progresses through whole class instruction, small group work, a guided oral reading group in which Kim takes anecdotal records, and whole class sharing.

In addition to seeing how the lessons progress, Kim provides insight on teaching students with a wide range age and ability.

The videos were originally part of the multimedia professional development resource, Literacy Strategies in Action, produced by KET in 2006 in collaboration with the Kentucky Department of Education.