ENGLISH LANGUAGE ARTS

The English Language Arts program at Parkside is designed to teach children with language-based learning difficulties to read and write and to improve their listening and speaking skills.  The program follows the Parkside School curriculum standards, based on the New York State standards, which are to be demonstrated by the end of the school year. Engaging learners whose special needs place them at high risk for reading, writing and oral communication difficulties requires individualized teaching and learning plans.

Reading

We describe our reading program as “Orton-Gillingham Enhanced.” Like other Orton-Gillihgham models, our reading program is a structured, multisensory, individualized approach that teaches reading in ten specific sequential phases. As children progress through the phases, they practice previously-taught foundational phonics skills so that those skills become automatized. Decoding is taught explicitly, with clear and consistent language. Children practice reading kinesthetically, through movement activities, aurally, with such activities as whisper reading and choral reading, and visually, with text that may have heightened visual cues. The “enhanced” aspect of our reading program is that our methodology is rooted in research-based speech science. Studies have shown that children with language-based learning differences are six times more likely to have reading disabilities and make the most decoding errors around vowel production and recognition. Our program focuses specifically on developing each child’s ability to blend sounds and process acoustical information. In our reading groups, which meet an hour per day four times a week, children learn how to identify and stretch “mouth” sounds, and how to apply phonics rules to age-appropriate, highly engaging texts.

As the students get older and master the basics of reading, the focus shifts to building their fluency and deepening their comprehension. They also learn how to recognize the components of a story with the Story Marker Program and how to read for emotion, character motivation, and arc. Our speech department works with classroom teachers to bring evidence-based, science-informed practices into all reading classes. 

Writing

At Parkside, Judith Hochman’s program The Writing Revolution is the basis for teaching writing in all classrooms. This program emphasizes building a strong foundation of sentence level skills and stresses the importance of honing those skills before moving into paragraph and essay work. Children are taught to recognize and produce complete sentences and different types of sentences. They work on combining sentences, using conjunctions, and developing appropriate transitions between sentences.  Once begun, paragraph work includes learning to create outlines and write topic sentences and detail sentences. All students have the opportunity over the course of the school year to write creative narratives, opinion pieces such as book reports, and expository paragraphs or essays. The writing goals and expectations vary based on student capabilities and grade level.

Handwriting

The mechanics of writing are an important and unified piece of Parkside’s writing curriculum. Children work with the two programs Size Matters and Handwriting Without Tears. These programs provide recognition and instruction in formation of upper and lower case letters and are designed to help children meet writing objectives, which include correct punctuation, spacing and orientation, and organization. 

MATHEMATICS

Our Math program covers the National Council of Mathematics Standards: numeracy, computation, patterns, measurement, geometry, fractions and probability/statistics in a format that is appropriate for each grade level. 

In concert with a curriculum that is based on the Common Core standards, we use Woodin Math as the primary program for our younger children based on staff and administrative research into effective teaching of math for children with language-based learning difficulties. Christopher Woodin, Ed.M, the creator of the program, works closely with Parkside as a consultant and provider of professional development. 

Woodin Math approaches math learning similarly to the way we analyze reading challenges. The students use hands on manipulatives, kinesthetic activities, and consistent diagraming to develop numeracy that leads to accuracy and efficiency in operations. The program develops fact fluency in a way that gives children the conceptual understanding of decomposing numbers from whole to part rather than just memorizing. The children build foundational skills that will support their understanding of more complex operations as they move throughout the program. Houghton Miflin’s Math In Focus® is used with our older students as they transition to fourth and fifth grade equivalent math levels.  Math in Focus's lessons and materials provide students with daily opportunities to build conceptual understanding, share problem-solving experiences, develop fluency, acquire mathematical language, and consolidate skills to achieve mastery. 

Children are placed in small groups based on a comprehensive assessments and teacher recommendations for math instruction. These groupings allow us to individualize the content that we teach and the techniques that we use, while enabling us to keep close watch over each student's developing ability. Some math concepts such as time, money, and measurement are reinforced in the classroom during whole group instructional times such as morning meeting and integrated throughout the day and during transitions.

SCIENCE

Our Science curriculum values "learning progressions" so that a student's understanding of a concept grows in depth and breath as they gain more experience. The goal of the science program is to foster your children’s curiosity about the world in which they live and to give them some of the tools and methods for investigating their world. Our teachers work with a science consultant, Janice Koch, to identify and organize science units for the classrooms at all grade levels, covering topics in Earth Science, Physical Science and Life Science. Teachers emphasize experiential learning along with real-life applications and technology is utilized in several ways to engage students. Students use digital photography to record observations as part of their scientific research.  Teachers use an interactive whiteboard to demonstrate steps in experiments and record results.  Video clips, audio clips, and digital pictures are also displayed and explained using interactive whiteboards to facilitate learning.

SOCIAL STUDIES

Our Social Studies curriculum is designed to help each student develop understanding and respect for others as they discover the similarities and differences among people—both around them now, as well as long ago and far away. In the youngest grades, our emphasis is on everyday topics and people. For our older students, the focus shifts to developing a cross-cultural perspective and an historical knowledge base. Field trips around the area, acting out historic events and experiencing cultures through artifacts and activities are common group experiences. Students and teachers make extensive use of technology for gathering, organizing and recording information, listening to languages spoken around the world, and visually describing places and traditions.

LIBRARY

The Parkside library serves the needs of the whole school by providing access to materials and technologies that support learning for both students and teachers.  Here we promote information literacy, fostering a love of literature, a joy of reading and a quest for knowledge. On a weekly basis, classroom groups come to the library for shared and guided reading opportunities, as well as for "read-alouds." Materials are chosen carefully for these lessons based on currently relevant themes.  Through this program students are exposed to many different genres of literature from many time periods and cultures.