Language Arts Homeschool Curriculum Skills List | Secular First Grade

Language arts activities have a social studies or science theme and incorporate reading, handwriting, and English skills. The activities provided during the year continue to drill phonics and blend these skills with sight word recognition to promote fluency and comprehension in reading and writing. The questions for discussion of literature stimulate higher-level thinking skills and incorporate new vocabulary words that become part of your child’s usable vocabulary. Practice worksheets to reinforce these concepts are included within the lessons.

Reading

• Recognize the symbol and sound for each letter in the alphabet.
• Develop left to right and top to bottom orientation.
• Recognize basic sight words.
• Read short and long vowel words.
• Look at an illustration and tell a story about the illustration using a variety of descriptive words.
• Draw a picture to illustrate a story.
• Differentiate between common and proper nouns.
• Identify and use words that rhyme, start, or end with the same sound.
• Use word recognition skills and strategies to read and comprehend text.
• Develop the ability to recognize and describe the main idea, setting, and characters in a story.
• Demonstrate evidence of literal and inferential comprehension.
• Use context as a clue to the meaning of a word or phrase.
• Sort and define words by category.
• Understand and recognize a synonym and antonym.
• Understand story sequence.
• Develop the ability to draw conclusions.
• Identify cause and effect relationships.
• Expand comprehension by analyzing, interpreting, and synthesizing information in text.
• Read to learn new information, perform a task, or for enjoyment.
• Understand literature written in a variety of genres.
• Recognize figurative language: simile, metaphor, personification, onomatopoeia, hyperbole, alliteration.
• Recognize an idiom.
• Recognize a pun.
• Read aloud with fluency and expression

Spelling

• Apply spelling and phonics concepts through oral, written, and tactile practice.
• Learn basic spelling rules.
• Understand and spell abbreviations and contractions.
• Add a suffix to a word.
• Decode words by breaking them into syllables.
• Identify the number of syllables in a word.
• Understand how to read and write compound words.
• Write words in alphabetical order.

Writing

• Write upper and lower case manuscript letters using proper spacing between letters.
• Understand that the names of people and places start with capital letters.
• Use pronouns correctly.
• Identify nouns and verbs; use correct subject-verb agreement.
• Understand how to write and use possessive nouns.
• Recognize and use possessive pronouns.
• Properly use homophones.
• Understand that a sentence begins with a capital letter and ends with a punctuation mark.
• Understand how to use proper punctuation in writing.
• Understand and use a writing process.
• Using a story starter, write and illustrate a story.
• Write in a variety of forms for different audiences and purposes.
• Write clearly and effectively.
• Describe people, places, things, and events with relevant details.
• Create an original story.
• Understand how to use a comma and quotation marks in writing.
• Analyze and evaluate the effectiveness of written work.
• Create riddles.
• Create a tongue twister.
• Write dictated words and sentences.

Communication

• Use listening and observation skills and strategies to gain understanding.
• Use communication skills and strategies to interact and work effectively with others.
• Dictate statements or questions for a story, card, or interview.
• Demonstrate the ability to express an opinion, or present ideas in a variety of situations.
• Develop listening comprehension and the ability to retell a story.
• Narrate a story and add an alternate ending.
• Participate in dramatic play.
• Use puppets to tell a story.
• Recite and memorize poems.
• Listen to and follow two- and three-step directions.
• Draw pictures to demonstrate understanding of positional words.