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Emma Hart Willard Elementary School

Where every student shines!

Reading Support

Reading Support

In the Berlin Public Schools, we use materials that support the science of reading. 

The Connecticut State Department of Education defines the science of reading as an evidence-based body of interdisciplinary research on how children learn to read, implemented across Connecticut schools through Structured Literacy principles.

Core Components

  • Phonemic Awareness: The ability to notice, think about, and work with individual sounds in spoken words.
  • Phonics: Explicit instruction showing how spoken sounds map to letters or groups of letters.
  • Reading Fluency: The capacity to read words quickly, accurately, and with proper expression and meaning.
  • Vocabulary Development: Expanding understanding of word meanings to support both oral and written language.
  • Reading & Language Comprehension: Making meaning from words, sentences, and overall texts.

Guiding Frameworks

  • Simple View of Reading: The formula stating that reading comprehension is the product of word recognition (decoding) and language comprehension (Decoding × Language Comprehension = Reading Comprehension).
  • Scarborough's Reading Rope: A visual model showing how word recognition and language comprehension strands gradually intertwine into skilled, automatic reading.

    • Students will engage with Wit & Wisdom, a rich and supportive curriculum.
    • They will explore high-quality texts, art, and media to build knowledge and spark curiosity.
    • Students will strengthen their reading, writing, and speaking skills with clarity and purpose.

    • Literacy is taught through a workshop model of instruction which consists of a familiar structure that guides every lesson. 
    • The workshop begins with a mini-lesson where the teacher models key literacy skills. Students then work independently while the teacher supports individuals or small groups. A mid-workshop teaching point reinforces the lesson, and the session ends with students sharing their work.

    • Students will participate in Heggerty Phonological Awareness lessons, which play a critical role in early reading development. 
    • Phonological awareness (the ability to recognize and work with the sounds in spoken language) is one of the strongest predictors of future reading success. 
    • Focusing on hearing and manipulating sounds in words, students will practice breaking words into smaller parts and identifying individual sounds, building a strong foundation for learning to read and write. 

    • Grades K-3: From Phonics to Reading 
      • Students move from learning letter sounds to becoming confident, fluent readers. 
      • Students will understand how letters and sounds work together—an important step in learning to read and spell. 
      • Students will study increasingly complex spelling patterns, with a built in system of spiraled review to ensure that skills are retained.
    • Grades 4 & 5: Morpheme Magic
      • Students learn how morphemes—the smallest units of meaning in language—contribute to word meaning, spelling, and reading comprehension.
      • Students will strengthen overall literacy skills, including vocabulary, spelling, and comprehension.

  • Connecticut State Department of Education: Structured Literacy

    Great Minds: Wit & Wisdom (K-4) and Geodes (K-3)

    From Phonics to Reading (K-3)

    Heggerty (K and 1)

    Berlin-Peck Memorial Library

    Classlink

     

Four smiling women stand together under a leafy tree in a park, enjoying a sunny day outdoors.

Kristin Piraneo

Literacy Specialist

Cynthia Herren

Reading Teacher

Maura Sullivan

Reading Teacher