Language

In this unit you will learn the building blocks of reading. First you will practise listening and talking: listening with your whole body, asking on-topic questions, taking turns, and using your voice, face and words to share ideas. Then you will learn to hear the sounds in words, blend sounds together and break words apart. You will learn the letters and their sounds, and use them to read short words like cat and sun, words with letter teams like ship, chop and frog, and words with long vowels like cake, rain and night. You will learn tricky heart words, practise reading smoothly with expression, and explore word meanings.

Every lesson has a hands-on activity you can do at home, practice questions and a short quiz. The spelling, printing and sentence skills from this strand are in the next unit, Spelling, Printing and Sentences.

Curriculum expectations covered: B1.1, B1.2, B1.3, B1.4, B1.5, B2.1, B2.2, B2.3, B2.4, B2.5, B2.6, B2.7, B2.8 (Ontario Language, Grade 1, 2023).

In this unit you will learn the building blocks of writing. You will print upper- and lowercase letters the right way, starting at the top and making tall, small and tail letters the right size. You will spell words by stretching and tapping their sounds, use spelling patterns (like ck in duck, ll in bell, and ay in play), and build words with endings, beginnings and compound words. Then you will write sentences that start with a capital letter and end with a period, question mark or exclamation mark, and learn about nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs and joining words.

This unit goes with Sounds, Letters and Reading Words. Every lesson has a hands-on activity, practice questions and a short quiz.

Curriculum expectations covered: B2.2, B2.3, B2.4, B2.5, B2.6, B3.1, B3.2, B3.3 (Ontario Language, Grade 1, 2023).

In this unit you will learn how good readers understand what they read, hear and see. You will tell stories from fact texts, use clues to predict, ask questions while you read, find the main idea, and retell stories in order. You will meet characters and settings, figure out who is telling a story, and play with rhyme, alliteration and sound words. You will make connections, share your thoughts, read texts by First Nations, Métis and Inuit creators, and become media smart and safe online.

Every lesson has a short read-aloud that a grown-up can read with you, a hands-on activity, practice questions and a quiz. You do not need to read every word by yourself: listening and talking about texts is a big part of Grade 1 reading.

Curriculum expectations covered: A1.1, A1.2, A2.1–A2.7, A3.1–A3.3, C1.1–C1.7, C2.1–C2.7, C3.1–C3.8 (The Ontario Curriculum, Grades 1–8: Language, 2023, Grade 1).

In this unit you will learn to be a writer! You will find ideas from your own life, think about your topic, purpose and audience, and plan by gathering and ordering ideas. You will write complete sentences with neat printing, then write short texts for different purposes: recounts (what happened to me), descriptions, how-to texts and opinions. Finally you will revise, edit, publish and share your writing.

Every lesson has examples to follow, a hands-on activity, practice questions and a quiz. Talking about ideas before writing is a big part of Grade 1 writing, so a grown-up can help by listening and asking questions.

Curriculum expectations covered: D1.1–D1.5, D2.1–D2.6, D3.1–D3.3 (The Ontario Curriculum, Grades 1–8: Language, 2023, Grade 1).