PS 33 employs a research-based reading and writing curriculum developed by Teachers College Reading and Writing Project at Columbia University. The teacher-educators from this research and staff development organization are involved in long-lasting collaborations with teachers across the world. The Project has a deep and enduring affiliation with six hundred schools, and develops ideas that are foundational to literacy instruction. For more information on TCRWP, please visit their website: http://tc.readingandwritingproject.com
Reading Workshop In lower elementary grades, students learn to read. In third grade, students learn how to read to learn, as well as to read for pleasure. The goal is for students to become enthusiastic, independent readers who use their literacy skills to learn new material across a range of content areas. At the end of the year, students will be able to: * Determine the main idea of a text; recount the key details and explain how they support the main idea. * Determine central ideas or themes of a text and analyze their development; summarize the key supporting details and ideas. * Determine what the text explicitly says and to make logical inferences from it; cite specific textual evidence when writing or speaking, to recount stories such as fables, folktales, and myths from diverse cultures and determine the central message, lesson, or moral while citing examples from the text. * Demonstrate comprehension of text by asking and answering questions and using examples from the text.
Writing Workshop Each writing period will start with a mini-lesson from the teacher. During this time the teacher will instruct the whole class on a writing technique that is not just appropriate to that unit of study, but to their life as a writer. Students will have the opportunity to engage this skill while still in a whole group; this is an opportunity for them to try it out before working independently. * Independent writing is the time when students are working on their own writing. Students work within specific genres, but each individual student generates his/her own ideas. * In third grade, students work in their own Writers Notebook, collecting artifacts, ideas, and storylines for their future writing. * The writing process is a major focus in third grade, as well. * Students are taught to brainstorm ideas, draft a story, revise and edit that story and publish their writing into a final piece. * Revision and editing are two areas of the writing process that are emphasized in each unit.