At Lark Skola, we know that communication is foundational to connection. Through direct instruction and immersive rich-language opportunities in the classroom, our students expand their vocabularies, build on their oral language foundations, organize thoughts and ideas, learn to ask questions, and communicate to solve problems. They find joy in sharing a laugh at snack time or communicating the plan while helping at the food bank or touring the theater. They use their language to question the limits to learning, and then communicate with power to push those limits to learn more, to share more, to feel more. We often ask, “What’s the evidence?” and “What’s our purpose?” as we use our own self-talk to guide us through forming and supporting our ideas. Our students’ developing spoken language becomes foundational to their development of written language, communication modalities that allow us to make our words “stand still” so we can decipher our own thoughts and share them broadly with others. We at Lark Skola adhere to the principles of “The Science of Reading,” understanding that complete understanding of what we read derives from our oral language development and our ability to recognize (decode) words in text. The “simple view of reading” shows

Word recognition (decoding) x oral language comprehension = reading comprehension
(Hoover, W., & Gough, P. (1990). The simple view of reading. Reading and Writing: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 2, 127– 160.)

At Lark Skola, our curriculum is designed to foster strong oral language growth AND the phonemic awareness and phonics skills that children need to become increasingly strategic and automatic, fluent and skilled readers, who comprehend what they read and make connections to what they know. Our days are full of reading rich-literature - fiction and nonfiction - and engaging deeply in topics of interest through project- and place-based learning. Our students work to broaden their oral communication skills, through intentional learning opportunities - to ask questions, develop opinions, share feelings, make connections to text and background knowledge, describe evidence that supports their ideas, resolve conflicts, problem-solve challenges, and act as change-makers with their peers and in their communities.

Our youngest students learn how to tell and write their own stories, finding and feeling pride in their developing voices - through speaking and writing - while engaging deeply in the process of thinking critically and flexibly about their world. They become writers, authors, storytellers. They learn through experience that “writers make changes” and build resiliency through the process. As our students grow and gain confidence in their identities as writers, they learn to gather relevant information from diverse sources and use frameworks for writing that allow their language to “stand still,” as they continue to interpret, analyze, and become fluent in their “job” as writers - communicating with different audiences for different purposes, such as providing opinions, researching and providing information, retelling stories, comparing/contrasting, summarizing, and describing. Conferencing and mini-lessons in letter formation, grammatical structures and punctuation aid in the writing process—building automaticity in these skills frees cognitive space for creativity, curiosity, and clear communication of ideas.

As our Larks learn and grow, their own communication becomes more complex and sophisticated, allowing them to find the joy that comes from a fuller vocabulary and more complex language use and the fulfillment they derive from connecting more deeply and broadly to self, text, and community.

In keeping with our commitment to “The Science of Reading,” our students participate daily in structured, systematic phonemic awareness and phonics lesson, building their understanding of how words work. Decoding dexterity is bolstered through small and large group structured lessons, and our students practice reading decodable texts that highlight word reading patterns. All children benefit from the solid foundations in reading that come from systematic phonics instruction, and our Larks also enjoy practicing word patterns through games, movement, and multi-sensory activities. Frequent progress monitoring allows us to individualize instruction to support all learners. Our Larks have many additional opportunities to expand on their word knowledge while doing deep dives into word study through spelling patterns, multi-word meanings, strategic vocabulary selection, and learning parts of words, such as suffixes and prefixes. Continued structured and systematic reading practices work to build the strategic, automatic, and fluent reading that allows them to use their growing literacy skills to access learning across subject content areas.

At Lark, Language and Literacy happens four days a week. We use 95 Percent Group’s Core Phonics Program for our phonics instruction. Students are taught in small groups with emphasis on their areas of need. Each day we practice reading decodable texts and spelling learned patterns while encoding our words. We have a structured phonics lesson every day, followed by a spelling and dictation exercise, and a game that helps us practice the day's skill(s). We read aloud decodable texts as a group to practice comprehension and decoding skills. Oral language development is fostered through specific vocabulary instruction, modeling of rich language use, word study, lessons on sentence structures, text structure learning, story grammar, and the bolstering of background knowledge through picture books, chapter books, interviews and field trips, projects, and other sources of information.

At Lark, structured math lessons occur every day and are taught in small groups to support students in their individual growth and learning. Foundational numeracy skills are taught and reinforced during lessons, focusing on Operations and Algebraic Thinking, Number & Operations in Base Ten, and Measurement and Geometry. We review our current math concepts, introduce new concepts, and then have time to practice those skills.

Students are provided varied opportunities throughout the day to connect math to current projects, reasoning abstractly and quantitatively as they work. Math is hands-on, providing multi-sensory learning through the use of manipulatives, and includes being able to represent numbers and number sentences in a variety of ways. For example, as we prepared for our theater project, students carefully measured pieces of cardboard, thought about shapes and angles needed, and estimated supplies to build a house for the main character. Our students apply math through real-world experiences, such as while participating in in-house cooking projects, collecting money and determining change when selling tickets to our play, and creating a budget and calculating discounts when shopping for theater costumes. Our Larks are mileage trackers as we walk around town during the year, adding new mileage to a growing total. The students have varied opportunities to apply learned concepts, working individually or in groups to make sense of problems and persevere in solving them. Just as in literacy, we develop arguments around our reasoning and use evidence to support our ideas.

Our lessons build from one day to the next, with a focus on developing automaticity in our math skills. Automaticity helps build a strong math foundation through numeracy as we move on to more complex concepts.

With the spiraling of our learning, math becomes less about specific skills being taught once at a specific time, and more about foundational concepts being integrated and reinforced again and again in a real-world, project-based curriculum.

At Lark, writing occurs in all areas of our curriculum and includes a focused writing lesson once per week. The focused writing lesson is supported by a writing time each day that allows students to practice concepts and skills in a variety of writing tasks. We use both Story Grammar Marker https://mindwingconcepts.com/collections/story-grammar-marker and EmPOWER writing https://www.vividolearning.com/training/empower/ as our core writing curricula, ensuring that all faculty members use consistent terminology that resonates with the students, as teachers and specialists guide the writing process, across subjects, topics, and projects.

We utilize graphic tools called BrainFrames that make language patterns visible, scaffolding organization and planning during the writing process. Our Larks engage in self-reflection on their writing, frequently reminding themselves that “writers make changes.” By recognizing that language is made up of patterns, students learn how to transfer their thoughts from their minds to their writing, using spoken language as the conduit. Our teaching also focuses in on transcription skills and grammatical and punctuation conventions, helping students increase automaticity and fluency in their writing to free up cognitive space to focus on their ideas. As a whole group, writing happens several times a week, and there are multiple small group writing activities across the week that connect with varied projects and authentic happenings in our day.

At Lark, we frame all of our curriculum within a project. We provide opportunities within projects that allow for student ownership, leadership, and engagement. Projects require students to be able to see the work we do in our curriculum from both a “big picture” viewpoint and with attention to important features and details. Projects we have completed so far include mapping our town, Whitefish history, a theater project, a food bank project. In the spring we will have projects that include: storytelling, Native American history, homesteading, economics, citizenship, and much more. Within all projects there are varied opportunities to apply math, reading, and writing concepts, as well as practice self-regulation, executive functioning skills, and emotional intelligence. Through our projects we embed other curriculum areas including science, social studies, and other curriculum content areas.

At Lark, we believe that social and emotional learning should be embedded throughout our day in all curriculum we do. Once a week as a whole group we have a focused lesson to empower and support our students with their social and emotional learning. Students also have two small group lessons a week that support the larger lesson. Our team works together to ensure that what is being taught during these focused lessons is being reiterated throughout the day. Our goal is to have students thrive socially and emotionally, which ultimately allows them to thrive academically.