Academic Support

View the Academic Knowledge and Skills for your child's grade level.

Websites/Apps

• Teach Your Monster - Free phonics, reading, and mathematics games
• Starfall
• Storyline Online
• Social Emotional Learning Read Alouds
• K5 Learning
• Beanstack (how to log in)

Printables/Articles

• How families can support literacy at home
• School Success Guides from Scholastic

Supporting Literacy at Home: Ideas for Kindergarten Families

• Audiobooks: Play audiobooks during car rides or quiet time to build listening comprehension and vocabulary.

• Shaving Cream Tracing: Squirt shaving cream onto a plastic tray or direction on the countertop. Let your child use their pointer finger to practice letters.

• Label the house: Write simple labels on sticky notes for common objects (like bed, door, box) and let your child stick them onto the correct item.

• Sticky note matching: Write uppercase letters on paper and stick lowercase letters on sticky notes. Have your child hunt for the sticky notes and stick them over the matching capital letter.

• Sound Spy: Pick a target sound (like /s/). Walk around the room together to "spy" items that start with it (e.g., soup, sock, sink)

• Post-it Match & Race: Write 5 letters on sticky notes and place them across a wall or room. Call out a letter sound, and have your child race to find and slap the correct note

Supporting Literacy at Home: Ideas for First Grade Families

• Don't leave home without it: Bring along a book or magazine any time your child has to wait, such as at a doctor's office. Always try to fit in reading!
• Once is not enough: Encourage your child to re-read favorite books and poems. Re-reading helps kids read more quickly and accurately.
• Dig deeper into the story: Ask your child questions about the story you've just read. Say something like, "Why do you think Clifford did that?"
• Take control of the television: It's difficult for reading to compete with TV and video games. Encourage reading as a free-time activity.
• Be patient: When your child is trying to sound out an unfamiliar word, give him or her time to do so. Remind to child to look closely at the first letter or letters of the word.
• Pick books that are at the right level: Help your child pick books that are not too difficult. The aim is to give your child lots of successful reading experiences.
• Play word games: Have your child sound out the word as you change it from mat to fat to sat; from sat to sag to sap; and from sap to sip.
• I read to you, you read to me:Take turns reading aloud at bedtime. Kids enjoy this special time with their parents.
• Talk, talk, talk! Talk with your child every day about school and things going on around the house. Sprinkle some interesting words into the conversation, and build on words you've talked about in the past.
• Write, write, write! Ask your child to help you write out the grocery list, a thank you note to Grandma, or to keep a journal of special things that happen at home. When writing, encourage your child to use the letter and sound patterns he is learning at school.

Supporting Literacy at Home: Ideas for Second Grade Families

• Tell family tales: Children love to hear stories about their family. Talk about a funny thing that happened when you were young.
• Create a writing toolbox: Fill a box with drawing and writing materials. Find opportunities for your child to write, such as the shopping list, thank you notes, or birthday cards.
• Be your child's #1 fan: Ask your child to read aloud what he or she has written for school. Be an enthusiastic listener.
• One more time with feeling: When your child has sounded out an unfamiliar word, have him or her re-read that sentence. Often kids are so busy figuring out a word they lose the meaning of what they've just read.
• Create a book together: Fold pieces of paper in half and staple them to make a book. Ask your child to write sentences on each page and add his or her own illustrations.
• Do storytelling on the go: Take turns adding to a story the two of you make up while riding in a car or bus. Try making the story funny or spooky.
• Point out the relationship between words: Explain how related words have similar spellings and meanings. Show how a word like knowledge, for example, relates to a word like know.
• Quick, quick: Use new words your child has learned in lively flash card or computer drills. Sometimes these help kids automatically recognize and read words, especially those that are used frequently.

Supporting Literacy at Home: Ideas for Third Grade Families

• Make books special: Turn reading into something special. Take your kids to the library, help them get their own library card, read with them, and buy them books as gifts. Have a favorite place for books in your home or, even better, put books everywhere.

• Get them to read another one: Find ways to encourage your child to pick up another book. Introduce him or her to a series like The Boxcar Children or Harry Potter or to a second book by a favorite author, or ask the librarian for additional suggestions.

• Crack open the dictionary: Let your child see you use a dictionary. Say, "Hmm, I'm not sure what that word means... I think I'll look it up."

• Talk about what you see and do: Talk about everyday activities to build your child's background knowledge, which is crucial to listening and reading comprehension. Keep up a running patter, for example, while cooking together, visiting somewhere new, or after watching a TV show.

• Different strokes for different folks: Read different types of books to expose your child to different types of writing. Some kids, especially boys, prefer nonfiction books.

• Teach your child some "mind tricks": Show your child how to summarize a story in a few sentences or how to make predictions about what might happen next. Both strategies help a child comprehend and remember.

• "Are we there yet?": Use the time spent in the car or bus for wordplay. Talk about how jam means something you put on toast as well as cars stuck in traffic. How many other homonyms can your child think of? When kids are highly familiar with the meaning of a word, they have less difficulty reading it.

Supporting Literacy at Home: Ideas for Fourth Grade Families

• Read and Research Together: Read the same book as your child independently, together, or a combination of both. Talk about the book as you read it, reviewing main ideas and plots and expressing your opinions. Then read an additional book or books on the same subject and compare and contrast how they dealt with the same issue. 

• Read magazine and newspaper articles. Focus on the illustrations, graphs, or charts. Point out to your child what they show, ask them to help you interpret them, and discuss how they help explain or elaborate on the text. 

• Encourage longer practice: Fourth graders should build up to reading independently for 30 to 45 minutes at a time.

• Practice Note Taking: When you and your child go somewhere like a museum, a new city, or a new store, pretend to be reporters and take notes (give them a journal they'll love to take notes in). Later on, use those notes to describe what you learned. You can even relay your “reports” like a newscaster would.

Supporting Literacy at Home: Ideas for 5th Grade Families

• Read To and With Your Child: Big kids love being read to! Choose a high-interest chapter book to read aloud together, or establish a daily "Drop Everything and Read" (DEAR) time where everyone in the house sets a timer for 5 to 10 minutes to read their own book.

• Make Library Trips an Event: Turn visits to your local public library into a fun, regular family outing where everyone gets to explore new genres, pick out books, or check out audiobooks.

• Talk About What You Read: Share what you are currently reading with your child and ask them open-ended questions about their own books, characters, or storylines.

• Incorporate Fun Learning on the Go: Practice grammar and vocabulary in low-stakes environments like car rides (e.g., "I see a tall tree. What part of speech is 'tree'?" or "Can you think of an adjective to describe that car?").

• Write Stories Together: Co-author short, silly, or creative stories where you alternate writing sentences or paragraphs.

• Celebrate Progress: Offer new books, graphic novels, or comic books as rewards or special treats.

• Stay Connected to Schoolwork: Regularly review your child's literacy homework, writing projects, and class assignments together to show that their progress matters.