Effective Literacy Practices
Student outcomes improve when teachers and schools implement evidence-based instructional strategies that reflect decades of research into how skilled reading develops and how to most effectively support children, including struggling readers, in learning to read proficiently.
Aligned with Arizona’s standards, this resource is intended to complement evidence-based core reading curricula and intervention programs already in place and help educators fill in gaps or modify their approaches with effective strategies, instructional practices, tools and activities.
By committing to evidence-based instruction and interventions, we can teach our children to read at grade-level and be successful in school.
Developmental benchmarks and literacy behaviors that most children display at a particular age/grade.
Find recommended instructional strategies and practices aligned with the science of reading by age/grade level and foundational literacy skill.
Evidence-based reading interventions support students who are identified as struggling with specific foundational literacy skills.
While seemingly effortless, good reading is made up of a set of complex skills and strategies.
Key Topics
Building Blocks to Becoming a Reader
What to expect from children at various ages.
Birth
- Coos, babbles
- Can focus on their parent’s face (8 to 10 inches away)
6 months
- Imitates speech, e.g., "ma-ma, da-da"
- Enjoys books with simple pictures
- Has good color vision
1 year
- Understands several simple phrases
- Says one or more words
- Enjoys lift-the-flap books
- Uses eyes and hands together to pick up and throw objects
2 years
- Says 15–300 words
- Holds books and looks at pictures
- Uses eyes and hands together well and sees if objects are far or near
3 years
- Says 800–1,000 words
- Repeats common rhymes
4 years
- Comfortably uses long sentences (3–5 words)
- Begins to rhyme and play with words, letter names, and numbers
- Makes predictions while reading using knowledge, pictures, and text
5 years
- Says 3,000–5,000 words
- Starts to match letters with sounds
- Uses complex and compound sentences
- Eyes are still fine-tuning their focus and ability to follow moving objects
6 years
- Starts to read words on the page
- Retells stories and makes connections
7 years
- Starts to read words automatically
- Expands knowledge by listening to and reading books
- Uses healthy vision to be a good reader
8 years
- Reads chapter books
- Learning an estimated 3,000 words per year
9-10 years
- Lifts information from text to support explanations and summarize content
Middle School
- Analyzes how details build the central idea and purpose of a text
- Integrates information gained from a variety of texts to determine different points of view
High School
- Analyzes how the author constructs an analysis or series of ideas or events
- Produces clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization, and style are appropriate to task, purpose, and audience