First Grade ELA Critical Concepts

Decoding

• I can read regularly spelled one-syllable words with short and long vowels.
• I can read regularly spelled two-syllable words with short vowels.
• I can read grade-appropriate irregularly spelled words.

Phonological Awareness

• I can blend sounds to say one-syllable words with consonant blends.
• I can break a spoken one-syllable word into individual sounds or phonemes.

Analyzing Text Organization and Structure

• I can describe a relationship between two ideas, events, or people in a text.

Text Features

• I can explain how specific text features can be used to locate information in a text.
• I can describe the difference between information conveyed through illustrations in a text.

Text Types

• I can determine the text type of a given text.

Analyzing Main Ideas

• I can identify the main idea of a text.
• I can identify details that relate to the main idea of a text.
• I can answer questions about details in a text.

Analyzing Claims and Reasons

• I can identify reasons that support an opinion in a text.

Analyzing Narratives

• I can describe major events in a narrative text.
• I can describe the characters in a narrative text.
• I can describe the setting in a narrative text.

Analyzing Point of View

• I can identify who is speaking at different points in the text.

Comparing Texts

• I can compare two texts on the same topic.
• I can compare the main characters' experiences in two texts.

Analyzing Words

• I can explain the meaning of a multiple-meaning word.
• I can use descriptive attributes to sort words into categories.

Analyzing Language

• I can identify sensory words and words that communicate different emotions in a text.

Generating Sentences

• I can explain the basic parts of a sentence.
• I can generate declarative, exclamatory, imperative, and interrogative sentences.
• I can use conjunctions to show relationships.

Generating Text Organization and Structure

• I can state the topic of a text in an introductory sentence.
• I can develop a topic with facts.
• I can restate the topic of a text in a conclusion sentence.

Generating Claims and Reasons

• I can state an opinion.
• I can give a reason for an opinion.

Sources and Research

• I can answer a question using multiple facts or pieces of information from provided sources.

Generating Narratives

• I can write about a sequence of at least two events.
• I can use illustrations and descriptions to convey the events in a narrative.
• I can use sequence words to show the order of events in a narrative.

Parts of Speech

• I can use possessive and proper nouns correctly.
• I can use personal, possessive, and indefinite pronouns correctly.
• I can use articles and other common determiners correctly.
• I can use verbs that agree with singular and plural subjects.
• I can form simple past, present, and future tense verbs correctly.

Spelling

• I can use long and short vowel patterns to spell words.
• I can use r-controlled vowel patterns to spell words.
• I can spell using consonant digraphs.

Editing

• I can use commas to separate words in a list.