3 [FREE] Ways to Check Your ELA Standards

3 free ways to ensure all ELA standards are covered in the classroom.

If you’re teaching at a school that requires you to teach Common Core standards, you know that it may be a little bit difficult some years to fit all of the standards in and teach them to mastery. What is required of you is to teach all literature, informational, language, reading foundations, writing, and speaking & listening standards in 180 days. This can prove to be very difficult so, here are 3 FREE ways to ensure you’ve covered all ELA standards.

Step 1-

Print out all of your ELA standards from the Common Core website. This is where everyone needs to begin. If you’re not too familiar with Common Core yet (if you’ve just adopted the standards), then you’re going to download your grade levels Reading Literature, Reading Informational, Reading Foundational Skills, Language, Speaking & Listening, and Writing standards. Here is a snapshot of what a few of the standards look like for 2nd grade RL.

After you have printed off your standards for each domain, you’re going to start your color-coding system. Read below to learn more ways to ensure you’ve covered all ELA standards.

What I suggest doing is using a straight edge to separate each standard so that your color-coding system is as clear as it can be. Here is a picture of me using a manila folder to draw straight lines along the standards. Once these are split up clearly, you can start your color-coding.

Color-Coding Organization

The color-coding system helps you keep track of all the times you’ve taught a standard. If you teach your standards throughout the year instead of one standard at a time, this will help you keep track of any time you touch on the standard. You will apply a yellow circle the first time you teach the standard, a blue circle the second time, and the pink circle the third time you teach the specific standard. This helps you ensure you’ve given multiple opportunities for the students to practice this standard AND it helps you keep track of what you’ve taught and what you still need to teach. Read on for two more ways to ensure you’ve covered all ELA standards.

Step 2 of Ways to Ensure You’ve Covered All ELA Standards

Here is a free and simple way to track your weekly ELA standards. Nothing fancy or techy here. I would suggest making these at the beginning of the year for a very informal pacing guide. Write the SIX domains on a piece of cardstock and plugin which standards you plan to teach in each month. This will help you be more intentional about your lesson plans. Plus, when you highlight each one of their monthly lists, you see what you’ve successfully taught and what still needs to be taught.

Step 3-

The final step is a FREE checklist for you for the RL and RI standards! There are two options for you on this freebie. You can choose the editable version to type in and check off, or you can choose to print and write the standards in. Either way, this is a simple, fool-proof way to track which standards you’ve taught and which you still need to teach or revisit.

You can snag this freebie today and get started right away! To use this, you will write each standard as you teach it. I think that putting a check every time you touch on it will help you keep track of how many times you’ve taught that standard. There are also options for you to mark if they have mastered the standard or need more time. It’s one of the ways to ensure you’ve covered all ELA standards.

As soon as you sign up, check your email and your freebies will be waiting there!

And as an added bonus and a thank you for reading my ways to ensure you’ve covered all ELA standards post, I’m adding in this editable binder cover, too!

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