Lesson packs and small groups help with the teaching you already do: something to print for the lesson you are teaching this week, and a suggestion of who needs the same thing next. Each is switched on separately, so your school may not have them yet.
Print a lesson pack
A lesson pack goes with one UFLI Foundations lesson. It has four parts:
- One of our decodable books for a sound that maps to the lesson. Every word in it can be sounded out once that sound and the ones before it have been taught, and a phonics specialist reads each one before it is published.
- A word list of words with the lesson's sound, and the heart words that go with it in our sequence.
- Sentence strips to cut out and read.
- A note to send home with your class code, so families can link and keep reading at home. The note is the same for every family and names no child.
- Open the class, then Assignments, and choose Print a lesson pack.
- Pick the lesson. Lessons with one of our books say Has a book. Where nothing of ours maps to a lesson, the list says so, and there is no pack for it.
- On the pack, choose Print or save as PDF. It is laid out for Letter paper. If the lesson has more than one book, Another book for this lesson lets you choose.
- Show it on the board shows the book a page at a time, then the words and the sentences. The arrow keys move between slides.
Where a lesson maps to one of our sounds but no book has been published for it yet, the pack says so and still has the word list, strips and note.
The books are our own. Printing a pack makes no new book and does not use up any of your plan's books, whatever plan your school is on.
A map shows where the same sound is taught in UFLI Foundations. It is a pointer, and it does not claim the two teach a sound the same way. Until a phonics specialist has checked the map against the current edition, the page says so.
Suggested small groups
Open the class, then Students and Reading groups. Under Suggested small groups, children are grouped by the sound each one needs next, in the order our sequence teaches the sounds, with no more than six in a group. Beside each child is what the suggestion rests on, in a sentence:
- Their reading and practice here, which is what the word games and reading aloud show.
- Your running records, where a sound was read wrong on at least two pages in the last six weeks.
A child appears in one suggested group only. Groups are never ordered by how many children are in them, and there are no scores.
To keep a group, uncheck anyone you would rather not include, change the name if you like, and choose Keep this group. Kept groups are listed under Your small groups, with Set a lesson for this group and Print a lesson pack for their sound. Remove group removes it; nobody's reading changes.
Who is suggested
A child is only suggested, or kept in a group, when learning from their reading is on for them and the updated notices that describe it have been agreed: by their family, or for students your school added, by your school through the updated school agreement. Until then they are listed under Not suggested with the reason, and nothing about them is used.
What is kept is the group's name, its sound, and who is in it. Why a child was suggested is worked out again each time you look and is not kept. A child's place in a group goes when you remove the group, when learning is turned off for them, and 60 days after they leave the class. It is included when the school or the family downloads its data.