Assessment standards

We know this when the learner:

• Listens attentively to instructions and announcements, and responds appropriately.
• Demonstrates appropriate listening behaviour by listening without interrupting, showing respect for the speaker, taking turns to speak, and asking questions for clarification.
• Listens with enjoyment to short stories, rhymes, poems and songs from a variety of cultures, and shows understanding:
• listens for the main idea and important details in the story;
• acts out parts of story, song or rhyme;
• joins in choruses;
• draws a picture of the story and writes a few words about it;
• puts pictures in right sequence and matches captions with pictures;
• answers open questions about the story;
• expresses feelings about the story;
• communicates back the sequence of ideas.
• Listens, enjoys and responds appropriately to riddles and jokes.
• Listens to messages and conveys them correctly.
• Develops phonic awareness:
• distinguishes between different phonemes, especially at the beginning of words;
• recognises some rhyming words in common rhymes and songs such as ‘We ’re going to the zoo, zoo, zoo; you can come too, too, too’;
• recognises plurals (‘s’ and ‘es’), ‘-ing’ and ‘-ed’ at the end of words.

Assessment standards

We know this when the learner:

• Talks about personal experiences, feelings and news.
• Communicates ideas using interesting descriptions and action words.
• Sings, recites, act out and mimes songs, poems and rhymes.
• Uses language imaginatively for fun and fantasy.
• Passes on messages.
• Recounts in sequence personal experiences.
• Tells a familiar short story that has a beginning, middle and ending, using pictures for support if necessary.
• Contributes to class and group discussions:
• by taking turns, asking quesions and showing sensitivity to the rights and feelings of others;
• reports back on behalf of group following group work;
• responds to questions asked by listeners.
• Uses appropriate language for different occasions and with different people:
• interviews an adult visitor to the class;
• role-plays relevant situations such as making new friends;
• varies tone and volume of voice.

Assessment standards

We know this when the learner:

• Uses visual cues to make meaning:
• predicts from the cover of a book what the story is about;
• uses illustrations to interpret the meaning of stories, and tells a story;
• interprets information including simple tables and graphical images found in print, media and advertising such as calendars and rosters, HIV/AIDS posters.
• Role-plays reading:
• holds a book the right way up;
• turns pages appropriately;
• looks at words and pictures;
• uses pictures to construct ideas.
• Makes meaning of written text:
• reads a story with the teacher and:
• discusses the main idea,
• identifies the details (e.g. main characters, sequence of events, setting),
• says whether the story was liked and why.
• Recognises letters and words and makes meaning of written text:
• reads simple written materials (labels, stories, etc.) for different purposes;
• reads own writing and the writing of classmates;
• uses phonic and word recognition skills to decode new or unfamiliar words in context (e.g. visual cues like shape of word and letter patterns, picture clues, context clues, and letter-sound relationships).
• Develops phonic awareness:
• recognises and names letters of the alphabet;
• understands the difference between letter names and letter sounds;
• understands that letter names remain constant but the sounds they represent may vary;
• understands the letter-sound relationships of most single consonants and short forms of vowels in words like ‘hat’ and ‘mat’;
• segments simple words with single initial consonants and short vowels (CVC pattern) into onset (the first sound) and rime (the last part of the syllable) (e.g. f-at, c-at, m-at, h-at, s-at);
• groups common words into word families (e.g. fat, cat, mat, hat, sat);
• recognises the ‘silent e’ in common words such as ‘cake’;
• recognises two letter blends at the beginning of words (e.g. gr-een, bl-ow);
• recognises common consonant diagraphs (single sounds spelt with two letters) at the beginning and end of words (e.g. sh, th, ch);
• recognises some high-frequency sight words such as ‘the’, ‘a’, ‘to’, ‘my’, ‘your’, ‘like’ and including own name and print in the environment.
• Reads for information and enjoyment:
• reads picture books with simple captions.

Assessment standards

We know this when the learner:

• Writes with increasing legibility:
• manipulates writing tools like crayons and pencils effectively;
• develops letter formation and handwriting skills, drawing patterns, tracing and copying words);
• forms letters of the alphabet successfully.
• Does pre-writing:
• creates and uses drawings as a focus for writing;
• responds to a picture by writing simple sentences;
• discusses with classmates (in pairs or groups) topics and ideas for writing.
• Writes for different purposes:
• compiles lists;
• writes simple labels or captions for drawings;
• creates simple texts such as birthday cards (with written and visual text);
• uses simple strategies for getting and recording information, such as carrying out a survey of how many languages are spoken in a group;
• organises information in simple graphical forms, such as a chart or roster;
• collects suitable pictures and graphics to illustrate text.
• Drafts and revises:
• contributes ideas to a group writing a story (initially with teacher as scribe);
• revises a draft of the group’s story to be clearer and more interesting;
• writes and reads own draft to teacher and classmates, and starts to make revisions.
• Writes so that others can understand, using writing conventions:
• uses letters to form single words and short sentences;
• leaves spaces between words;
• uses left to right, top to bottom orientation to print;
• writes own sentences, with the support of writing frames where necessary;
• starts to use basic punctuation (capital letters and full stops).
• Begins to build vocabulary and starts to spell words so that they can be read and understood by others:
• writes words that represent familiar people, places and things;
• spells common words correctly;
• attempts to spell unfamiliar words using knowledge of phonics (emergent spelling);
• builds own word bank and personal dictionary.

Assessment standards

We know this when the learner:

• Uses language to develop concepts:
• demonstrates developing knowledge of concepts such as quantity, size, shape, direction, colour, speed, time, age, sequence;
• understands and uses the conceptual language of different learning areas necessary at this level and in preparation for the next level.
• Uses language to think and reason:
• understands and uses language for logic and reasoning, such as cause and effect;
• classifies information (e.g. groups of different kinds of animals);
• identifies parts from the whole (e.g. parts of a bicycle, parts of a plant);
• identifies similarities and differences, using appropriate language (e.g. like, the same as, different from).
• Uses language to investigate and explore:
• asks questions and searches for explanations;
• offers explanations and solutions;
• uses simple strategies for getting and recording information, such as carrying out a survey of how many languages are spoken in a group, or finding relevant information in texts;
• solves picture and word puzzles.
• Processes information:
• organises information in simple graphical forms such as a chart, timeline, etc.

Assessment standards

We know this when the learner:

• Relates sounds to letters and words:
• uses phonics to read and spell words.
• Works with words:
• knows where a written word begins and ends, and leaves spaces between words;
• spells some familiar words correctly;
• forms the plural of familiar words;
• groups words (e.g. words which rhyme);
• uses capital letters for names (e.g. Brenda).
• Works with sentences:
• writes simple sentences (e.g. ‘Jay won the race.’);
• uses punctuation - a capital letter at the beginning of a sentence and a full stop at the end;
• uses nouns, pronouns (I, you, she, he, etc.) and prepositions correctly;
• uses simple present and past tenses correctly.
• Works with texts:
• sequences text (e.g. by using words like ‘then’ and ‘next’ in a recount);
• talks about texts (e.g. stories) using terms like ‘beginning’, ‘middle’ and ‘end’.
• Develops critical language awareness;
• recognises the difference between language used in the classroom (e.g. at news time) and when playing with friends;
• explores why different language is used in different contexts.
• Uses meta-language (terms such as sentence, capital letter, full stop, dictionary).