Skill Descriptor: Construct and communicate personal strengths and an awareness of self, others, and the world.

Global Competencies: SASM, CL, CM, SGC, ICE

Achievement Indicators:

• Communicate and explain observations, understandings, viewpoints and perspectives
• Describe personal strengths

Skill Descriptor: Persuade and support ideas and opinions with evidence.

Global Competencies: SASM, CL, CM, SGC, ICE

Achievement Indicators:

• Justify, citing evidence, position and perspective for self and others
• Explain difference of opinion by citing facts, anecdotal evidence, and experiences
• Use evidence objectively, identifying, and critiquing generalizations and bias
• Communicate persuasively citing evidence free from generalizations and bias

Skill Descriptor: Evaluate and present content to communicate facts, ideas, and opinions.

Global Competencies: CL, CM, ICE

Achievement Indicators:

• Select information, topics, and theme that support their purpose
• Support ideas and arguments with evidence
• Use credible information to support or refute ideas and opinions
• Present with intention, using source content and language to influence the audience

Skill Descriptor: Use language of harmony and respect, self-monitoring and adjusting as appropriate.

Global Competencies: SASM, CL, CM, CTPS, SGC

Achievement Indicators:

• Explain why some language is inclusive and some is not
• Use and promote helpful, respectful, and equitable language
• Communicate using thoughtful and respectful language free from prejudice, stereotyping, or bias
• Use inclusive language that respects gender identity
• Use language that demonstrates cultural sensitivity and respect

Skill Descriptor: Seek and provide clarification and explanation of ideas and concepts, problems, and solutions.

Global Competencies: SASM, CL, CM, CTPS, ICE

Achievement Indicators:

• Participate in inquisitive questioning by asking questions and responding to others
• Ask clarifying questions to seek further information and determine next steps
• Seek outside resources to support ideas, concepts, or claims
• Ask pondering questions to extend ideas, rather than to seek a definitive answer

Skill Descriptor: Give and respond to a variety of directions and instructions.

Global Competencies: SASM, CL, CM

Achievement Indicators:

• Give multi-step and increasingly complex instructions
• Follow multi-step and increasingly complex instruction
• Clarify processes, routines, and order of sequence or operation

Skill Descriptor: Understand communication conventions for a diverse set of audiences.

Global Competencies: SASM, CL, CM

Achievement Indicators:

• Communicate with sensitivity and respect
• Select and adjust language to reflect an understanding of the audience perspective, context, and purpose

Skill Descriptor: Respond personally and critically to a variety of text.

Global Competencies: SASM, CL, CM

Achievement Indicators:

• Respond and react to oral presentations and multimodal text, by challenging ideas and communicating thoughts and opinions, citing evidence
• Evaluate oral presentations and stories, and multimodal text citing incomplete information, outstanding questions, and possibilities for further elaboration

Skill Descriptor: Adjust interactions to reflect situation, audience, and purpose.

Global Competencies: SASM, CL, CM, CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

• Identify appropriate conventions for specific types of interactions
• Use conversational conventions that demonstrate respect for the needs, rights, and feelings of others
• Engage in active listening

Skill Descriptor: Critically reflect on the contributions of others and extend my understanding.

Global Competencies: SASM, CL, CM, CTPS, SGC

Achievement Indicators:

• Determine what information is important, relevant, and worthy of further consideration
• Identify and respond to the perspective implicit within a speaker’s contribution. Understand the power of spoken language to influence and manipulate, and reveal ideas, values, and attitudes
• Recognize language used to manipulate, persuade, or control

Skill Descriptor: Efficiently use word structure knowledge to independently solve unfamiliar and technical words.

Global Competencies: CM

Achievement Indicators:

• Apply morphological knowledge to solve unfamiliar and technical words with ease
• Solve unknown words using a variety of cues (dividing into syllables, root words and origins, background knowledge, context clues)

Skill Descriptor: Reads unfamiliar texts with accuracy and expression, both silently and aloud.

Global Competencies: CM

Achievement Indicators:

• Reads a variety of text forms smoothly and with confidence
• Uses a pace that is consistently conversational and matches form and purpose of different texts
• Read less familiar texts with appropriate phrasing and expression to convey meaning to audience
• Confidently uses dimensions of fluency (intonation, stress, pausing, phrasing, tone, & volume) to convey meaning of multimodal texts
• Self-assess silent reading
• Rehearse and self-correct as needed

Skill Descriptor: Use a range of strategies to determine new vocabulary in all texts.

Global Competencies: CM, CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

• Flexibly uses different strategies for solving new vocabulary words in texts with independence (context, morphology, dictionary, text features, etc.)
• Explain the choice of strategy when solving new vocabulary in texts (meta-cognition)

Skill Descriptor: Construct meaning from a variety of text considering the source, intended audience, and purpose.

Global Competencies: CM, CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

• Construct literal and inferred meaning of complex texts with connections to the theme
• Explain the effectiveness of a variety of text features to convey the intended meaning of the writer
• Identify connections between texts across genres by purpose, audience, and/or theme
• Demonstrate the ability to summarize information from a variety of sources

Skill Descriptor: Confidently apply appropriate comprehension strategies to clarify understanding of a range of text independently.

Global Competencies: CL, CM, CTPS, SGC

Achievement Indicators:

• Efficiently apply self-correction strategies without losing fluency or comprehension
• Explain meta-cognitive processes when reading
• Use inferential predictions to enhance meaning
• Annotate reading to summarize key information concisely and independently
• Use relevant questioning during reading to clarify understanding of text and evaluate questions after reading to determine if inferring or further information is required
• Construct meaning from a variety of text forms, including print and non-print texts
• Identify key story elements of narrative text
• Distinguish between main ideas and supporting details
• Preview and locate information using text features

Skill Descriptor: Examine and respond personally to a range of texts across genres, interests, and complexities, citing evidence.

Global Competencies: CM, CTPS, SGC

Achievement Indicators:

• Express how a text has impacted changes in personal viewpoint/ideas
• Interpret relationships among texts, personal experiences and prior knowledge to draw conclusions or make comparisons supported by relevant details
• Select specific and relevant textual details

Skill Descriptor: Independently select, read, and examine critically a
variety of texts representing all voices.

Global Competencies: CM, CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

• Explain preferences and choice of reading material
• Communicate purpose of text selection related to learning needs and interests
• Interpret information using text features
• Explain how events/main ideas are related to theme
• Explain how the different elements of author’s style/technique create meaning and impact
• Evaluate author’s effectiveness, using textual support
• Evaluate purpose, structure, and characteristics of a variety of text forms and how they contribute to understanding the text
• Examine texts for bias
• Interact with storytellers and people in the community (Elders, family members, librarians, etc.)
• Evaluate ways in which various cultures, genders, socioeconomic groups are portrayed in texts
• Analyze the meaning of a variety of texts by exploring alternative worldviews

Skill Descriptor: Critically analyze and evaluate the characteristics, language, form, features, and genre of a range of texts.

Global Competencies: CM, CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

• Discuss and apply strategies for enhancing understanding (context clues, prior knowledge, and knowledge of forms/features to verify and adjust predictions while reading, etc.)
• Refer to relevant textual details/features when inferring
• Describe relationships among characters and effect on plot/subplots or overall theme in narrative texts
• Interpret relationships among ideas to draw conclusions or make comparisons
• Support responses with relevant details
• Explain relationships between language, topic, genre, purpose, context, and audience
• Detect and articulate bias in text
• Evaluate the veracity of a claim by distinguishing between sound and fallacious reasoning

Skill Descriptor: Implement effective writing strategies to enhance clarity and control in multi-modal works.

Global Competencies: CL, CM, CTPS, ICE

Achievement Indicators:

• Examine a variety of mentor texts to guide creation
• Select and develop a topic based on a purpose; demonstrate awareness of audience and competence crafting a variety of text forms (including hybrids)
• Gather ideas from a variety of sources and use a framework (e.g. web, graphic organizer) to sort and classify the information/ideas, recognize different perspectives, and make new connections
• Apply knowledge of copyright/plagiarism (including the use of A.I.)
• Draft a text making critical choices about ideas/content based on the purpose and intended audience
• Independently reread to add to, delete from, or reorganize the text to clarify and strengthen content
• Request, obtain, and make decisions about constructive criticism
• Refine text to enhance impact
• Select literary and print/visual/audio devices to influence audience
• Reread aloud, review and listen for fluency; make changes to sentences and word/visual/audio choices to provide variety and ensure parallel structure
• Use appropriate tools (e.g., dictionary, thesaurus, grammar checker, and text models) to edit conventions, and strengthen word/visual/audio choices
• Choose appropriate text and text features to suit purpose
• Use a variety of publishing formats (e.g., pamphlets, posters, websites, video) and technology tools
• Reference all sources, in a bibliography, using a standard framework (e.g., MLA, APA) and available technology

Skill Descriptor: Create a variety of texts with purpose and understand the influence of the writer/creator.

Global Competencies: CL, CM, CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

• Define a specific topic with a main idea that supports the purpose and audience
• Develop ideas relevant to the topic
• Elaborate on the main idea, add relevant details, and maintain focus with minimal distractions

Skill Descriptor: Select an appropriate form for the purpose, audience, and topic.

Global Competencies: CL, CM, CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

• Select an appropriate form and use an engaging introduction that includes the purpose
• Use an underlying structure to present ideas (e.g., temporal sequence, cause and effect, compare and contrast)
• Has well-developed paragraphs/sections with smooth transitions
• Has a definite conclusion

Skill Descriptor: Include interesting and/or domain specific words and phrases to convey and enhance meaning.

Global Competencies: CL, CM, CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

• Include interesting words and/or technical/subject-specific language to enhance meaning
• Use figurative language (e.g., metaphor, analogy, symbolism)

Skill Descriptor: Provide evidence of author’s style, personality and experience.

Global Competencies: CL, CM, CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

• Skillfully connect the audience to the topic
• Show care and commitment to the topic
• Generate strong feeling, energy, and individuality

Skill Descriptor: Include well-crafted sentences to support meaning and readability.

Global Competencies: CL, CM, CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

• Include well-crafted sentences (pronoun references, expanding and contracting sentence elements) to support meaning and readability through coherent paragraphs
• Vary sentence length for rhythmic flow

Skill Descriptor: Demonstrate correct spelling, punctuation, capitalization, and usage.

Global Competencies: CL, CM, CTPS

Achievement Indicators:

• Include internal punctuation (e.g., commas, semi-colons, colons, dash, hyphen, parentheses, apostrophes) and paragraphing of dialogue
• Apply correct grammatical structures that make the text readable (numbers, apostrophe, contractions, plurals, conjunctions, all parts of speech, etc.)
• Correctly spell almost all words; use spelling support (e.g., dictionary, spell checker); correctly use homophones
• Use a range of print characteristics and layout to enhance the meaning (e.g., headings, visuals, white space, italics, bold, font size, and style)