Language Arts

Dyslexia is a learning disorder characterized by a difficulty in learning both written and oral language. Students with dyslexia sometimes experience letters that appear “mixed up.” The condition may also manifest in delayed speech, difficulty with pronunciation, trouble learning nursery rhymes and songs, problems with processing and understanding instructions, difficulty with spelling, and other challenges with both spoken and written language. The Laurel School of Princeton offers an integrative, engaging curriculum that helps students overcome these and other language issues.

The Laurel School language arts curriculum provides instruction in all language areas including reading, writing, and oral language.

Language Arts Curriculum

Laurel School’s language arts class is grouped by homeroom class. Our intensive curriculum incorporates reading comprehension, written expression, vocabulary, and study skills. We use a research-based, multisensory, direct-instruction approach to teaching language arts. Teachers focus on student’s strengths, while remediate areas of personal challenge. 

In Language Arts class, curricular content unfolds in logical ways that facilitates student learning and progress. Reading comprehension and vocabulary instruction are taught explicitly while fostering creative expression and a love of books. Teachers provide direct instruction using literature that is age-appropriate despite the fact that some students may not be able to independently decode the text to ensure students are challenged to their intellectual ability. Students begin learning the structure of text, specifically narrative and expository text structures by exploring advanced literature and nonfiction text. Laurel incorporates well-respected specialized programs, such as Lindamood-Bell® Visualizing, and Verbalizing®, Project Read® Story Form® and Report Form®, Project Read, and Developing Metacognitive Skills® to support individual needs. We explicitly teach active reading strategies to facilitate greater comprehension, such as understanding text structures, determining importance, drawing Inferences, monitoring comprehension and meaning, and creating mental images. 

Writing goals are differentiated by grade level standards and a student’s current level of ability. Students develop the skills needed to write clear, linguistically-complex sentences, and well-organized paragraphs and compositions as part of their Language Arts curriculum. They progress from sentence structure mastery to more complex paragraph structure and longer writing pieces, learning to use text evidence and more detail as they advance. The writing strategies learned during structured writing time are integrated into the written expression instruction across all content areas.