Blast Foundations for 1st Grade
Exciting and engaging scientifically-aligned foundational reading skill instruction for 1st-grade students.
Blast Foundations Quick Facts: Only 15–20 minutes a day
- Prevention: 1st-grade whole-class, supplemental first instruction
- Intervention: RTI Tier II and III, early intervention for Grades 1–3, and intensive small-group intervention for emerging readers in Grades 3–5
- 25 weeks of playful, targeted instruction in phonemic awareness, letter knowledge, phonics, and high-frequency words
- Easy, ready-to-teach scripted lessons, complemented by a ready-made, colorful, animated teacher presentation tool
- Great for ELLs in Grades K–5!
Teacher Guides
Blast Foundations Online
Our Blast Online Teacher Presentation Tool can be presented with an interactive whiteboard, LCD projector, tablet, or stand-alone computer.
Blast Student Practice
Student Letter Tile Kits
Blast - Student Group Size, Scope and Sequence, and Lesson Structure
Blast Foundations lessons can be taught in various group sizes, depending on your situation. When used in early 1st grade, Blast can be taught as a whole class supplement, thus the group sizes are large. When it is taught as an intervention in 2nd grade, it is typically taught in smaller groups.
The Blast Foundations scope and sequence is systematic and cumulative.
The scope and sequence covers explicit instruction in the foundational skills needed to help students who struggle with basic skills in reading in 1st Grade. They will learn how to master reading words with complex consonant constructions in Closed Syllables, Open Syllables, Vowel-Consonant-e Syllables, Vowel Team Syllables, and inflectional endings. Students also learn how to apply functional strategies to successfully read multisyllabic words with ease. Blast targets the skills students need to build confidence with decoding skills in order to become accurate fluent readers.
For a full scope and sequence, click here to download the Blast Foundations Sample Lesson>>
Blast has 25 units which are comprised of 5 lessons per week. Designed to be completed in 15 to 20 minutes sessions, each lesson keeps students actively engaged in the learning process with multisensory teaching. In one week, students are immersed in 75-100 minutes of explicit instruction.
- Lesson 1 (Monday) – Letter Sounds / High-Frequency Words
- Lesson 2 (Tuesday) – Phonemic Awareness
- Lesson 3 (Wednesday) – Phonics Instruction
- Lesson 4 (Thursday) – Student Practice
- Detective Work
- Word Sort
- Partially-Controlled Phrase Reading
- New! Blast Foundation Passages, to be taught after Lesson 4
- Lesson 5 (Friday) – Wrap-Up
- Partially-Controlled Phrase and Sentence Reading
- Spell It! (Review and practice words with phonics concept from Lesson 3)
Diagnostics
The 1st Grade Foundational Skills Surveys are a complimentary set of assessments that are commonly used:
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in 1st grade
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with older students who perform well below expectations on Beginning and Advanced Decoding Surveys
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as a one-on-one assessment of 1st-grade foundational literacy skills, including:
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Simple and complex single-syllable words (including short vowels, digraphs, blends, closed syllables, and various long vowel spellings)
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Decodable two-syllable words
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Selected high-frequency words
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Optional assessments for high-frequency words, letter-sounds knowledge, and letter-names knowledge
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Sight Words Survey
The Sight Words Survey is a complimentary set of assessments that determine how well a student reads high-frequency English words. It is designed to be used:
- at the beginning of Kindergarten through 3rd grade
- and with older students who still struggle to read high-frequency sight words
One-on-one assessment of:
- High-frequency sight word knowledge from the Pre-Primer through 3rd-grade levels of the Dolch 220 list
- Automaticity reading sight words both in context (simple sentences) and in isolation
The data collected from these assessments can help determine the levels of sight words with which students are proficient and the levels with which they need more instruction and practice to gain automaticity.
Grouping Students
Successful reading interventions start with accurate diagnosis and grouping. Really Great Reading’s Grouping Matrix helps facilitate differentiated data-driven instruction and reporting. It is a free, web-based data management system that enables educators to group students (K- 12) according to the type and depth of their decoding difficulties. The same data management system can be used to monitor progress, report, and adjust.
NEW - Grouping Matrix Live Assess
Now you can assess and group your students in just one step. As you listen to your students read, enter the miscues directly into the Grouping Matrix, and it will do the rest. “Live Assess” will pinpoint the types of words a student is misreading, identify specific areas of confusion, total the types of errors, record the results, and group your students according to their decoding strengths and weaknesses. It’s never been easier to diagnose and group your students.
Learn more and sign up for free access to the Grouping Matrix>>
