1st Grade Reading Expectations

Home support plays a critical role in a child’s academic success, especially during the early years when they develop foundational skills. By actively engaging in your child’s learning journey, you can reinforce what they are taught in school, boost their confidence, and help create positive learning habits. The resources here will empower you with practical tools to make learning fun, effective, and meaningful at home.

1. Phonological and Phonemic Awareness

Master phonological and phonemic awareness. These activities can be done with eyes shut—no print should be in front of the child. Print and follow this! If children cannot hear and manipulate sounds in their heads, they won’t be able to read and spell! Blending and segmenting are the most important phonemic awareness activities because they directly correlate to reading and spelling. You can find these activities by following this link, but you can blend and segment any word!

It would also be great to teach your child nursery rhymes. It is sad so many children no longer know these classics. Rhyming helps children experience the rhythm of language, recognize sounds in words, anticipate what is coming next, and more! There are many cute free online videos of nursery rhymes, and the library has beautiful nursery rhyme books. 

2. Letter Names, Letter Sounds, and Letter Formation

Master letter names and sounds. Get a set of flashcards online, or here are free ones to print! These sets are good because the upper and lowercase letters are on separate cards.

Correct letter formation is important! All letters start from the top down. Not only are improperly formed letters messy, but improperly formed letters will slow children down when writing – impacting test-taking, creative writing, and note-taking… It will also impact their ability to learn cursive. 

3. Phonics

Follow the Wilson Fundations Scope & Sequence for 1st grade.

My Wilson Fundations page will give you even more information! The Wilson Fundations Home Support Pack will support your child’s learning. 

For paper and pencil phonics, try Primary Phonics 1A Short Vowels. These stories go with it.  

Here is a first-grade phonics workbook.

Please check phonics by grade level and look at the grade 1 column.

3. Tapping, Blending, Spelling

Teach tapping out and blending 3 sounds to form consonant-short vowel-consonant words or CVC words, such as bat, bit, tub, pet, pot.

Here is an AMAZING activity! Watch the video clip below. (This is not my video.) Word lists are also below.

• Say it
• Stretch it
• Spell it
• Change it

If your child can read these 1st Grade- Six Decodable Units, they are ready for grade 2! 1st grade science of reading

Research shows decodable texts are the BEST way to learn to read!

Decodable text falls under the phonics approach of the science of reading. When students decode words, they break them down and figure out how to pronounce them. Teaching beginning readers how to sound out words is critical in reading and writing. 

Tips

• Always have your child read each story 3x for fluency and accuracy.
• Having your child point to each word with 1:1 correspondence is essential because students tend to guess or memorize these simpler texts.
• Your child should figure out unknown words independently by SOUNDING OUT. Not all words can be perfectly sounded out, but most words have at least parts that can!

When reading any text…

• No more than 10 errors per 100 words, including words you had to tell your child, are acceptable.
• The child must also demonstrate comprehension. Grade 1 students should retell the story, make a connection to their life or another book, and tell their favorite part and why.
• Reading at an appropriate rate (words per minute) is essential. When fluency is achieved, comprehension can occur.

Words Per Minute for Grade 1

To calculate rate – WPM: ___words in the book divided by ___SECONDS it took to read X 60 = __WPM

For example, say there are 207 words in a book. The child read it in 3 min. 25 seconds, which is 205 seconds. 207 divided by 205 is approximately 1.0 words per second x 60 = 60 WPM!

This table shows approximate percentile ranks for correct words per minute at 2 points during the school year. The average first grader should be reading 29 words correctly per minute in the winter and 60 words in the spring.

* WCPM = Words Correct Per Minute

5. Master Sight Words

Master a few sight words each day. First graders should know the Pre-primer (Pre-Kindergarten), Primer (Kindergarten), and Grade 1 sight words in isolation. These are best learned in context. They should read, reread, and reread:

Grade 1 word in your own simple sentence for your child to practice reading.

Here are more sight word stories.

Your child must also know how to read and spell the Grade 1 Fundations Trick Words and the Kindergarten Fundations Trick Words.

6. Vocabulary for 1st Graders

1st graders must know the meaning of these words, taken from the Marzano list.

And 1st graders must know the meaning of these words, which were taken from  WORDS TO KNOW BY GRADE LEVEL.

7. Spelling 1st grade science of reading

If you want to keep your child busy with a workbook, here is a first-grade spelling workbook. (If you want paper and pencil activities, I recommend this phonics workbook instead of the spelling workbook.)

8. Are you looking for a tech option?

9. Read Aloud or Listen to Online Texts – Put the Closed Captioning On

Read aloud more complex books to your child, or have your child listen to books online – not decodable texts – on topics they enjoy to instill a love of reading, improve listening comprehension, and grow vocabulary. 1st-grade reading and listening comprehension are based on:

1st grade reading expectations

Here are Grade 1 Common Core State Standards Question Stems you can use as discussion starters with your child, but make talking about books fun! However, the CCSS is used in the classroom.

We administer the FREE DIBELS 8 3x/year. Each are 1-minute tests:

• Name letters. The upper and lower case are mixed up on a sheet of paper.
• Segment individual sounds heard in a word; for example, “apple” is /a/ /p/ /l/ and “holes” is /h/ /o/ /l/ /z/. If the child can correctly segment apple and holes, that is 7 sounds.
• Read 3-letter short vowel nonsense words. These can be sounded out ~ for example, “sil,” “tob,” “paj,” “zev,” “nud.” The goal is for the child to recognize these chunks automatically.
• Read actual words – sight words.
• Oral reading fluency ~ Can the child read x amount of words in a story with at least 96% accuracy?

The minimum scores to pass:

Here are other free literacy assessments if you want to assess your child!

1st grade reading expectations

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Copyright 05/04/2012

Edited on 10/24/2024

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