Explore the additional Learning Resources below to see how the Independence School District supports teachers and students with effective, research-based strategies that help students learn and grow across all subject areas.
Family Choice Boards
Family Choice Boards provide students and families with flexible ways to extend learning beyond the classroom. Each board includes a variety of engaging activities that allow students to explore concepts, practice skills, and apply their learning in creative ways.
Students can choose activities that match their interests and learning style while reinforcing important academic skills. Choice Boards encourage curiosity, independence, and problem-solving, helping students stay engaged with learning at home while supporting the work happening in the classroom.
Science of Reading
What Is the Science of Reading?
The science of reading refers to the study of how the brain learns to read and research-based teaching methods. The National Reading Panel (2000) identified five fundamental components of reading that can be found in our instruction. These are phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension.
To support student literacy, over 150 Independence staff members are participating in LETRS training based on Missouri's priority to build knowledge and skills to deliver systematic reading instruction.
More information on Missouri's literacy trainings can be found online here: https://dese.mo.gov/literacy
What Is Word Study?
Word study is a foundational reading skill. It involves studying the relationship between sounds and written language.
Word study focuses not on memorization, but on helping students see the regularities, patterns, word origin, and meaning of words.
Word study teaches students how to use word knowledge strategically to:
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support their writing
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help them decode unknown words
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understand word parts
Students work with weekly patterns during their word study block.
What Are Heart Words?
Heart Words are words that do not seem to fit a regular pattern.
Examples of heart words are said, are, and where.
Some part of the word will have to be learned by heart. When we teach this way, readers are no longer asked to memorize the whole word but rather to pay attention to the parts that make sense and the parts that do not make sense.
Check out this video to see it in action: Heart Word SAID
What Is Morphology?
Morphemes are the smallest meaningful parts of words. Morphology is the study of those meaningful parts.
When we focus on morphemes, we learn prefixes, root words, and suffixes. We also learn Greek and Latin roots to explain the way words are spelled and how roots affect their meaning.
For example, the word intersection:
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The prefix inter means between
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The Latin root sect means to cut
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The suffix tion makes the word an action word
How Do Students Learn Vocabulary?
Vocabulary is vital to the development of reading comprehension. Vocabulary refers to understanding words in the context of reading.
Students learn new words through:
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reading
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listening to read-alouds
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having conversations
How Do Students Develop Fluency?
Fluency includes accuracy, rate, and expression when reading.
Students need to be able to decode words automatically and with expression. Fluency is the bridge between word recognition and comprehension.
How Is Comprehension Developed?
Comprehension is how readers understand what they read. This is the ultimate goal for all readers.
Oral language and background knowledge and experiences help younger students grow as they work on word recognition at the same time.
What Can Families Do at Home?
Get Free Books for Your Home
Missouri families can now participate in Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library, a program that provides free books to young children across the state. Through a statewide partnership led by the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE), every child in Missouri from birth to age five is eligible to receive a free, high-quality book mailed directly to their home each month.
Since its inception, Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library has gifted more than 170 million books to children around the world, helping build early literacy skills and a lifelong love of reading.
To learn more or enroll your child, visit: https://www.isdschools.org/imagination-library/
Reading Assessments by Grade
| Grade | Time Frame | Assessments |
| Kindergarten | Fall, Winter, Spring | STAR Early Literacy, Letter Sounds, Phoneme Segmentation, LETRS Spelling Screener |
| 1st Grade | Fall, Winter, Spring | STAR Early Literacy, Phoneme Segmentation, Fluency, LETRS Spelling Screener |
| 2nd - 5th Grades | Fall, Winter, Spring | STAR Reading, Fluency, LETRS Spelling Screener |
Click here to learn more about Assessments in the ISD.