Literacy Plan

The Owatonna Public School District is dedicated to providing all students with the educational foundation necessary to succeed in school and life. To ensure student success, the district sets high standards that are reflected in what is taught in each classroom. The intended curriculum, or the written curriculum, is what we expect each student to know, understand, and be able to do in each curricular area and at each grade level. Our intended curriculum is driven by state standards, national standards, and local practices. 

The K-6 curriculum is aligned to and supports the Common Core state standards. The Owatonna School District utilizes enduring understandings to allow for the delivery of essential content. These standards are aligned vertically. Learning targets have been derived from these enduring understandings, describing specifically what a student should know and be able to do as a result of daily instruction or learning experiences. In addition, curriculum maps for language arts (grades K-5) organize content in a sequential & research-based manner, while still allowing for differentiation models to be implemented in all classrooms.

Owatonna Public Schools inspires a community of learners with equitable access to high quality, innovative learning opportunities ensuring all students are college, career and life ready. Today’s students are increasingly more diverse in their cultures, languages, abilities, interests and learning styles. As educators, we are held accountable to ensure that all learners achieve state standards. Thus we must create classroom environments where student differences are supported and celebrated so that all students have the best opportunity to learn. We use the Culturally Responsive Educator Framework (CREF). The CREF is aligned with equitable strategies as part of a district-wide response to the need for culturally and linguistically responsive instruction:

• Cultural - emphasizes the human purpose of what is being learned and its relationship to the students' own culture.
• Equitable - respectful learning environments in which students’ racial and ethnic diversity is valued and contributes to successful academic outcomes.
• Achievement - includes multiple ways to represent knowledge and skills and allow for attainment of outcomes at different points in time.
• Responsive - through positive relationships, rigorous learning experiences are created involving higher order thinking and critical analysis.

Simply put, CREF is responding to the cultural diversity of students within instructional activities. To accomplish this, teachers must be culturally proficient in relating to their students. This knowledge of students is incorporated into curriculum, instruction and assessment in order to meet the needs of all learners.

We believe that the collaboration of classroom teachers, special education teachers, EL teachers, intervention teachers, teaching and learning coaches, talent development coordinator, and administrators is paramount to the success of all of our learners. Together, we can support our students in their varying needs.  

We will address academic language with all learners. Academic language is a meta-language that helps learners acquire the 50,000 words they are expected to have internalized by the end of high school and includes everything from illustration and chart literacy to speaking, grammar and genres within fields.

Think of academic language as the verbal clothing that we don in classrooms and other formal contexts to demonstrate cognition within cultures and to signal college readiness. There are two major kinds: instructional language ("What textual clues support your analysis?") and language of the discipline (examples include alliteration in language arts, axioms in math, class struggle in social studies and atoms in science). No student comes to school adept in academic discourse - thus, thoughtful instruction is required.

Communication with parents about student’s learning progress happens on an ongoing basis throughout the year. The Local Literacy Plan is uploaded to MDE, posted on the district website, and made available each fall to key stakeholders.

Date Submitted to Commissioner June
Submitted By
Julie Sullivan, Director of Teaching and Learning
Kelly Kruger, Teaching and Learning Coordinator, Local Literacy Lead
Kenneth Griswold, Data and Assessment Coordinator