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English Language Arts

21st Century Curriculum Design in ACPS Content and Program Areas: English Language Arts

Students in classroom Ideally, a 21st Century student will be able to communicate using a range of critical, creative, and self-regulated media and methods. Our students should be able to think, read, write, listen, and speak in a way that expresses both who they are and how they are connected to their world. Because of teachers' use of engaging and interactive instructional practices, students will perceive reading and writing as avenues for pleasure, connection, and meaningful self-expression.

Key Curriculum Design and Learning Principles for English Language Arts:

  • As a result of participating in an effective English Language Arts curriculum, students will become effective critical, creative, and self-regulated learners. They will be able to analyze problems and tasks, synthesize effective solutions, evaluate situations using viable criteria, and pose/answer questions generated in response to text and life situations.
  • All learners will engage in ongoing critical and analytical reading in response to a variety of genres from a variety of eras.
  • Curriculum should support students to become effective consumers and analysts of informational/non-fiction text.
  • Such a curriculum shall also ensure that students can write effectively for a specific audience for a specific purpose.
  • Students shall respond to multiple rhetorical domains (e.g., narrative, expository/informational, argumentative/persuasive) via multiple forms of expression, including writing in print and electronic formats.
  • English Language Arts shall prepare every student for success in the constantly changing world of work in the 21st Century, including such higher-order reasoning processes as synthesizing and summarizing, problem solving, decision making, and related habits of mind.
  • Students shall learn to use research as a life-long process to investigate questions and issues, and use a range of valid resources to discover answers and solutions.
  • As a result of their experiences in English/Language Arts, students will use complex academic vocabulary to express themselves and communicate with others concisely, clearly, and accurately.
  • They will also learn to adjust voice, tone, and language to accommodate specific audiences and contexts, including understanding when to use specific forms and levels of English (e.g., Standard English).
  • Students will also employ technology as a critical consumer, using a range of thinking and communication skills to assess the reliability and validity of sources and to access and synthesize information.