Pennington Publishing Blog

Should teachers use worksheets to teach and practice literacy knowledge? Yes! If you’re familiar with the science of reading and Dr. Scarborough’s famous reading rope, you might recall that literacy knowledge is listed as a key component of the upper language comprehension strand of the rope (the lower strand is word recognition). Literacy knowledge refers to a reader and writer’s knowledge of genre, such as a mystery novel or argumentative essay. Literacy knowledge also refers to literary elements featured in those genre, such as metaphors or personification. Finally, literary knowledge refers to text features, literary and poetic devices and structures, such as theme or expository paragraph organization.

But doesn’t literacy knowledge best lend itself to direct, explicit, whole-class instruction? I would agree, but students best understand retain what they are learning through targeted practice. Often a teacher will use novels, short stories, or articles to teach genre, literary elements, text features and structures. A conscientious teacher may have time to teach a dozen genre in a given year; however, to build literacy knowledge many more are necessary to explore. Targeted independent worksheets provide the best means of providing comprehensive instruction and practice on the breadth of literacy knowledge.

And, despite what we’ve been told to believe, there’s nothing bad about a good worksheet! Check out what Dr. Tim Shanahan, Professor Emeritus University of Chicago and Research Lead on the National Reading Panel, has to say…

Like most professors, I have long looked askance at worksheets and their role in reading instruction (though I had relied upon them as a teacher). These newer studies (e.g., Amendum, et al., 2024), suggest that they are not as bad as we have been led to believe (Taylor, et al., 2005). Good teachers often use a mix of direct instruction along with some practice sheets.

The study Dr. Shanahan refers to (Amendum, et al., 2024) “…was a correlational study, which identified how time was spent in classrooms and its relationship to learning to read. It found that the most effective teachers were using a combination of authentic texts and worksheets, etc. Unlike in some past studies, there was no particular benefit to using one type of material over another — in other words, they did see some learning gains due to use of seatwork (worksheet) activities” (Shanahan’s Comments).

Of course we all believe that direct, explicit, whole-class instruction should be our priority, but some small group and individualized work is necessary to differentiate instruction, and it certainly makes sense that the independent worksheets and/or activities we use in our classrooms can help maximize learning.

I’ve found that independent practice, targeted to specific, diagnostically assessed literacy deficits, gets the best results. And worksheet practice should conclude with formative assessment to determine mastery of the practiced concept or skill.

Literacy Knowledge is particularly well-suited to diagnostic differentiation and independent practice. My affordable program includes a short diagnostic, concise definitions, clear examples, and connected reading and writing practice. You don’t need to teach an entire novel to teach the science fiction genre. Here are 20 literary genre with all the grade-level standards dealing with text features, literary and poetic devices and structures. I invite you to check out the entire affordable program. Grades 4 on up.

Targeted Independent Practice

My Targeted Independent Practice series supports teachers with quality assessment-based independent learning. Each program includes 1. A comprehensive diagnostic assessment to determine student needs 2. Targeted worksheets corresponding to the specific diagnostic test components 3. Formative assessments to determine mastery. View each program in its entirety.

*** Reading Fluency and Comprehension

*** Spelling

*** Phonics

*** Grammar, Usage, and Mechanics

*** Literacy Knowledge

*** Executive Function and Study Skills

Not sure if your students need interventions? Download the free Targeted Independent Practice Diagnostic Assessments and let the data inform your instructional decision-making.

Grammar/Mechanics genre, literary devices, poetic devices, structures, text features, text structure

Language Comprehension

Literacy knowledge refers to how language and text are organized to communicate.

“We have long known that students benefit from instruction in common structures and elements of narrative or story text (e.g.,  identifying  characters, setting, goal, problem, events, resolution, and theme; e.g., Fitzgerald & Spiegel, 1983). With respect to informational text, meta-analyses (quantitative studies of many studies) have also documented positive impacts (Hebert, Bohaty, & Nelson, 2016; Pyle et al., 2017).”

Nell K. Duke, Alessandra E. Ward, P. David Pearson, 2021 

Children begin acquiring literacy knowledge even before their first “Once upon a time…” story. Children from literate households learn a wealth of background literacy knowledge even before they begin to read. Through print and media, children are exposed to story structure, character development, and the elements of plot. Moreover, students experience different kinds of narratives, such as fairy tales, poems, and songs—many of which include sensory/descriptive writing.

In addition to narrative and sensory descriptive genre, children also learn expository structures and their components. For example, when a parent tells a child the agenda for the day such as “First, we will finish our breakfast; next, you will brush your teeth; afterwards, you will put on your backpack…,” the child learn sequential organization and key sequence and number transitions.

Because older students in reading intervention classes often have missed out on many pre-reading learning experiences, the reading intervention teacher has gaps in literacy background knowledge to fill to help their students access prior knowledge when reading different types of text.

Language Comprehension Literacy Knowledge is one of seven key components in the upper strand of Scarborough’s Reading Rope. The 47 Literacy Knowledge lessons, included in The Science of Reading Intervention Program: Language Comprehension, serve as a crash course in text structures, literary elements, sentence functions, and genres for your students. Students will learn to identify (read) and apply (write] narrative and sensory/descriptive text structures and literary elements. Students will also learn to identify (read) and apply (write] expository and argumentative text structures and sentence functions in a wide variety of genre to improve reading comprehension. Each lesson takes about 35 minutes to complete.

The narrative and sensory/descriptive lessons are provided first, followed by the expository and argumentative lessons, but the teacher may decide to pick and choose. Some of the lessons build upon previous lessons, but others are stand-alone. 

The teacher introduces each lesson; students complete guided practice with correction and review; and students complete the lesson with independent practice, which serves as the formative assessment. Answers included.
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Language Comprehension

Reading background knowledge, genre, language comprehension, literacy knowledge, literary elements, prior knowledge, text structure