Grade 4 English Language Arts
What your child will
learn
What your child
will do
What you will see
(products)
How you can help
• Put the important story events in order
and understand how the incidents are
connected
• Find important details in a story or
passage.
• Tell what a story or passage is mostly
about
• Make predictions and draw conclusions
• Use text features (such as graphs and illustrations)
to help with understanding
• Retell a story with the important events in
order
• Ask questions and participate in discussions
about stories or passages
• Summarize what has been read
• Make predictions and draw conclusions
using clues from the story or passage
• Written retellings and summaries
• Plays and performances based on readings
• Projects, timelines, charts, and illustrations
that show understanding of works that
were read
• Help your child read and follow instructions
to make a handmade craft or play a game
• Ask your child to retell a favorite story, TV
show, or movie in order
• Take your child to the library and check out
books together
• Let your child see you reading
• Strategies to help him/her figure out unknown
words
• Choose books that he/she can read independently
• Read common high-frequency words
• Reread familiar stories or passages to build
reading fluency
• Read materials on fourth grade level
• Read at about 120 words per minute (by
the end of the year)
• Read high frequency words
• Read aloud correctly and with expressions
• Read silently from chapter books for an
extended period of time
• Read aloud to entertain others
• Reread the same passage multiple times
to improve the quality of the reading
• Poems, passages, and selections from
stories or plays to practice reading
• High frequency word lists for practice
• Charts of words read per minute
• Time your child to see how many words
he/she can read in one minute
• Listen to your child read aloud
• Read aloud to your child
• Tape your child while he/she is reading
(audio or video)
• Continue to learn new words and their meanings
while reading
• Learn word parts that help the reader figure out
word meanings (such as un-, -able, -less)
• Understand that some words have more than
one meaning
• Use clues the author puts in a story (such as definitions
or examples) to figure out unknown words
• Use word parts to help figure out word meanings
• Choose the correct meaning of a multiple-meaning
word using clues and dictionary definitions
• Word maps and drawings that show word meanings
• Word lists (such as word parts and their common
meanings)
• Personal dictionaries, notebooks, or vocabulary
folders
• Ask your child to explain the meanings of unfamiliar
words when you are reading together
• Help your child use clues to figure out the meanings
of words
• Help your child practice word lists at home
• Encourage your child to pay attention to new and
interesting words
• Write journals, descriptions, letters, narrative
essays, book reports
• Plan stories before writing using webs,
maps, or charts
• Write stories about real events
• Conduct research using three or more
sources
• Use correct capitalization, punctuation,
and spelling
• Find and correct mistakes in his/her own
writing
• Practice writing to a narrative prompt within
a specific time frame
• Write stories about real life
• Write an I-Search report using three or more
sources
• Use webs, maps, or charts to plan stories
• Evaluate work using the Tennessee Writing
Rubric
• Webs or charts for planning a story
• Stories that are easy for the reader to
understand
• Corrections made by the student to his/her
own work
• Encourage your child to write letters to family
or friends
• Help your child plan and write a story
• Provide writing materials