Barkley Bridge Elementary School

The Alabama Reading Initiative is a K-12 comprehensive strategy to bring the best research on reading instruction and the best teaching practices to classrooms in Alabama. The primary method is intensive, research-based professional development for teachers. The Alabama Reading Initiative is targeted on three fronts:

1. Strengthening reading instruction in the early grades;
2. Continuously expanding all students’ reading power and comprehension levels
3. Intervening effectively with struggling readers.

ARI’s balanced approach to reading instruction requires a highly skilled teacher. It builds teachers’ capacities by giving them access to the latest research, many practical demonstration lessons, and ongoing support. Barkley Bridge is a part of the Alabama Reading Initiative. We have a full-time ARI funded Reading Coach on site who provides professional development and support to teachers, as well as students. 

Barkley Bridge Elementary strives to accomplish these goals by providing the most EFFECTIVE approach to literacy instruction:

To reach ALL students, many reading experts recommend a STRUCTURED literacy approach, which is an explicit and systematic way of helping students take apart the sounds of words. We use the NEW Saxon Phonics & Spelling Curriculum, in addition to authentic literature, to ensure ALL students receive this structured, systematic, and explicit instruction in grades K-3, which includes:

• Phonology: Study of the sound structure of spoken words, which includes rhyming.
• Sound-symbol association: Connecting sounds with letters or groups of letters. Often called phonics.
• Syllable instruction: Helping readers divide unfamiliar words.
• Morphology: Study of the smallest units of meaning, such as base words, roots, prefixes and suffixes.
• Syntax: Grammar, sentence variation and the mechanics of language.
• Semantics: Meaning of words and reading comprehension.