Literacy and English Language Arts (221)
The five pillars and their order
Literacy items on 221 cluster around phonological and phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, comprehension, plus writing and language conventions. Know the progression: phonological awareness (rhyming, syllables, onset-rime) precedes phonemic awareness (isolating, blending, segmenting individual phonemes), which in turn supports phonics (mapping sounds to letters). Fluency rests on three legs - accuracy, rate, and prosody - and comprehension draws on both decoding and oral language knowledge, so a child with strong language but weak decoding and a child with the reverse need different instruction.
Traps
The biggest trap is confusing phonemic awareness with phonics. Phonemic awareness is oral and print-free; the moment letters appear, the task is phonics. A second trap: invented spelling is a predictable developmental stage, not an error to penalize. Third, "sight words" means words read automatically on sight, which includes many regular high-frequency words, not only irregular ones. Fourth, a comprehension strategy (predicting, summarizing) is a deliberate tool the reader chooses, distinct from a skill practiced to automaticity.
Worked example
A kindergartner hears "sun," says "/s/ /u/ /n/," but cannot locate the word on a page. That is segmenting - phonemic awareness - without letter-sound mapping. Rule of thumb: eyes on print, it's phonics; ears only, it's phonological awareness.