To improve their reading skills students will learn how to link prior knowledge to what they are reading, how to determine if information is a first or second hand account, will practice reading nonfiction, and will learn how to make predictions about what will happen next in a story. Through writing practice students will improve their abilities to paraphrase, write essays, construct a story from idea to finished product, write a play, and write a persuasive essay. Students will be encouraged to visualize what they are reading and writing about, to make connections between stories, and to ask questions about what they read.