Language Arts Development (LAD) is designed to be a course that supports students in areas of reading, writing, vocabulary development, and critical thinking. Along with this course, students take a grade-level college preparatory English class. This course will help students become aware of their strengths and areas of growth in English through one-on- one conferencing, continual assessment of progress, self-reflection, technology-integrated lessons, group work, critical reading, vocabulary development, and process essay writing. Throughout the year, we will explore our essential questions and discover how critical it is to truly “know” academic language and use it properly in our everyday lives. We will also become confident writers who know how to make assertions and support those arguments with continual evidence. The constant access to academic words, the language of different genres, and examples of excellent writing will help us improve our English skills and become “high level thinkers as we progress through the year.