Intermountain Christian School Elementary Reading Program
For families looking for a private Christian school near Salt Lake City, Intermountain Christian School is known for an intentional culture of literacy across grade levels. From early phonics and fluency to upper-elementary comprehension, writing, and speaking, we help students become confident readers within a Christ-centered environment. At ICS, students are taught to meet—and often exceed—the Utah Core Standards.
Utah Reading Benchmarks and Trends
Across Utah's public-school system, the reading picture is mixed. In the state's official early literacy reporting, 46.5% of students were reading on grade level, and 68.2% were making typical or better progress. At the same time, the Utah State Board of Education reported that Utah's 2024 eighth-grade NAEP reading score fell four points from 2022, while fourth-grade reading remained unchanged, showing that reading growth remains a statewide challenge.
Utah public education leaders are actively trying to improve these results. The state says it is expanding resources for reading programs, emphasizing evidence-based literacy practices, providing targeted training, and tracking progress more closely through efforts outlined in the USBE release and Utah's P-12 Literacy Framework.
That public-school context matters. Utah's P-12 Literacy Framework says only 46% of Utah's third graders and 42% of eighth graders score proficient in reading, and it calls literacy "the most fundamental skill and the gateway to knowledge and lifelong learning."
Recent Deseret News reporting on Utah K-3 literacy adds more public-school context: in 2025, 53.3% of kindergarteners, 48.2% of first graders, 48.7% of second graders, and 50.3% of third graders met grade-level expectations, underscoring why strong early instruction and intervention matter so much.
Against that statewide public-school backdrop, ICS students already meet and often exceed Utah standards while also cultivating a genuine love of reading through strong instruction, intervention, and joyful literacy experiences.
The following article, written by ICS first-grade teacher Darah Doty, comes from our 2026 Lionheart Spring Newsletter.
How ICS Cultivates a Culture of Literacy at ICS
Reading is the bedrock of all other instruction. It has been said that reading is a discipline in search of content. Reading skills and strategies are required across content areas. When students read, the world becomes an open book, and our teachers ensure our students have the skills to discern what it is saying.
We love reading at ICS! Through all of the instruction and state standards, it is important to maintain the joy of reading. We want to impart the joy of reading. That’s something that cannot be taught, but is cultivated after years of instruction, amounting confidence, and community support. You can see the love of reading being imparted every day at ICS. Often, you’ll see students getting reading help in our halls, with their reading buddies, or begging our librarian for a book they heard in their classroom read-aloud. They share their library books when they get back to the classroom after checking them out as a “library celebration.” Reading is not just academic; it is fun!
We recognize the urgency and significance of reading instruction as central to our mission of equipping and inspiring students to thrive in God’s world. While our test scores show we are continually making gains and are well above state standards, we do not “teach the test”. We use the data from standardized testing to drive instruction, but we focus on incorporating best practices and our passion for learning into our instruction.
At ICS, we love literacy. Reading and writing are gifts, and we love to share them with our students. As Dr. Seuss says, “The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go.” Our prayer is that our students will go all over the world, equipped and inspired to thrive in God’s world.
Progression of Reading Across Elementary Grade Levels
Each upper elementary grade level has an opportunity for an in-depth project where students showcase literacy skills learned over the years, allowing them to read, write, and speak about their topic. (see timeline graphic)
PreK Celebrates literacy with a Little Lions reading hour each week and incorporates hands-on activities to increase comprehension of stories.
Focus: building decoding, fluency, comprehension, and writing skills.
K-2nd graders use multisensory techniques to reinforce skills, and are complemented with targeted instruction, both in the classroom and with our reading interventionist. We enjoy community support with parents regularly practicing fluency with our students.
Focus: phonics and phonemic awareness, and students are expected to write in all content areas
3rd graders research a historical figure, and the class creates a wax museum. They write out the information and then dress up like that person. As the community walks through, students tell museum visitors about their person.
4th graders research a state and then decorate a cookie that displays important landmarks and locations within that state. Students then present their information and answer questions from other grade levels as they walk through the stations, stopping at each one.
5th graders complete several projects throughout the year, including informational writing on the Revolutionary War and a science fair project that requires experimentation, writing, reading, and interpreting graphs, before presenting their findings to the class.
Focus: In 3rd-5th grade, the focus shifts from learning to read to reading to learn, increasing student vocabulary through grade-level texts, morphology instruction, and focusing on comprehension skills such as point of view, sequencing, theme, and cause and effect, which gives students the tools to interpret information.
Want Your Child to be a Lifelong Reader? Schedule a Tour Today!
If you're looking for a school where literacy is foundational to long-term academic growth, we'd love to show you what that looks like in person. Schedule an in-person or virtual campus tour to meet teachers, see classrooms in action, and learn how ICS helps students grow in reading, writing, and confidence.