WGU D668: Elementary Literacy Curriculum

What D668 Elementary Literacy Curriculum Is Really About

D668 Elementary Literacy Curriculum is a School of Education course at Western Governors University that deepens your understanding of how young children learn to read and write, and how to build classroom curriculum that supports that growth. According to WGU's course description, it explores the science of reading and writing, key theories and research behind literacy development, and the foundational components teachers work with every day: phonological awareness, phonics, word analysis, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. You also learn to evaluate diverse instructional resources and to use purposeful oral, written, and digital communication in an elementary setting.

Direct answer: To pass D668, ground yourself in the five pillars of literacy and the science of reading, then practice applying them the way the course asks: on the objective assessment know the terminology and the research cold, and on the performance task follow the rubric line by line, aligning every instructional choice to standards and to a stated literacy skill. Study for understanding, not memorization, and you will be ready.

You will typically encounter this course inside WGU's Bachelor of Arts in Elementary Education, the Educational Studies degree, and related teaching programs. It matters because literacy is the foundation of nearly everything else an elementary student does. The habits you build here, using evidence-based reading instruction and designing coherent, standards-aligned lessons, carry directly into your demonstration teaching and your first classroom.

Topics the Assessment Covers

Based on WGU's published description and the emphasis of the course, plan to be comfortable with:

• The science of reading — the research base explaining how the brain learns to read and why systematic, explicit instruction works.
• Phonological and phonemic awareness — hearing and manipulating the sounds in spoken words as a precursor to decoding.
• Phonics and word analysis — the letter-sound relationships and structural patterns students use to decode and spell.
• Fluency — accuracy, rate, and expression, and why fluency bridges decoding and comprehension.
• Vocabulary — direct and indirect approaches to word learning across the curriculum.
• Comprehension — strategies that help students construct meaning from text.
• Curriculum design and standards alignment — building coherent literacy plans tied to state or Common Core standards.
• Evaluating resources and purposeful communication — judging instructional materials and using oral, written, and digital communication intentionally.

How Hard It Is and How Long to Budget

Difficulty is personal, but many students report that D668 is manageable when they respect both halves of it. The content itself is intuitive for anyone drawn to elementary teaching, yet the course pairs an objective assessment with a performance task, so you are asked to both know the theory and produce polished, rubric-aligned work. Students who already have classroom or tutoring experience with young readers often move faster; those newer to literacy instruction should expect the science-of-reading vocabulary to take real study.

A realistic plan is a few focused weeks. If you can commit steady study time, many learners complete the course in roughly three to five weeks, sometimes faster with prior experience. Treat that as a guideline, not a promise: your pace depends on your background and how much writing the performance task asks of you. Because this course sits alongside other literacy work in the education programs, ideas from courses like D696 Foundations of Literacy Through Literature and D689 Literacy Assessment and Interventions will reinforce one another.

A Study Plan Built for This Course

Because D668 has an objective and a performance component, split your preparation deliberately.

• Build a terminology map first. The science of reading has precise language. Make active-recall flashcards for terms like phonemic awareness, orthographic mapping, morphology, and fluency, and quiz yourself until definitions come without hesitation. Recall practice beats rereading.
• Use spaced repetition. Revisit your hardest cards every day for a week, then space them out. The five literacy pillars are easy to confuse under pressure, so short daily reviews lock them in better than one long cram session.
• Practice with scenarios. For the objective assessment, don't just memorize definitions; ask yourself which instructional move fits a given student situation. Turn each pillar into a "what would you teach and why" question and answer it aloud.
• Read the performance-task rubric before you write a word. Print or copy the rubric and treat each row as a checklist item. WGU evaluators score against those specific aspects, so a plan that hits every one is far likelier to pass on the first submission.
• Anchor every instructional choice. In your curriculum plan, tie each activity to a named literacy skill and to a specific standard. Evaluators look for that explicit alignment, not just good-sounding lessons.
• Draft early and use the course instructor. WGU course instructors will look at drafts and answer questions. Submitting a rough plan for feedback before your final upload catches gaps while they are still cheap to fix.

Where Students Trip Up

A few patterns show up again and again in this kind of course:

• Confusing the pillars. Phonological awareness (sound) and phonics (sound-to-letter) are easy to blur. Keep a one-line distinction for each pillar and quiz it.
• Writing to the rubric loosely. A thoughtful plan can still fail if it skips a required element. Address every rubric aspect by name and in order.
• Vague standards alignment. Saying a lesson "supports reading" is not enough; cite the specific standard and the specific skill.
• Underestimating the objective assessment. Some students focus only on the project and are surprised by the exam's vocabulary and research questions. Prepare for both.
• Ignoring the "why." The course is rooted in evidence. Explaining the research reasoning behind a choice reads far stronger than describing an activity alone.

D668 Readiness Checklist

Before you sit the objective assessment or submit the performance task, ask yourself:

• Can you define and clearly distinguish all five literacy pillars in your own words?
• Can you explain, at a high level, what the science of reading says about how children learn to read?
• Can you match a student's difficulty to the right area of instruction (for example, decoding versus comprehension)?
• Can you name the standard and the literacy skill behind each activity in your curriculum plan?
• Can you point to where your submission satisfies every row of the performance-task rubric?
• Can you justify your instructional choices with research reasoning, not just description?
• Have you had at least one draft reviewed, by a course instructor or a peer, before final submission?
• Can you evaluate an instructional resource and say why it is or isn't appropriate for your learners?

D668 FAQ

Is D668 an objective assessment or a performance assessment?

Publicly available study resources indicate D668 includes both an objective assessment and a performance task. Always confirm the exact requirements in your own WGU course of study, since programs occasionally update how a course is delivered.

How long does D668 usually take?

Many students report finishing in roughly three to five weeks of steady work, with prior classroom experience shortening that. Your pace depends on your background and how much the performance task asks you to write.

What should I study first?

Start with the five pillars of literacy and the core science-of-reading vocabulary. Those concepts underpin both the objective questions and the reasoning you'll show in your curriculum plan.

How do I make the performance task pass on the first try?

Work directly from the rubric, address every scored aspect explicitly, align each instructional choice to a standard and a skill, and get a draft reviewed by your course instructor before submitting.

Does experience teaching help?

Yes. Students with tutoring or classroom exposure to young readers often find the applied portions faster, because the concepts connect to things they've seen. If you're newer, budget extra time for the terminology.

Where can I get official information about the course?

Check your WGU course of study and the program page for the Elementary Education bachelor's program. For related prep on this site, see D171 Curriculum, Instruction, and Assessment, browse the School of Education hub, or the full guide index.