WGU D670: Elementary Literacy Methods

What D670 Really Asks of You

D670: Elementary Literacy Methods sits in WGU's School of Education, and it is one of the courses where the university stops asking whether you know the theory and starts asking whether you can teach. Most students meet it while working toward elementary education licensure, often after foundational coursework on child development and the science of reading. The course centers on how children in the upper elementary grades build reading comprehension: how they acquire vocabulary, how they make meaning from real text, and how reading and writing feed each other.

Direct answer: D670 is a performance assessment, not a proctored multiple-choice exam, so you pass by submitting a literacy lesson plan and written explanation that satisfies every line of the rubric. Read the task instructions and the rubric side by side, choose one strong, appropriately complex text early, and write so that each rubric aspect has an obvious, labeled home in your document. Submissions usually come back for revision because something was implied rather than stated, not because the teaching was wrong.

That distinction matters more than anything else in this course. There is no cramming strategy here and no bank of facts to memorize. The evaluator is reading your work as a piece of professional practice: does this lesson use evidence-based comprehension instruction, is the text worth the class time it consumes, is vocabulary taught deliberately rather than assumed, and does the writing component genuinely connect to the reading? If you have taught before, some of this will feel intuitive. If you have not, expect the challenge to be less about literacy content and more about the discipline of documenting your thinking in the exact form the rubric expects.

Students often pair D670 with other education coursework such as D184: Standards-Based Assessment and D630: Designing Curriculum and Instruction I, and the habits transfer directly — all three reward precise alignment between standards, instruction, and evidence of learning. You can browse the rest of the program in our School of Education hub.

The Literacy Territory the Task Covers

Publicly circulating task descriptions and student accounts point consistently to the same cluster of literacy topics. Expect to work with:

• Text selection and text complexity — choosing a high-quality text suited to the developmental level of upper elementary readers (students commonly report a grades 4-6 general education context) and justifying that choice against the structured text-quality framework your task names, rather than personal preference.
• Evidence-based comprehension strategies — instruction such as questioning, summarizing, monitoring for meaning, using text structure, and building background knowledge, applied to a specific passage rather than described in the abstract.
• Vocabulary acquisition — deliberate, explicit teaching of words drawn from the text, including how you decide which words merit instruction (tier-two academic vocabulary is a frequent choice) and how students practice them in context.
• The reciprocal relationship between reading and writing — designing writing that grows out of the reading and deepens comprehension, not a tacked-on worksheet.
• Explicit instruction structure — modeling, guided practice, and independent application laid out in a clear instructional sequence, usually on a supplied lesson plan template.
• Standards alignment and differentiation — connecting the lesson to a grade-level literacy standard and adjusting for the range of learners in a general education classroom.
• Formative and summative assessment — describing how you will know whether students actually learned what you set out to teach.

Because WGU periodically revises course tasks, treat this as an orientation rather than a specification. The live task instructions, template, and rubric inside your course of study are the only authority on what is required this term.

Difficulty and How Long It Actually Takes

Many students report D670 as moderate: conceptually approachable, but heavier on writing time than they expected. Practicing teachers and long-time classroom aides often move quickly because lesson planning is already familiar. Students with no teaching background more commonly describe two to four weeks of steady work, with the first draft taking the longest and revisions after evaluator feedback being comparatively fast. Treat those figures as student-reported consensus, not a rule.

The most useful planning assumption is that the thinking is short and the drafting is long. Selecting a text and sketching the instructional arc might take an evening. Turning that sketch into a document that addresses every rubric aspect explicitly, in professional prose, is where the hours go. Students who budget a couple of focused sessions per week and submit for evaluation well before their term ends rarely feel squeezed.

Building the Submission in Five Passes

Work in passes rather than trying to write a finished document straight through.

Pass one — decode the rubric. Copy the rubric into your own document and turn each aspect into a question you must answer. This one habit prevents most revision requests. Where the rubric uses a specific term, use that same term as a heading in your draft so the evaluator never has to hunt.

Pass two — choose your text. Pick something you can actually access and reread several times, at a complexity level defensible for the grade band your task specifies. Write your justification while the text is fresh. A text you find genuinely interesting will produce better vocabulary and comprehension decisions than one you chose because it was short.

Pass three — draft the instruction. Build the lesson in the explicit-instruction sequence: what you model, what students practice with support, what they do independently. Name the comprehension strategy you are teaching and show it operating on your specific text, with the actual questions you would ask.

Pass four — audit with active recall. Close your draft and, from memory, list the rubric aspects and how you addressed each. Anything you cannot recall is probably underdeveloped on the page. Then reopen and check. Spacing this audit a day or two after drafting catches far more than reading immediately after writing.

Pass five — use the real support. Lean on the course of study materials, any cohort or webinar sessions your instructor offers, and instructor feedback on a partial draft when it is available. That feedback is the closest thing to a practice test this course has. Avoid third-party sites selling completed tasks or filled-in templates — submitting someone else's work is an academic integrity violation and will follow you much further than a revision request ever would. WGU publishes its academic policies on the official university site.

Where Submissions Usually Go Wrong

• Implying instead of stating. Your lesson may be excellent, but an evaluator can only score what is written. If the rubric asks you to explain why a strategy is appropriate, write that explanation in plain sentences.
• A text chosen for convenience. A passage that is too simple or too thin gives you nothing to teach, and the vocabulary and comprehension sections collapse around it.
• Generic strategy talk. Describing summarizing in general terms rather than showing summarizing applied to your chosen passage is the single most common weakness.
• Writing that is bolted on. A writing activity unconnected to the reading misses the reciprocal relationship the task is built around.
• Ignoring the exact task wording. Grade band, learner population, and lesson type are constraints, not suggestions.
• Leaving template sections blank. If the task supplies a lesson plan template, every field is scoreable real estate.
• Waiting too long to submit. Revision cycles take days. Submit early enough that a second round is comfortable rather than frantic.

D670 Readiness Checklist

• Can you state, in one sentence, what students will be able to do at the end of your lesson?
• Can you justify your text choice using the framework your task specifies, not just personal taste?
• Can you name the comprehension strategy you are teaching and show it working on your actual passage?
• Can you explain why you selected each vocabulary word rather than picking hard-looking words at random?
• Can you point to the exact paragraph in your draft that satisfies each rubric aspect?
• Can you describe how the writing task deepens the reading, not merely follows it?
• Can you identify the grade-level standard your lesson addresses and how your assessment measures it?
• Can you say how you would support a struggling reader and extend for an advanced one within this same lesson?
• Have you proofread aloud and confirmed that every required template section is complete?

D670 FAQ

Is D670 an objective assessment or a performance assessment?

It is a performance assessment. You submit written work — a literacy lesson plan with supporting explanation — rather than sitting a proctored multiple-choice exam. Confirm the current task structure in your course of study, since WGU revises tasks periodically.

How hard is D670 compared with other education courses?

Many students describe it as moderate. The literacy content is approachable, but the rubric is detailed and rewards precise, explicit writing. Students with classroom experience generally report finishing faster.

How long should I plan for?

Student consensus tends to land around two to four weeks of steady part-time work, with experienced teachers moving faster. Build in time for at least one revision cycle after evaluator feedback.

What should I do if my submission is returned?

Read the evaluator comments literally and revise what they flag, addressing each point with explicit new language. Returned submissions are routine at WGU and carry no penalty — treat the feedback as a map to the finish line.

Can I use a text I already teach or love?

Often yes, as long as it meets your task's requirements for quality, complexity, and grade band. Verify against the task instructions before you invest hours planning around it.

What other WGU courses pair well with D670?

Assessment-focused and curriculum-design courses reinforce the same alignment skills. Our guides to D293: Assessment and Learning Analytics and D702: Elementary Health and Physical Education Methods cover neighboring territory, and the full catalog lives in our study guide index.