Our TEKS-aligned, adapted core curriculum, along with our supporting interventions, challenge your students with the appropriate level of rigor while promoting independence, employability and community access to succeed in a post-secondary setting.
Placing equity and inclusion at the forefront of education, our K-12 TEKS-aligned, adapted core curriculum, enCORE, sets our most complex learners in Texas up to experience academic AND personal success:
The tools we offer at TeachTown directly align with the Texas Education Agency’s strategic plan and provide schools in Texas with a measurable, whole-child education for students with moderate to severe disabilities from early childhood through the transition years.
*Pictured above includes comprehensive data from TX schools using TeachTown in the 2023-2024 academic school year.
TeachTown’s enCORE ensures:
TeachTown Benchmark Assessments include 190 assessments (average 10-15 items each) across ELA, Math, & Early Learning skills. Specifically designed to help you monitor your students’ progress on an individual skill over time and show growth, we recommend teachers administer benchmark assessments 3 times per school year: beginning of year, middle of year, and end of year.
All benchmark assessments are available in 3 formats: as printable PDFs, teacher-facilitated technology lessons, & student-led technology lessons. Each individual assessment includes 3 different forms (A, B, C) to ensure test validity as students retest on a skill over time.
TeachTown Benchmark Assessments include reports that provide the raw score, percentage, and item analysis and direct you to the units in enCORE that will drive progress on students’ skill levels.
Texas teachers using TeachTown now have even more tools to provide data-driven, personalized instruction and develop strong IEP goals and maintain compliance!
Bonus: The Benchmark Assessments within enCORE can provide Texas educators with the student growth data needed to be qualify for the Teacher Incentive Allotment (TIA).
This is the front cover of one ELA Benchmark Assessment
This is an example of one assessment item for the Letter-Sound ID Benchmark Assessment
This is the front cover of one Math Benchmark Assessment
This is an example of one assessment item for the Adding Fractions with Like Denominators Benchmark Assessment
TeachTown supports Texas Education Agency’s strategic plan, which outlines 4 areas of focus that will further enhance student outcomes among the 5M+ students in Texas:
With a primary focus in TX pointing to literacy and reading comprehension among students, the 5 tenets of the Science of Reading have been systematically embedded into the ELA domain of enCORE, from Kindergarten through the transition years:
Data from over 250 TX schools indicates impressive student growth, with a nearly 66% student growth rate between pre- and post-test scores in elementary, middle, and high school.
enCORE targets the Texas TEKs via socially and developmentally-appropriate, research-based instruction. Offering a strategic blend of hands-on, teacher-led instruction and technology-facilitated lessons, every single unit and lesson segment in enCORE is structured to flow through a gradual release of responsibility, guiding students from exposure to mastery.
Supporting personalized instruction and automated data collection aligned to your students’ IEPs and skill levels, Texas special educators can run reports in enCORE at any time to analyze student progress, monitor growth toward IEP goals, assess mastery of specific learning objectives and more.
Take a look at real data from your own Texas peers below.
Monthly Lessons Mastered by District
Monthly Lessons Mastered by District
Student Performance on Sight Word Spelling
Like you, we are deeply committed to our students’ academic and personal success with moderate to severe disabilities. We support Texas special educators every step of the way with ongoing professional development, including:
TeachTown is the umbrella name for all of our programs. Depending on what your district has purchased for you, you will have access to one or more programs from our suite. The complete list of programs includes:
enCORE is an award-winning K-12 standards-based, adapted core curriculum for students with moderate to severe disabilities. It includes leveled, differentiated content across English Language Arts, Math, Science and Social Studies and includes content to fill all instructional time in these areas. enCORE incorporates traditional lesson plans as well as technology-based instruction to provide equity and accessibility to all students.
Through interactive content, visuals, illustration and storytelling, our adapted core curriculum enCORE represents the diversity and multiculturalism of the population of students it serves. Bonus – student engagement and knowledge retention skyrockets as a result!
enCORE’s advanced blended learning model includes hands-on, teacher-led lessons and technology-facilitated, individualized student-led lessons. Our teacher guides, student workbooks, adapted reading library and hands-on manipulatives and materials bring ease and efficiency to the lives of teachers.
enCORE Elementary is designed to serve students in grades K-5. This curriculum includes 36 units of instruction (18 units for K-2, and 18 units for 3-5) across ELA, Math, Science, and Social Studies. Each unit contains a fiction and associated nonfiction book that anchors the instruction across all four domains. Lessons are completely scripted and differentiated with 3 levels of support for all students.
enCORE Middle School serves students in grades 6-8 and includes 27 units of instruction. Each unit contains an adapted chapter book and two corresponding companion texts. Science content covers Earth Science, Life Science, and Physical Science. Social Studies includes U.S. History, World History, Civics, and Government.
enCORE High School launched in 2022 for students in grades 9-12 and all lessons include high school-appropriate coursework, an expanded adapted library, and opportunities to work on transition skills.
Yes. According to the Science of Reading, phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and text comprehension are all necessary components of becoming a skilled reader – which is why each of these are systematically embedded into the ELA domain of enCORE, from kindergarten through the transition years.
Phonemic awareness: enCORE Elementary includes age-appropriate phonemic awareness activities to support students learning to identify & manipulate individual sounds in words. Includes rhyming skills and follows a developmental progression.
Phonics: Each unit of enCORE K-12 contains phonics instruction, beginning with single sound-letter correspondence, short vowels, digraphs, initial and final blends, common inflections and silent ‘e,’ progressing to vowel teams, vowel digraphs, r- controlled vowels, word patterns, and the most common prefixes and suffixes, and moving toward decoding and spelling.
Fluency: Repeated readings are embedded in the enCORE implementation guide within every unit, giving students the opportunity to read the literature (with or without icons), from the e-Reader OR have the e-Reader read to them.
Vocabulary: Every unit of enCORE K-12 focuses on vocabulary that is embedded within that unit’s literature, with vocabulary words embedded in the text multiple times so that students have multiple opportunities to engage with the words and develop deeper semantic knowledge.
Text Comprehension: Every segment in enCORE begins with anchored instruction to help students connect information in the text to their daily lives or to build background knowledge prior to reading. Each book, companion text, and/or chapter incorporates multiple comprehension activities to address text comprehension standards.
To learn more about The Science of Reading component in the enCORE curriculum, click here.
Yes. enCORE offers a strategic blend of hands-on, teacher-led instruction and technology-facilitated lessons. Schools can purchase physical curriculum materials, including Teacher Guides, Student Workbooks, Adapted Library, Math Manipulatives, etc., which are eligible for purchase under the Instructional Materials & Technology Allotment (IMTA).
To learn more about TeachTown, schedule a consultation and a member of our team will reach out to you shortly.
“What led us initially to TeachTown was our Life Skills teachers asking if other programs were available for us to consider for students. We had been using a competitor and found that it was not a robust learning system, and our teachers were having to supplement instruction. Our teachers were also looking for realistic images in their instructional materials along with physical literature resources. We created a panel of Life Skills teachers (elementary, junior high and high school) to attend a TeachTown demo and our teachers were very impressed and wanted to move forward with partnering with TeachTown!” – Denise Z. Deffes, M. Ed., Coordinator of Instruction, Special Education Services, Angleton ISD
“We ultimately chose TeachTown because there truly wasn’t anything else like it! The alignment provided with our state standards is unheard of for national programs within Texas. The access it provides our students to their grade level content defines what access should look like in a self-contained classroom. Our teachers are already reporting significantly less time spent preparing materials and lesson planning within weeks of implementation, and our students are elated with the activities and success they are experiencing. After years with a “competitor” our eyes have been opened to the possibilities created by bringing TeachTown to our district. Our teachers could not be any more excited and our students are LOVING it! We will continue to sing the praises of TeachTown to anyone who asks so please share our experience!” -Schuele Batenhorst, M.Ed., Coordinator of Special Education and Instruction, Canyon ISD
View the Canyon ISD & TeachTown Success Story here
Hear about Mount Pleasant ISD's experience with TeachTown
Galena Park ISD & TeachTown
Our special education curriculum software has been nationally recognized for driving growth in students with moderate to severe disabilities.
Browse TeachTown’s suite of special education solutions and see firsthand why thousands of special educators rely on TeachTown to measurably improve students’ academic, behavioral, and adaptive skills – from Pre-K through the transition years.