Katie Brody – Director of Studies K-6

How do we ‘Get Reading Right’ here at Emanuel School?

If you missed Joanne Dooner’s presentation on Thursday morning, or have an interest in understanding how young people learn to read, this article is for you.

Last Thursday Jo-Anne Dooner, co-founder of Get Reading Right, visited to work with our Years K-2 teachers once again. She began the day with an informative and engaging presentation to the K-2 parents, the highlights of which are outlined here. If you would like a copy of the handout, please see the link below.

According to Jo-Anne Dooner, “Learning to read is essentially learning a code. The letters we use are simply symbols or written code for the speech sounds of English. Learning about the relationship between the letters of the alphabet and the speech sounds they represent allows us to ‘crack the code’ and learn to both read (decode) and spell (encode)”. If students have spent too much time learning words off by heart, looking only for picture cues or looking to find words they recognise only by site, they soon reach a stage where they can’t progress further and they need specialist intervention. These students can eventually learn to read and spell.

Once students can recognise and say even a small number of phonemes, they can then begin to blend them together and read their first words. For some students in Year K, this happens at an impressive rate. However, Jo-Anne affirms that one should not be discouraged if students cannot blend the sounds together right away. Learning the skill of blending sounds together, is like that of learning to ride a bike. Just as with any new skill, students don’t all learn to balance, pedal and steer right away. They need practice, encouragement and time to build confidence through small, incremental successes (and failures) along the way.

Learning to read:

• ‘Cracking the code’ = developing phonemic awareness. Students have to learn all 44 speech sounds (phonemes) and how they are represented by the letters to write them down (graphemes – how you write a phoneme, which is the basis of learning to spell). Students learn to write the phonemes and then they can segment the spelling of each word based on the phonemes within the word. Learning all the ways we can represent sounds in words takes students all the way to Year 6 as there are around 280 graphemes.
• Consolidate their ability to ‘crack the code’ and develop the ability to blend those sounds together (synthesise). Once this skill is developed, they need to work on doing it quickly – fluency. This is the time when decodable books really allow students to feel a wonderful level of success. In addition, a sequence of ‘Camera Words’ are reinforced. These are not decodable, but they are essential and help to connect decodable words to create sentences (eg ‘the’ and ‘was’). These are offered in a deliberate order based on regularity, frequency and functionality.
• Once fluency is developed, the understanding of each sentence becomes the focus. This is where pictures can assist in word-meaning association as well as helping students to build meaning through the unwritten messages (visual literacy) that is deliberate in quality picture books.
• Developing reading comprehension is the next stage. This happens at a literal level at first, then students learn to show inferential comprehension and finally they learn to analyse text (which takes longer).

Types of books – using the analogy of their ‘health’ benefit:

‘Chocolate’ books: They’re fun, light, humorous or silly eg – Captain Underpants or the Rainbow Magic Fairy series. They’re not really quality literature but they’re popular with young readers as the sentences are short, vocabulary is simple and students engage with the humour. Children often read and enjoy these alone.

‘Fruit and vegetable’ books: They’re still quite sweet but a little bit ‘healthier’ in terms of a decent plot and development of characters. They are still quite light in terms of complexity or quality, can generally serve as good shared reading experiences or as a read alone book. These are often based on a high interest topic for the child. ‘Fruit and vegetable’ books are good for children as they provide enjoyment as well as developing vocabulary.

‘Protein books’: These books are high-quality literature, often having won literary prizes or they may be classics that have been around for generations. These books have well-developed plot lines and characters, as well as having a didactic message that can benefit young people. These can be picture books as well as novels. They provoke discussion, often contain figurative language or sensory imagery and serve as excellent models for the developing writer.

Jo-Anne Dooner’s advice for parents wishing to assist their child at home:

• Maintain a focus on the decoding of the phonemes, blending (when ready) and building fluency.
• Ensure your child uses the pictures as secondary information – decode the words first. If dependence on the pictures is clear, cover the picture as they read, then uncover it as a ‘reward’ for good decoding.
• Provide children with a ‘healthy diet’ of reading – We all love a bit of ‘chocolate’ and so long as it is not the only book in the ‘diet’, it is harmless and can lead to better choices.
• Non-fiction books should be encouraged as part of the range of books experienced by your child.
• Insist that even reluctant readers read for 20 minutes (minimum per day)  – read alone, read to them or alternate reader page by page.

Please click here for access to the Handout for Parents provided at the information session.

NAPLAN testing begins next week

From Tuesday 14 May to Friday 17 May, our Years 3 and 5 students will participate in NAPLAN Online.  Aside from the writing task for Year 3 being on paper this year, the rest of the assessments will be completed online. Click here for the information brochure for parents and carers. It addresses common questions about NAPLAN Online testing.

One of the main features of the NAPLAN Online format is that it is a tailored (or adaptive) test. The tailored test provides a more precise assessment of your child’s performance in the areas of reading, language conventions (grammar, spelling and punctuation) and numeracy by adapting to responses. As your child progresses through the test, questions may be easier or more difficult, to better assess his or her ability. Your child’s NAPLAN results and scores are based on the number and complexity of questions he or she has answered correctly.

If you have any questions about NAPLAN Online, please contact your child’s teacher or Katie Brody, Director of Studies K-6  kbrody@emanuelschool.nsw.edu.au                                           

For more info click on these links:

• Learn how to support your child during NAPLAN
• Read more information for parents and carers
• View types of questions on the public demonstration site
• Watch a video that explains the NAPLAN online tailored test
• Download the frequently asked questions about the online tailored test

Uniform update

Please review the uniform requirements on the Parent Portal to ensure your child is appropriately dressed each day for school. There have also been a few updates to the uniform requirements:

• NEW soft shell jackets are available for purchase and can be worn with the sport uniform.
• Students in Years 5 and 6 are required to wear the blazer to and from school every day. They may add a school jumper underneath for more warmth.

Students in Kindergarten to Year 4 may wear the Micropeach as an extra layer on colder days.