Missing Link WE ARE READERS PRINCIPAL’S REPORT What is your favourite book and why? This week is National Literacy & Numeracy week as well as Education week. One thing we all know is that to be successful at school students have to be readers. Schools think reading is important and this week we are focusing on reading as part of our Education Week activities.
bringing and sharing their favourite books. - a special assembly for Year 7 and their parents to talk about reading and the new Year 7 Literacy Program - a special display in the library of great books for teens - a meeting with Year 9 to call for volunteers to be trained as Literacy Mentors to work with Year 7 students who need more help in Term 4 in a special program - a preview of the new Numeracy program to improve critical skills needed at high school
Like many schools in 2013 we have been looking closely at the national curriculum capabilities and working on new ways of learning in literacy, numeracy, digital literacy and thinking. Our goal is for 80% of students to reach stage and age benchmarks in each capability.
At the heart of our activities will be the chance to share our favourite books and to show that, like all successful learners, our teachers and students are readers. With everything from comics to Game of Thrones, from stories of sporting greats to great romances like Pride & Prejudice, For Year 7 this will be a challenge from science fiction to crime thrillers we because our assessment of their literacy will be talking about books. and numeracy in early Term 2 showed that the majority of students had not achieved Why not help us by telling us via our the benchmarks at the end of Year 6. This Facebook what is your favourite book has given us a great opportunity to be and why? innovative, especially because the government has given us $435000 to spend on improving Literacy & Numeracy. In Term 2 we assessed all Year 7 & 8 • WHY WE ALL NEED TO READ students as part of the Personalised • CREATING A READING CULTURE Learning program and we employed three outstanding consultants to work with the • CAFE 2766 - WHAT STUDENTS WILL teachers and students. We spent a lot of BE DOING AT RHHS IN TERMS 3 & 4 time preparing teachers for teaching subject based literacy and numeracy in • BECOMING A BETTER READER BY new and creative ways. USING THE DAILY 5
Christine Cawsey INSIDE: READ ABOUT
• SUBJECT-BASED LITERACY We are now ready to launch our new programs in Education Week. There will •THE LITERACY CONTINUUM be: •READABILITY - a special "We are Readers" edition of Missing Link with teachers and students •RHHS NATIONAL PARTNERSHIP TEAM
Why do we read? Making meaning Since the invention of printing in the 1600s reading has become the major way people can find information. In the 21st century, with online technology, reading and writing remain critical ways to share that information. We read to make sense of opinions and information, and the relationship between ideas and finding solutions. Reading (like listening and watching) gives our brain information that we turn into thinking, felling and acting. We read to understand and to learn so we can take part in every aspect of life in school, work, family and community.
school where students are encouraged to choose to read with a wide range of options in the library and classroom, not just books but newspapers, magazines, comics and anything that will encourage sustained reading where students are surrounded by reading role models. Where students have access to as many reading experiences as possible. At home students can be encouraged by surrounding them with reading materials, encouraging them to talk about or discuss what they have read but most of all by showing that parents read and value others who do so. Reading for pleasure is the key to lifelong learning and one of the most effective ways to leverage positive social change in society. Students who are more enthusiastic about and engaged in reading perform better in tests. Being an enthusiastic and frequent reader is more of an advantage than having well-educated parents in good jobs. Research also shows that the more children read the more they keep reading, leading to improved vocabulary and verbal skills, general knowledge, language skills and ability to think and reason.
GETTING STARTED ON BEING A BETTER READER - THE DAILY FIVE Top athletes practise. Top musicians practise. Top readers practise.
CREATING A READING CULTURE Reading for pleasure is the key to lifelong learning. The best way to encourage reading is to create a culture where reading is respected and expected. A school with a reading culture is one where reading is valued, modelled and talked about. A place where staff and students read and are encouraged to read for pleasure at school and at home. Students emulate what they see around them and what adults do. They take their cues on how to behave by what people around them are seen to be doing eg driving, working and, hopefully, reading. If students are surrounded by people reading then they will want to read rather than it being a chore or forced on them. Creating a reading culture takes time, commitment and leadership from staff, and collaboration with family and community. The aim is to create a 2
Here are 5 things students who need to read better should do every day: 1. Read to self 2. Work on writing 3. Read to someone 4. Listen to reading 5. Work on words
READING FROM A YOUNG AGE Starting at a young age we have learnt that books offer an escape into worlds of wonder and amazement yet similarly educate us on the issues that matter today. The knowledge that we have all individually gained from our passion for reading has assisted in allowing us to grow into the people we are today. Literacy week is a great opportunity to pick up a book and start expanding yourself creatively and allows for a great foundation for your future learning and understanding of the world. All of us can learn through the power of story so enjoy this opportunity!
Madison Nixon - School Captain
CAFE 2766 What Year 7 will be doing in Term 3&4 The school has developed the CAFE 2766 program to focus on developing skills, capabilities and dispositions in literacy, numeracy, thinking and digital literacy. When you go to a cafe you get a menu and you select the choices you want. That is our plan for Year 7 - to teach them tools and tricks to be better readers, writers, thinkers, digital users and mathematicians. At the same time they will also become better scientists, geographers, historians, designers, artists, musicians and performers by using the "key capabilities". We are going to start with an intensive program of reading and writing skills for every Year 7 class; teaching students more about comprehension, reading accurately, reading fluently, expanding their vocabulary, taking notes and writing better. The English, HSIE, CAPA and PDHPE faculties are leading in this area. We are also designing a special program for students who need "some catch up" using Year 9 students who will be trained as Literacy Mentors for students who need more help (that is, those who are well below year level). The Learning Support staff and faculty national partnership leaders will be implementing an intensive learning to read program with each student. CAFE 2766 programs are also being developed in numeracy (led by the Maths, Science and TAS faculties), digital literacy (led by Computing Studies) and thinking (led by Ms. Mattimore and and a cross faculty professional learning team). Later this term we will be inviting parents to come to the school and take part in a special program that explains CAFE 2766 and offers parents a chance to look at the ways they can support their own children as high school learners. This is an exciting time for the school and for Year 7 students in particular. Year 7 Adviser, Ms Sarah Haigh with her favourite book
READABILITY When we look at something to read we can usually see what is easier to read and what is harder to read. The degree of difficulty of a book, newspaper or document is called its "readability".
SUBJECT BASED LITERACY What Year 8-12 will be doing Anyone who has completed Years 10, 11 or 12 knows about the importance of being able to read, write, calculate, think and solve problems differently in each subject. this is sometimes the reason why some students love one subject and find another one hard. It is also why study programs in high schools need to be subject specific. In recent years there has not been nearly enough focus on subject based literacy and numeracy teaching in high schools. Too many people outside schools thought that, if students learnt to read and write in English in primary school and do numeracy in Maths it would be enough. We now know this is not true and during this year each program for each subject in the school is being reviewed to ensure that teaching and learning activities focus on subject specific skills, capabilities and dispositions. If our students are going to leave school to study to be writers, carers, financiers, tradespeople, business managers, scientists, geographers, historians, designers, health professionals, artists, musicians, dancers, performers, computer engineers, software designers as well as all the traditional occupations they need to be able to use the language and skills of the industry in which they will work. We are not just getting students ready for the HSC - our job is to get students ready for university, TAFE, employment and the demands of particular careers. In addition, most of our students will also go on to be parents, voters, travelers, householders and income managers in their own homes.
THE LITERACY CONTINUUM One of the best tools for helping students, teachers and parents understand what students actually have to do to read, write, listen and speak is the literacy continuum. The skills are shown in clusters and each student can locate his or her reading, writing, listening and speaking based on the descriptors in each cluster. For example, a student starting Year 7 should be able to: - read longer novels and subject texts using a range of word identification strategies to make meaning - read and view a range of texts with increasing independence - read more demanding subject texts that having increasing levels of technicality and abstraction. The advantage of the continuum is that a teacher, working with a student, can move backwards when a student needs to pick up a missed skill or can identify when a student needs to move forward having mastered all the skills in that cluster.
Readability can be calculated and is usually shown as a "year, age or grade" level or as a percentage (what percentage of people could read this easily in that year or age group?) In Microsoft Word, most students have used the spell checker. Most students have not used the function in the spell checker called "readability statistics". it is easy to use and helps us to understand both the level of what we are reading but also the level of what we are writing. We want students to check the readability of their own writing and the things they read online so they become skilled in knowing whether the text they are using is one they can read easily or one with which they will need more help. However, readability is also influenced by the way words are used. At Rooty Hill we have been talking about the "water table". Water and table are two concepts children learn about in infant school. In geography at high school, students study the water table to understand ideas like salinity, water conservation and the impact of drought and evaporation. In this case water table becomes a subject specific concept and the ways the words are combined makes its readability harder.
There is also a continuum for numeracy. After personalised learning week, every student in Year 7 received a document showing where they were on the literacy continuum and we are happy to discuss this with parents if they have questions.
That is a major reason why high schools focus so much on subject specific vocabulary and why students need to learn words in a subject context to become more skilled learners.
Being prepared for the literacy, numeracy, digital and thinking demands of life after school starts at high school and it starts in Year 8 at the latest. It starts with a sound ability to use subject specific vocabulary and goes on to much higher level skills including writing extended essays, solving complex problems, understanding texts that use lots of abstract concepts and thinking for the future. We look forward to seeing students using vocabulary grids and other tools to develop their skills and achieve stage benchmarks in each capability as well as improving their overall grades. 3
OUR NATIONAL PARTNERSHIP TEAM For any project to be successful, project leaders are critical. We are pleased to have the following people leading our work: Our consultants: Judy-Ann Abdini - a highly regarded consultant, literacy coach and project manager in student learning; Dubravka Vukic - Presland - a former Head Teacher English and highly skilled program designer; Dianne Hennessy - a former Secondary Principal with a state wide reputation in the development of middle years, thinking and assessment programs. The project leaders of the 6 major projects we are undertaking: 1. Improving classroom practice - a professional learning program - Peter Langfield 2. Capability (disposition) projects - Thinking: Conny Mattimore; Numeracy: John Meng; Digital Literacy: Computing Studies faculty 3. Programming project - Shauna Pollard 4. Project 4 - CAFE 2766 for Year 7 - Christine Cawsey 5. Targeted literacy & numeracy project - Kate Short & Learning Support Team 6. Planning, assessment, reporting & evaluation - Andrew Pesle Our faculty leaders, each of whom is a recognised teacher leader. They have been given extra time to lead their faculties in the development and implementation of the CAFE 2766 program and other projects in 2013: Melanie Douglas, Elise Edeney, Linda Graham, Traci Halliwell, Cliff Harper, Melissa Scerri, Joanna Wilkins, Joanne Wilson and Peta Zeibots.
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