Teaching English at Palmerston
Collaborative Planning:
Teaching teams work and plan together on documentation to then move to independent planning for individual classes. The Balanced Literacy Program is used in all classrooms, with daily reading, writing and spelling lessons. Oral language and questioning is also a focus in all classrooms. The Readers Workshop model is used across K-6, this design of lesson allows for explicit teaching, time to practice and check in and concludes with reflections.
Curriculum:
Teams sequence all Australian Curriculum English Standards inside Concept-based Inquiry Units, as well as stand-alone lessons.
Core Beliefs:
All teachers use a whole school approach and have copies each of core Spelling, Writing and reading resources. It is important to us to create a school wide approach with a common metalanguage where students will make links in their learning from term to term and year to year.
10 Essential Instructional Practices
The below practices drive our core work and are used in every classroom, every week.
Preschool
* Intentional use of literacy artefacts in dramatic play and throughout the classroom
* Read aloud with reference to print
* Interactive read aloud with a comprehension and vocabulary focus
* Play with sounds inside words
* Brief, clear, explicit instruction in letter names, the sound(s) associated with the letters, and how letters are shaped and formed
* Interactions around writing
* Extended conversation
* Provision of abundant reading material in the classroom
* Ongoing observation and assessment of children’s language and literacy development that informs their education
* Collaboration with families in promoting literacy
Kindergarten to Year 3
* Deliberate, research-informed efforts to foster literacy motivation and engagement within and across lessons
* Read alouds of age-appropriate books and other materials, print or digital
* Small group and individual instruction, using a variety of grouping strategies, most often with flexible groups formed and instruction targeted to children’s observed and assessed needs in specific aspects of literacy development
* Activities that build phonological awareness (grades K and 1 and as needed thereafter)
* Explicit instruction in letter-sound relationships
* Research- and standards-aligned writing instruction
* Intentional and ambitious efforts to build vocabulary and content knowledge
* Abundant reading material and reading opportunities in the classroom
* Ongoing observation and assessment of children’s language and literacy development that informs their education
* Collaboration with families in promoting literacy
Year 4 to 6
* Deliberate, research-informed efforts to foster motivation and engagement within and across lessons
* Intentional, research-informed instruction using increasingly complex texts and tasks that build comprehension, knowledge, and strategic reading activity
* Small group instruction, using a variety of grouping strategies, most often with flexible groups formed and instruction targeted to children’s observed and assessed needs in specific aspects of literacy development
* Activities that build reading fluency and stamina with increasingly complex text
* Discussion of the ideas in texts and how to construct text meaning across texts and disciplines
* Research-informed and standards-aligned writing instruction
* Intentional and ambitious efforts to build vocabulary, academic language, and content knowledge
* Abundant and diverse reading material, including digital texts, and opportunities to read in the classroom
* Ongoing observation and assessment of children’s language and literacy development that informs small group and individual instruction
* Collaboration with families in promoting literacy