Podcast and Blog

One of the hardest things for us to fit into our day is listening to every student read aloud. In days gone by, this was a daily feature. Even if students spent much of their time doing busywork or mucking around putting pegs on the end of their fingers during Guided Reading sessions, we at least felt good that we had heard everyone read.  The move away from these groups to more whole class instruction means that teachers feel an understandable anxiety that we aren’t paying enough attention to i…

One of the frequent questions I am asked is, “What does planning look like in structured literacy?” Firstly, let me say that I think that planning is an individual thing.  As a school leader I never mandated particular planning templates, but did provide them for my teachers to use if they chose to. We also bought teachers a nice diary for consistency. I felt that mandating how planning was arranged would likely add to my team’s cognitive load. After all, it’s so much harder to plan and teach …

The start of a new school year is an exciting time to be purchasing all sorts of new resources for reading instruction.   Decodable texts, magnetic letters, whiteboards and new phonics programs are all high on the list of importance.   It’s exciting to receive all of those shiny, new things in our classrooms. When these things are purchased, it feels good. We imagine that having them is going to make a difference to our teaching and our students. And it can.  But it could also, just as easily, n…

If you are a teacher in Australia, there’s a fair chance that you are feeling a degree of worry about what the 2022 school year is going to throw at you.   School communities are going back to the classroom with uncertainty about a range of things including:

• When exactly will we go back?
• Will we be in person or online?
• Will we be expected to teach in a hybrid model?
• What happens if staff or students are covid positive?
• Exactly what will all of this mean for learning?
• How do I prepare for…

This last week I’ve been interviewing teachers for my book, ‘Reading Success in the Early Primary Years: A Teacher’s Guide to Implementing Systematic Instruction’. As well as a summary of the research and in-depth details about how to bring structured literacy to life in your classroom, the book will contain ‘snapshots of practice’ from experienced teachers who have adopted the approach in their classrooms. While these teachers certainly don’t feel like they know it all (who does?), they are far…

2022 is here and it’s time to get clear about what’s important.  Learning to read is a complex process that goes on behind ‘closed doors’. That is, we can see the impact of what we do as teachers, but we don’t see the processes happening inside children’s heads.  Reading instruction is also complex. There are so many moving parts to gold standard reading instruction, especially when we are trying to meet every one of our students where they are up to, that teaching reading can feel like an overw…

Dear Colleagues, 

What a year it's been!  I know that so many of you have put in a mammoth effort this year to help each and every child reach their reading best and, on their behalf, I want to say, "Thank you!"   It has been an absolute pleasure  to work with such a wonderful group of dedicated and talented teachers over 2021. I have been humbled by the emails and messages I have received from teachers sharing success and letting me know that my work has been of use.  My mission, like yours, i…

The end of the 2021 school year is upon us and many of us are turning our thoughts to what will happen in 2022.   In my last post I talked about different aspects of getting ready for structured literacy instruction and shared a reflection template and action plan for individuals and teams to work through.   This week I’d like to address what it looks like to support teachers through this journey at their various stages of development.

Just as there is no one size fits all for student learning,…

A quick peek at many a Facebook group just now will reveal that teachers are tired. Not just a little bit tired, but pooped, beat, spent and feeling plain old burnt out.  Having just read that first sentence, you might then be wondering why I have decided to write about getting set up for the school year that hasn’t even started yet. It’s this simple. If you are anything like me, trying to rest and rejuvenate while the ‘to do’ list is swimming around in your head is a fool’s errand.  You lie dow…

This post has previously been published, and has been republished on 27/11/2021

It is report time in Australia right now and tens of thousands of parents are either reading, or about to read about their child’s academic progress over the last two terms.  All schools in Australia are required to grade children’s academic results on a 5 point scale.  In many schools this is represented through A – E grades, with a C grade meaning that the student has learned to complete the skill or task reason…