New way of learning
Takaro School pupil Violet Vulimailodoni, left, works with literacy expert Liz Kane, while pupils Jaylyn Ngarongo-herewini and Sumayabibi Asmatali work with assistant principal Josie Victor-woon and teacher Ethan Harnett.
The benefits of a new method of improving children’s reading are evident in Manawatu¯ classrooms.
Literacy coach Liz Kane works in schools to help teachers better teach children to read, write and spell. She promotes the awareness of sounds in words, and the relationship between letters and sounds. Pupils learn the sounds then put the words together.
Kane’s work has been reinforced by the release of a recent Massey University study, meant to improve literacy learning among children in their first year at school, by giving teachers strategies focused on literacy learning. Massey researcher Christine Braid said in the past children relied on the meaning of the text and didn’t look at the letter patterns.
‘‘It appeared they could read well, but they had large gaps in their writing. In research we found that the children whose teachers engaged in [personal development] had significantly better results than a comparison group. ‘‘The results showed it was successful with children who, traditionally, were struggling to learn to read...’’
‘‘It will be business as usual – still reading to children and having lots of fun with books and varied texts, still developing children’s learning by reading to them.’’ This method was ‘‘almost slowing down to speed up’’.
Takaro School assistant principal Josie Victor-woon said Kane’s methods had led to a big improvement in results at the school in the year it had been used. It was beneficial for Ma¯ ori pupils and for children who are speakers of other languages.
‘‘Out of a class of 20, 15 students are working above expectation level. We’ve not had that in the past. It’s a huge turnaround.’’
She said previously pupils were consistently below that.