Literacy

At Garfield Primary School, we are currently refining the way that we teach and assess  Literacy to align with the Science of Reading and Learning. Some of the approaches that we are currently utilising include the following.  

Little Learners Love Literacy

Little Learners Love Literacy is a systematic synthetic phonics program. Through Little Learners Love Literacy, our teachers focus on phonemic awareness, the alphabetic code (phonics), vocabulary and linking the teaching of reading, spelling and writing.

Evidence-based literacy research stresses the importance of explicit and sequential literacy teaching from the beginning. Through using Learners Love Literacy, we ensure that this is happening in Foundation from Day 1, giving children the best possible chance of being fluent readers, writers and spellers.

PhOrMeS

PhOrMES is an acronym meaning ‘Phonology
(sound letter relationships), Orthography (spelling patterns), Morphology (parts of meaning), Etymology (work origins) and Semantics (whole-word meanings)’.

Created by Shane Pearson, Speech Pathologist at Brandon Park Primary School in Melbourne’s South-East, PhOrMeS aims to equip teachers and schools with a ready-to-teach, comprehensive, whole-class curriculum which covers all these skills.

At Garfield Primary School, PrOrMES lessons are taught daily to ensure that our students develop the skills necessary to become confident and capable at spelling and determining the meaning of unknown words.

The Syntax Project

The Syntax Project is an open-source collection of grammar and syntax lessons created collectively by a group of highly skilled and qualified Australian teachers. It is a comprehensive sequence of lessons throughout the Primary School years that explicitly teaches syntax, which is defined as ‘the arrangement of words and phrases to create well-formed sentences in a language.’ The Syntax Project is based upon the work of two mentor texts – The Writing Revolution and Writing matters.

The Syntax Project ensures that all students receive explicit teaching of sentence level skills that increase in complexity as they progress through the years, in a systematic and sequential manner. Creating strong, interesting and grammatically correct sentences are a fundamental building block for writing strong paragraphs and then larger texts.

At Garfield Primary School, The Syntax Project is used for one session per week with later review sessions, to ensure that we are creating Writers who are confident and competent in their use of syntax.