Literacy

At Lalor North Primary School, we prioritise the teaching and learning of Literacy…

At Lalor North Primary School, we believe that language acquisition is fundamental to every area of learning and enables students to participate fully. While helping students become confident communicators, imaginative thinkers and informed citizens, being literate will also assist in their personal and social development as active members of society.

At Lalor North Primary School, we are committed to providing our students with a dynamic, evidence-based approach to literacy learning where students learn to be successful readers, writers, speakers and listeners.

At Lalor North Primary School all students are engaged in our Literacy Program for two hours each day. Our Literacy Program incorporates whole class teaching, small group and individual work based on student needs. Whole class reflection of student learning is included at the end of each session.

All students are expected to read daily, both at home and at school. Home Reading provides children with the opportunity to choose text to read at home with the family. Books are brought home daily as well as borrowed from the library weekly.

Reading and Viewing

Students are constantly challenged to further develop their reading skills, to both foster their love of reading and develop strong comprehension skills to become critical, deeper thinkers. Students are supported to develop skills in; 

• comprehension – understanding what they read,
• accuracy - read and decode words, 
• fluency -read smoothly and with expression
• developing broad vocabulary – learn new words along the way.

Our early years program is derived from The Science of Language and Reading and delivers a rigorous and structured approach to phonological awareness, phonics, word decoding and language comprehension. As a student's decoding ability increases there is an enhanced emphasis on six key comprehension strategies: using prediction and prior knowledge; thinking aloud and asking questions; visualising during reading; looking at text structure; visual representation (we don’t just read books, we read charts, graphs, tables); summarising during and after our reading. Our reading lesson structure follows the Reading Instructional Model.

Writing

Writing involves students in the active process of conceiving, planning, composing, editing, and publishing a range of texts. Writing involves using appropriate language for purposes or occasions, both formal and informal, to express and represent ideas and experiences, and to reflect on these aspects. It involves the development of knowledge about strategies for writing. Students develop understandings and skills to use language conventions (grammar, punctuation, spelling) at an appropriate standard for their year levels. 

Handwriting is also an important element of the writing program and is explicitly taught from Prep to Year 4. Our writing lesson structure follows the Writing Instructional Model.

Speaking and Listening

Speaking and listening refers to the various formal and informal ways oral language is used to convey and receive meaning. It involves the development and demonstration of knowledge about the appropriate oral language for audiences and occasions, including body language and voice. It also involves the development of active-listening strategies and an understanding of the conventions of different spoken texts.