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ACCELERATING LITERACY LEARNING

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THE PURPOSE of ALL

Aim of accelerating the progress of identified learners

Understand what you are trying to accelerate for each learner.

Need to be able to measure whether or not acceleration has occurred.

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The definition that we are working with for acceleration is:

‘when a learner makes more than one year’s progress over the course of a year.’

This definition can be applied to both shorter and longer periods of time. 

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Alongside this, (MoE) also see that accelerative learning:

Is situated in the context of quality universal (‘tier 1’) classroom teaching and the curriculum progression:

  • Assumes learner diversity is expected and deliberately planned for
  • Focuses on teacher practices that make the difference
  • Aims to notice what learners can do and what they need in order to continue to access the full classroom curriculum and address it urgently (as opposed to remediation/waiting to fail)

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TIERED INTERVENTION

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KNOW YOUR LEARNER

�Undertaking assessment to better understand the strengths and needs of identified learners (may be in addition):

  • Assessment and evaluative capability
  • Taking deliberate action – having an intervention plan
  • Being strategic about addressing needs in relevant context
  • Holding high expectations that students will progress
  • Relationships with students, parents, whānau
  • Wider involvement of teachers across the school
  • Leadership that supports accelerative practice

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WHAT?

Focuses on new learning: 

  • Past concepts and essential skills are addressed, but in the context of purposeful current learning

Implications: 

  • Need to identify essential literacy skills that students need and align them with current context of instruction
  • Learning is purposeful and relevant

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EXPLICIT, PURPOSEFUL, CONTEXTUAL AND RELEVANT

Setting a clear purpose for learning in the session e.g. ‘Today we will focus on adding two details to our opening statement’

�Intervention sessions need to be tight and focused – this links to knowing what students need to learn, and taking progressive steps over the intervention period

�Practice essential skills required for today’s learning e.g.

Review and practice punctuation of sentences – ready for writing about two details

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  • Generate thinking, curiosity, interest 
  • Create relevance - link to prior knowledge
  • Multi modal, understanding how ideas are connected, and skills build on each other

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CONFIDENCE, UNDERSTANDING, SELF EFFICACY

  • Learning should be highly engaging
  • Students should know the ‘why’ and feel confident as they move forward
  • They should be able to feel they know what they’re doing – Lots of revisiting the skills and lots of practice.

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WHAT I DID…

  • Inquiry question – specific focus of acceleration
  • Identified my group based on easttle results – BUT it’s not the only way!
  • Resourcing – What will be engaging? How can I link to whole class learning? How can I keep this relevant, fun and connected to the wider learning…

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PLANNING FOR INTERVENTION

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“The goal is not to address a broad list of skills, but rather to provide a narrow but deep dive into a skill that will shift the trajectory of a student’s academic or social and emotional learning.”

(Fisher, Frey & Hattie, 2022)

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TARGET SKILLS

  • Skimming and scanning and vocabulary
  • Find select and retrieve information
  • Knowledge of vocabulary
  • Explore authors purpose and question intent

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PLANNING FOR TEACHING

  • Target group based on e-asttle results – skills to gain
  • Linked all skills to wider class novel study – all groups would use them BUT in different ways.
  • Three texts running at once: Dystopian fiction – Monster Island, The Wave and Z for Zachariah
  • Part of a genre study – whole class learning, looking at purpose and building prior knowledge

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RESOURCING

I also used resources such as Steps Web for embedding spelling, Twinkle for skills sheets, Teachers Pay Teacher for resources for my other groups.

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PATTERN OF LEARNING &� HOW TO PLAN

  • Explicit teaching of skill
  • Practice skill
  • Front loading vocabulary
  • Practice skill
  • Front loading vocabulary
  • Practice skill
  • Front loading vocabulary
  • Explicit teaching of next skill
  • Front loading vocabulary
  • Embed with previous and practice skill
  • Front loading vocabulary
  • Embed with previous and practice skill
  • Front loading vocabulary
  • Embed with previous and practice skill
  • Front loading vocabulary……the was a pattern of repeating and practice, consolidation of the skill and new learning.

Learning was looped with cycles of new skills integrated while other skills were practiced.

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MONSTER ISLAND

  • High interest and fast paced story
  • Chapters and a High School ‘feel’
  • Some similarities to the other texts – students could compare reading experiences, narrative structure, characters and the genre.
  • It wasn’t hard to read – this was VERY important
  • A skill can’t be built if they can’t read the text

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THE SEQUENCE

Week 1:

We spent a week looking at and learning about Dystopian Fiction

  • We watched some short films, students listened to a story and completed short tasks with this (I was away sick so this worked well)
  • We talked about texts we already knew about – Students were knowledgeable about The Hunger Games and similar books and films.
  • Vocabulary: dys/origins and Utopia vs Dystopia
  • A little about Science Fiction and Fantasy

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Week 2:

Students moved into their groups based on their e-asttle results.

  • Students were told the focus for their group. This was the same for all groups, not just my target group.
  • Students were given their text and they completed pre-reading activities – these were different depending on the group.
  • I discussed with the class the purpose of the groups and everyone was working on different skills.
  • Introduced Reciprocal Reading - predicting, clarifying, questioning, and summarizing collaboratively.

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Week 3 and beyond:

All groups started reading using a structured approach to reading

  • We used Reciprocal Reading as a way to meaningfully read the text
  • Then, the group completed vocabulary and skimming and scanning activities that I explicitly taught
  • We then moved onto retrieving specific information from the text and using the language in responses to the text.

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SUCCESS!

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RESOURCES FOR YOU