Reading
Strong literacy skills, knowledge and understanding are the building blocks for success. We understand how important reading and writing is to support all learning and we use evidence-based practices to help our students excel in English. Our teachers work collaboratively to plan, monitor and assess to ensure students are supported and extended at their point of need.
The essential elements of reading (The Big 6’, Konza, 2014), which form our approach to reading are: Oral language, Phonemic awareness, Phonics, Fluency, Vocabulary and Comprehension. These skills are all necessary to enable students to independently read and respond to increasingly complex fiction and non-fiction texts.
In the beginning years of Prep to Year 2, we use a systematic synthetic phonics approach to ensure that students develop strong foundational reading and writing skills.
This method focuses on explicitly teaching students to recognise and link individual sounds to their corresponding letters or letter combinations. The approach is “systematic” because it follows a carefully structured sequence, introducing phonemes and graphemes in a logical order, ensuring students build on their knowledge gradually and systematically. The “synthetic” aspect refers to students learning to blend or synthesise individual sounds together to form words.
Writing
In the early years, writing is closely linked to reading as students learn to apply their phonics knowledge to both decode (read) and encode (write) words.
At Northcote Primary School, students learn the fundamental skills of writing, including letter formation, handwriting, punctuation and spelling. They learn to construct sentences and paragraphs, and to apply these skills when planning and drafting whole texts.
Students learn to write a range of text types, such as informative, imaginative, and persuasive, helping them to understand that writing serves different purposes and is tailored to various audiences.
In the classroom, speaking and listening skills are essential for helping students express their thoughts, engage with others, and develop a deeper understanding of the world around them. At Northcote Primary School, these skills are embedded every day across all curriculum areas.
Our students develop their confidence when speaking aloud in more formal settings, such as whole-school assemblies, productions and year level presentations. Our Year 6 students have the opportunity to take part in the annual Year 6 public speaking competition run by Northcote High School.