How We Do It?
BUILDING LANGUAGE and LITERACY SKILLS
At YarraMe, oral language activities are fully integrated into the classroom program. In addition, students have the benefit of a speech pathologist working with teachers and in the classroom, offering tailored oral language activities and support.
YarraMe has also adopted a structured synthetic phonics reading and spelling program, with an underlying focus on phonological and phonemic awareness – crucial for building sight vocabulary and the underlying skills for reading and spelling development (Kilpatrick, 2016). Research has shown that students taught using a structured synthetic phonics approach develop better word reading, spelling and reading comprehension skills (Johnston et al, 2011).
Students at YarraMe access a tailored structured synthetic phonics reading program, targeting the big 5 of literacy: phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. Students then practice these five skills through the use of decodable readers.
