Additional Support Programs
Melton Secondary College is committed to ensuring every student achieves success in their learning. The college offers additional support in Literacy and Numeracy across year levels 7-10 and has multiple programs running throughout 2023 to cater to student needs.
Students are identified as needing extra support in a variety of ways including OnDemand testing, NAPLAN data, semester reports, teacher judgement, and skill-based screeners.
Additional support is driven by student learning needs and Intervention programs at the college are facilitated via small group learning to maximise impact. Current research suggests that small-group learning offered through focused, regular sessions, is a clear evidence-based approach for improving student learning outcomes in a timely manner.
Tutor Learning Initiative
The Victorian Government has continued its funding of the Tutor Learning Initiative (TLI) in 2023. This initiative is designed to address the continued impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on student learning and engagement in Victoria.
Tutors join and strengthen the already-existing Intervention programs at MSC, which allows us to reach many more at-risk and vulnerable students across the school.
A wide range of data is used to identify and monitor the progress of students participating in the Initiative, which encompasses both an in-class and small group withdrawal focus for students in need of extra Literacy and Numeracy support.
Middle Years Literacy and Numeracy Support (MYLNS) initiative
The MYLNS initiative provides intensive teaching support to government secondary school students who are at risk of finishing school without the Literacy and Numeracy skills they need for future work, education and training.
This initiative seeks to support and build on the work that schools are already doing to improve Literacy and Numeracy outcomes for all students, by providing additional teaching support to prioritised students as part of a whole-school approach.
The intended outcomes of the initiative are to:
- improve targeted students’ Literacy and Numeracy achievement to agreed standards
- support teachers to confidently teach Literacy and Numeracy to all students
- support and contribute to embedding a whole school community approach to improving Literacy and Numeracy achievement for all students.
In 2023, MSC has several teaching staff members working with selected students in year 10 as part of the MYLNS initiative.
Numeracy support
The 2023 Numeracy program encompasses an in-class support model.
Up to five times a fortnight, an allocated tutor works with selected students in a small focus group, within timetabled mathematics classes.
The aim of the targeted focus groups is to identify student strengths and areas for improvement in mathematics, while building on existing skills and knowledge to keep students engaged, motivated to learn and on track to reaching their potential.
Tutors work on building student confidence, continuing to extend their learning and developing their capacity to work independently at a more challenging level. The work completed with tutors complements the explicit instruction from their classroom teacher during mathematics classes, with an emphasis on being able to confidently articulate the processes used to complete tasks.
Ongoing progress is monitored and discussed between the classroom teacher, tutors and team leaders in order to continue meeting students at their level of need.
Literacy support
In 2023, MSC has expanded its year 7-9 reading support program to work with our most vulnerable, at-risk readers by incorporating phonics instruction. Our comprehensive, structured and sequential lessons focus on the two key aspects of reading- decoding and language comprehension- while ensuring we cover the skills that are necessary for effective reading instruction: phonological awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension.
Students are organised into groups based on their needs, which is determined through the analysis of assessment tools.
Our reading support programs allow students to practise, consolidate and internalise effective reading and spelling strategies, which assists their ability to decode and construct meaning; in turn, this allows students to experience success in reading while being able to understand more complex texts across all learning areas as more proficient readers.