MACS Flourishing Learners - Vision for Instruction
This week we bring you the start of an Annotated Glossary of Terms to support your understanding of MACS Vision for Instruction: This glossary features essential terms and concepts related to evidence-based teaching practices, cognitive science and the Melbourne Archdiocese Catholic Schools (MACS) Vision for Instruction. It provides concise definitions of each term along with annotations.
The following terms are separated into categories. The first section is learning.
At St. Mark's, we are committed to using research-based teaching methods that support effective learning for all students. The preferred approach to achieving teaching and learning excellence is found in the Explicit instruction sequence: We continue to learn, practise and reflect on our instruction to continually improve and better the impact on our students' learning.
Vision for reading instruction
Reading is the gateway to meaning and knowledge. Yet, teaching children to read is complex. Fortunately, reading instruction is one of the mostly widely researched topics in education, and hundreds of studies have refined and consolidated a strong evidence base for reading instruction (Moats 2020).
Research summaries
• AERO (2023b) – Introduction to the science of reading
• Wheldall, Wheldall & Buckingham (2023) – Effective Instruction in Reading and Spelling
• Thomas & Thomas (2021) – Teaching and Learning Primary English
When classroom teaching includes a range of research-based components and practices, it can prevent and mitigate reading difficulties. Classroom environments should be motivating and supportive, where reading and effective reading instruction is highly valued. The MACS vision for reading instruction is for every student to commence school with access to a high-quality, evidence-based literacy program, made up of the following core areas:
• Phonemic awareness: This is when students understand that speech is made up of words, and words are made up of distinct sounds. It requires being able to identify the phonemes in a word. Students benefit from explicit instruction in phonemic awareness, however, once basic phonemic awareness has been established, further phonemic awareness instruction should occur in tandem with systematic phonics instruction.
• Phonics: Phonics is knowledge of the relationships between letters and sounds, and the ability to use letter-sound relationships to decode words. Students need explicit and systematic instruction in how to decode words using their knowledge of letter-sound relationships.
• Fluency: Fluent readers can read accurately, quickly and expressively. Fluency is critical for deriving meaning from texts. Evidence based practices for fluency include modelling fluent reading for students and providing students with repeated practise of reading written passages.
• Vocabulary: Vocabulary is knowledge of the meaning of words, both in isolation and in context. Vocabulary is essential for understanding texts but there are often wide disparities in student vocabulary when students enter school. Many studies point to rich, explicit vocabulary instruction as the most effective approach to support students from disadvantaged backgrounds.
• Comprehension: The ability to understand and construct meaning from a text is the ultimate goal in literacy instruction. Comprehension relies on strong decoding skills and fluency, but also on the general background knowledge students have about the various subjects they are reading about. This is why a knowledge-rich curriculum is important for student learning.