This is a one day intensive workshop.  Cued Articulation consists of a system of hand signs to represent the sounds of English.  Each hand signal has a corresponding colour coding for the written sound.  It represents a multi-sensory approach to teaching about sounds where information from the ears, the eyes and the mouth is integrated so that manner (how), place (where) and voice (loud or soft) is demonstrated by one hand sign.  Cued Articulation can be used with the whole class, small groups or individual children.  It is useful for teaches, aides, parents and speech pathologists.  The workshop unpacks the book Cued Articulation.

This 2 hour workshop is the follow-up session for those who have completed the Cued Articulation – Learning the Consonant Cues Workshop.  In this session you will learn how to implement Cued Articulation in the classroom.  This may be with the entire class, small groups or individual children.  It can be used to support literacy development – for spelling by being introduced into phonetic work; for the hearing impaired; or migrants (ESL) who often can’t distinguish sounds and for students learning a Language other than English (LOTE). The workshop unpacks the publication A Handful of Sounds.

As teachers, we want to turn our vision of every child reading fluently into reality – but how do we do this?  This hands-on workshop focuses on strategies to improve phonemic awareness, phonics teaching, fluency and comprehension. Phonics teaching should not be tedious. In this one day workshop participants will find out how reading instruction can be efficient, fun and successful. Learn about our alphabetic code so that you can teach it with confidence.

This workshop is designed to assist teachers in enhancing the literacy outcomes for all students. Through the development of accelerated learning techniques teachers will experience first hand strategies that can be immediately applied in their classrooms to rapidly improve word knowledge, increase fluency and develop comprehension skills. This dynamic, hands on session outlines the most resent research, teaching strategies and learning centre ideas to assist all students to master the most frequently used words in reading and writing.
Participants will:

• Explore strategies that rapidly enhance reading
• Investigate efficient ways to increase fluency
• Learn how automaticity and comprehension are linked
• Consider which are the most effective literacy activities and why
• Experience a range of high value literacy activities

This two day, interactive program will be offered to both primary teachers and secondary teachers on seperate dates. The program will focus on practical strategies for teaching spelling, writing and comprehension. These sessions are aimed at providing participants with the knowledge and practical strategies that can be implemenedt immediately to improve literacy programs to help all students. Partticipants will have the opportunity to trial and discuss implementation of the stategies and ideas.

Day 1: Introduction to effective, researched-based methods of teaching spelling, writing and comprehension. The workshop will cover basic diagnostic assessment tools for spelling, the content to teach at each level, how to learn strategies, and writing and comprehension approaches that will interest students and gain results in your VELS program. Hands-on practice of strategies to teach is integral to this workshop.

In between workshop days: Participants are expected to trial at least two of the strategies introduced on Day 1.

Day 2: Day 2 of this workshop will focus on practical strategies for teaching spelling and writing including feedback and discussion on participants’ trialling of strategies introduced on Day 1. Further strategies in spelling, writing and comprehension will be introduced, discussed and practised.

Morning Session - Spelling Recovery
Students who spell competently can concentrate on the meaning of their reading and writing, instead of wasting effort on the mechanics of decoding or spelling the words. As an educator, you need to be aware of the causes of spelling problems, and take appropriate action to help poor spellers become proficient. The information in this session can be used in two ways: to take specific action after having identified an occasional error made by a particular student, or a common error made by several students in a class; and to decide upon a priority of learning outcomes and the selection of appropriate actions to help students with pronounced, multiple spelling problems, once an analysis of their spelling has been made.

Afternoon Session - Teaching Grammar
Students and teachers speak, write and edit more competently and confidently when they understand grammar. Many teachers themselves have missed out on this part of their education and so may have difficulty in teaching it. Learning grammar need not have to be boring. In this workshop, participants will explore the topic through discussion, exercises and games. The workshop will cover basic grammar e.g. parts of speech and punctuation. It will also discuss how to overcome common errors, e.g. ‘fragments’ (subordinate clauses), non-agreement between parts of speech, misused verbs and pronouns. We can address any other relevant issues you have in teaching grammar.

Traditional English texts often don’t appeal to Victorian Certificate of Applied Learning (VCAL) students. They are more likely to be interested in texts that have immediate application to their lives. In this workshop participants will look at a range of authentic texts, consider how these can be used in literacy classes and develop resources that take an applied learning approach. Workshop activities will focus not only on engaging learners but on using authentic texts and contexts to develop core literacy skills and to have fun. This workshop is suitable for middle years English and literacy teachers.

What kind of literacy experiences do we want for our children in our classrooms and beyond?
This one day workshop will explore ways of making our classrooms vibrant, challenging places where literacy thrives and where children enjoy learning.Participants will be involved in exploring ways of integrating literacythe arts and collect 49 great ideas for literacy in the classroom through such activities as:

• An introduction to song writing in the primary classroom
• Song writing for teachers and children as a way to develop literacy skills
• Rhyme and  rhythm – the music of words, the music of sentences.
• Writing with children in a range of genres
• Creating real purposes for real writing in the classroom.