Supporting our students in the Literacy Reading Co-requisites

One of the challenges we are having this year is how to best support students to pass the Literacy reading co-requisite.  In May of this year, our first group sat it and of the 148 students tested, 122 were Stanine 5 and below.  As a result of those chosen to sit the corequisite reading assessment only 5 of the 30 who sat the test succeeded which is very low. To support students before their next attempt in September, our level up crew ran a number of intensives where a core group of Heads of Learning provided time during their non-contacts to guide students through revision. We pitched our idea to our curriculum meeting.

In my session today, I decided I would be a fia poto (know it all) and read aloud the co-requisite text and guide the students through the questions. Below are two example of the texts and questions I read aloud.

Straight away, I could see and hear the complexities of the text in them not understanding the context or words that were unfamiliar to them.  I asked students to think about replacing the word with another word that they would know to try and make it make sense.  I also asked them think of the sound the word made.  I was trying to pull out all the strategies.

At the end of the session, I discussed the challenges with Marc who shared his updated literacy plan and he agreed with the challenges saying 'The texts and questions above highlight the need for our students to experience a wide variety of texts during their junior years at secondary school. Many of our junior students do not distinguish between fiction and non-fiction'.

Similarly, the text on Polynesian food, although relatable still remained a challenge for some students because they rushed ahead thinking they could answer it without reading the text. This was a challenge that Marc also identified as a "lack of engagement with the texts in this practice test is symptomatic of their comprehension skills. These skills need to be taught systematically". (Marc Literacy @ T.C doc)

This experience has reminded me about the need to be prepare my year 9's with their reading by going wide and deep and ensuring creater care is taken by the students to engage with the reading fully before answering the questions.