English
At MCS we use researched based programs to explicitly teach the students.
We use Heggerty – phonemic awareness program and Letters and Sounds – Synthetic Phonics Program.
We are currently undertaking research into the best writing program for the students at our school, and currently, the students are being exposed and taught to write different text structures, following the Western Australian Curriculum.
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Developed in 2003 by Dr Michael Heggerty, the Heggerty Phonemic Awareness Curriculum is a systematic 35 week program of daily lesson plans that provide a high level of explicit modelling and student engagement. Each level of the Heggerty Phonemic Awareness Curriculum focuses on eight phonemic awareness skills, along with two additional activities to develop letter and sound recognition, and language awareness.
The Heggerty Curriculum includes explicit instruction in the following phonological and phonemic awareness skills:
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Rhyming
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Onset Fluency
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Blending
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Isolating final and medial phonemes (sounds)
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Segmenting
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Adding Phonemes
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Deleting Phonemes
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Substituting Phonemes
Letters and Sounds
Letters and Sounds is a phonics resource published by the Department for Education and Skills (UK) in 2007. It aims to build children's speaking and listening skills in their own right and to prepare children for learning to read by devel
oping their phonic knowledge and skills. It sets out a detailed and systematic programmer for teaching phonic skills for children starting at Kindergarten, with the aim of them becoming fluent readers.