Let’s Decode!

Day 4 – Our Memorable Visit to St Mark’s Anglican Community School

We had a great time at St Mark’s today. We were shown around the school campus comprising the Pre-school, Primary and Secondary sections. We were impressed with the conducive learning environment and the sprawling grounds. The discipline of the pupils was also commendable.

We visited the school with the objectives of firstly, observing how Let’s Decode is infused into the curriculum. Secondly, we hoped to gain a better understanding of the school’s profile and its programmes and lastly, to learn more about their good practices.

Let’s Decode was infused into the Pre-school and lower Primary curriculum. There was explicit teaching of phonics to help pupils associate sounds with letters. Parent volunteers are roped in to assist the teachers in the programme. Parents play an integral part in the education of the children. They are involved in daily classroom activities together with them. Assessment for learning was also observed and immediate feedback was given to the pupils. Tasks carried out by the pupils provided the teachers with feedback on those who needed reinforcement.

The teachers are well-supported by the teacher aides. From our conversations, we realised that the teacher-pupil ratio was 1:10. The teacher aides helped the teachers in the various learning centres conducted during the Kid’s Club sessions daily.

In the Kid’s Club, there are various learning centres for pupils to engage in teaching and learning activities like cooking, artwork, speech and drama, and environmental studies. These activities help to develop the pupils’ social skills and provide them with a holistic education. We feel that this is aligned to the PERI recommendations of engaging pupils in learning to achieve curiosity, confidence and creativity.

Our observations are as follows:

IT is infused into the curriculum and teachers were able to use the smartboard skillfully to engage the pupils.

Pupils learn in a happy environment where they participate actively in class discussions and activities. SEL is evident in the school. There is mutual respect between pupils and teachers and they converse politely and respectfully to one another. There is lots of encouragement by the teachers and this helps the pupils to build their self-confidence.

The emphasis on reading skills was seen prominently in the language-rich environment. Teachers used the interactive approach in the teaching of reading and books were also available to inculcate the love for reading.

All of us were truly enlightened by the experience and we look forward to visiting the next school to further enhance our learning.

Day 7 Visit to St Stephen’s School (Camarra)

We truly benefitted from the school visit as we witnessed two lesson demonstrations on Let’s Decode. The first class we visited was a Year 2 class and the form teacher was Ms Ingrid Winker. Before school started, she had some of the pupils read to her and she assessed them individually. Prior to the start of formal lessons, circle time was conducted to check the pupils in and set the tone for learning. A sense of belonging was promoted when Ms Winker encouraged the pupils to pass a smile around the circle and sought their opinions on matters concerning the class. She then continued with Let’s Decode incorporating all the skills that we had learnt this week. The pupils were confident, spontaneous and apt with the skills.

Ms Oliver, an educator with 20 years experience, teaches the Year 1 pupils. She also demonstrated the Let’s Decode skills for a span of 10 minutes. The pupils were equally at ease and familiar with the skills. In addition, she demonstrated auditory manipulation where pupils were asked to say a three-syllabic word without the middle syllable. This helps the pupils enhance their listening skills and better prepare them for manipulation of longer words. According to Ms Oliver, Let’s Decode provides pupils with the skills and tools to tackle new words and gives them the pre-requisite knowledge and skills to read independently. It provides them with the mechanics for reading. She also mentioned that besides PA, there must be a balance between auditory and visual input to facilitate literacy development. A balance must be struck between PA and language literacy skills to ensure that pupils are able to cope with reading comprehension.

A tour of the school campus was conducted by Mrs Anne Von Druven, School Administrator. She showed us the various rooms and elaborated on the school’s programmes. One interesting programme was the Learning Support Maths where the teacher assistant not only helps in small group teaching for pupils weak in the subject, she also helps to stretch the HAL. Another insight was that all parents were members of the PSG. Each had to contribute $200 or volunteer 20 hours of their time to help out in the school per year.

We all agreed that it was a well-spent and fulfilling morning. We gained deeper insight into St. Stephen’s school programmes and Let’s Decode. It is evident that the programme is a success at the school and the pupils have benefited richly.