Literacy at HPS

We believe reading is a fundamental life skill, enabling students to participate fully in the world around them.

Beginning in prep we teach all students using a structured synthetic phonics program, in which students explicitly learn to blend and segment letter sounds to read and write.

We focus on phonemic awareness, phonics, vocabulary development, fluency and comprehension in our literacy sessions.

Throughout the school we use explicit teaching and daily reviews to build reading and spelling skills. We use the PhOrMeS program to build morphological and etymology knowledge to understand the structure and history of words.

Under the guidance of the teacher, students explore a wide range of texts including fiction and non fiction. Students use texts to understand the world around them and to read for enjoyment. Students develop writing skills enabling them to write to persuade, inform or entertain.

Teachers use assessment to target learning to meet students’ needs.

At the heart of it all, teachers at Healesville Primary School aim to meet the needs of every one of their students.