Pre-requisites

ED920 Developmental Learning and Pedagogies
ED931 Curriculum, Assessment, Evidence and Data
2 Method units from separate streams

Co-requisites

None.

Learning Outcomes

On successful completion of this unit, the student will be able to:

• Demonstrate knowledge and understanding of literacy and numeracy teaching strategies and their application in teaching areas that differentiate teaching strategies to address diverse student learning needs, including those of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders.

• Critically analyse educational literature to identify how literacy and numeracy skills are embedded within and essential to the chosen teaching areas.

• Analyse the literacy and numeracy needs of students and apply expert judgement to plan ways in which these needs can be catered for in a diverse classroom.

• Create and critically evaluate assessment strategies to identify student literacy and numeracy needs relevant to the chosen teaching area.

• Critically reflect on every teacher’s responsibility to teach literacy and numeracy knowledge and skills.

• Critically apply reflexive practice to their own learning process and ongoing development as a teacher including their understanding of the Christian faith in the context of Christian worldview, Scriptures and broader vocation.

Unit Description

A strong foundation in literacy and numeracy is vital for every child and young person, and underpins their ability to engage in education, reach their potential, and to participate fully in the community. This leads to the ability to reason critically, to experiment, and to be resilient and persistent also support the development of literacy and numeracy. (Literacy and numeracy strategy, Victoria State Education and Training, 2017)

In this unit, Preservice teachers will examine the general and subject-specific literacy and numeracy knowledge and skills that need to be explicitly taught or implicitly present and modelled in the teaching of each curriculum area. The unit covers strategies for planning and embedding literacy and numeracy learning within all curriculum areas, with a specific focus on effective literacy and numeracy teaching relevant to their major and minor subject specialisations.

Topics

1. The language dimension of everyday life and why literacy is “across the curriculum”.
2. The changing role and responsibility of teachers for literature and numeracy: the Victorian Curriculum F-10 and Australian Curriculum General capabilities.
3. Ways of assessing literacy and numeracy and diagnosing needs.
4. How to teach reading attending to how the brain learns.
   i/ Explicit teaching practices for phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, comprehension and oral language.
   ii/ Reading and Writing instruction in specific discipline areas
5. Designing effective lessons to enhance literacies across the curriculum. The importance of vocabulary, and specific literacies involved the various discipline areas.
6. Supporting the use of texts in courses.
7. Understanding the numerical dimension of everyday life and why it is “across the curriculum”.
8. Strategies for explicitly teaching numeracy across curriculum including the progressive removal of scaffolding and problem solving and reasoning.
   i/ Problem-solving: The importance of independent problem solving once a student approaches proficiency (ie. After ample opportunities to practice progressively challenging tasks).
9. Understanding the range of knowledge, skills and elements of numerical competency.
   i/ 6 strands of mathematics: number, algebra, geometry, measurement, statistics and probability.
   ii/ 4 proficiencies: understanding, fluency, problem solving and reasoning.
10. Assessing literacy and numeracy competencies and identifying needs of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories, cultures and languages impact on numeracy.
11. Identifying the mathematical ideas and applying numerical ideas to solving and describing problems and language in texts.
12. Whole school approaches.

Learning Experiences

Topic 2: Understanding Research

Centre for Education Statistics and Evaluation (2016) How schools can improve literacy and numeracy performance and why it (still) matters. NSW Department of Education. www.cese.nsw.gov.au

de Bruin K, Kestel E, Francis M, Forgasz H and Fries R (2023), Supporting students significantly behind in literacy and numeracy: a review of evidence-based approaches, edresearch.edu.au

Moats L C (2020). Teaching Reading Is Rocket Science: What Expert Teachers of Reading Should Know and Be Able to Do. American Federation of Teachers. https:// www.aft.org/ae/summer2020/moats

Choose one of the above research reports or another one provided by the lecturer. Read the research and create a summary. As a class discuss the significance of explicit literacy and numeracy instruction to improve academic performance and engagement.

Discussion Board: In what ways does this research and your discussion suggest that the role and responsibilities of the teacher is changing?

Topic 4 Micro-Lesson (cc2.4.1, 2.4.3 3.2.3)
Part 1 Design a 15-minute literacy micro-lesson in a subject area of your choice. In groups of 3 select a topic and design a micro-lesson incorporating: - structured lesson - clear instruction - effective questioning - reduced cognitive load - specific feedback.

The literacy lesson must include explicit reading and writing skills that are relate to the subject area.

Part 2 Teach Micro-lesson Each group delivers their 10-minute micro-lesson to peers, who act as age appropriate students. Peers provide specific, positive feedback (e.g., “Your question about the /s/ sound really engaged us!”) and one suggestion for improvement.

Lecturer observes and provides feedback, focusing on the pedagogical practices.

Students reflect individually (5 minutes) on how their delivery focused on literacy learning within their chosen subject area.

Topic 7: Research Readings Goos, M, and O’Sullivan K (2022), Numeracy Across the Curriculum, Retreived from https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190264093.013.1530

Forgasz, Helen J., Gilah Leder, and Jennifer Hall. “Numeracy Across the Curriculum in Australian Schools: Teacher Education Students’ and Practicing Teachers’ Views and Understandings of Numeracy.” Numeracy 10, Iss. 2 (2017): Article 2. DOI:http://doi.org/10.5038/1936-4660.10.2.2

Using the readings above, write a 300-word blog post on Numeracy as a fundamental component of learning across the curriculum. These posts will be read and discussed in class.

Topic 8 From modelling to Independence

1. In Groups, PSTs are given a scenario card that specifies:
   - Year level
   - Curriculum content descriptor
   - Numeracy skill in context

PSTs identify:
- The underlying mathematical concepts
- The discipline-specific application

1. PSTs use the “I do - we do - you do” model to plan explicit instruction of the identified mathematical concepts within the context of the subject discipline.

Including:
- mathematical thinking prompts
- General thinking skills
- link to the Australian Curriculum numeracy progression.

1. Micro-teaching opportunity. PSTs choose one group member to be the teacher who teachers the lesson sequence:
   - 2 - 3 minutes per stage of scaffolding
   - include intentional fading of supports

2. Reflect as a group on the process.

Consider:
- Clarity
- Appropriateness of scaffolding and pace of removal.
- Integration of mathematical thinking prompts.

1. Write an individual reflection:
   - how they balance concept and skill teaching.
   - what they learnt about scaffold removal timing.

Topic 8a: Tiered Problem-solving tasks Objective: Students experience and practice problem solving at different levels of expertise.

Task: Divide the class into groups and assign each group a label (novice, intermediate, expert) Provide each group with a complex task. The novice group’s task includes detailed instructions and significant scaffolding. The intermediate group’s task has less scaffolding, encouraging more independent problem solving. The expert group’s task is open-ended, and no guidance is given.

The groups are given time to complete their task. Once the time is finished, the class discusses the following:

How did the level of scaffolding impact learning and the completion of the task? What were some of the learning strategies employed? How do we support students to develop their problem-solving skills?

Topic 9

Pre-service teachers will identify their own levels of understanding and gaps in numeracy and literacy skills through a testing process, analysis of their results and subsequent development of a plan to target and improve in the areas of need:

1) In the first week of class you will complete a series of adult numeracy and literacy assessment tests. 2) Following careful analysis of your own results, you will contribute to a class discussion on strategies to support your own growth and improvement in the areas of weakness. 3) Using this information, you will design your own intervention plan in the form of a project. 4) You will set short and long-term goals and prepare a weekly schedule of activities to improve your levels of numeracy and literacy. 5) You will share these ideas with the class. 6) By the completion of this unit, you will be required to provide evidence of improvement in your targeted areas.

The project will be an annotated record of the weekly work you undertake, and a final test to demonstrate improvements in understanding.

---

Unit offerings

Please note

The Unit Offerings listed above are a guide only and the timetable for any year is the final authority. The College may vary offerings based on demand, regulatory requirements, continual improvement processes or other conditions.

This unit may be available in different modes of delivery i.e. online and face-to-face as listed above. The unit content will not differ between these modes of delivery. There will possibly be a difference in the schedule and/or the prescribed assessment tasks, however both will cover and assess the same content.