Term 4 Newsletter Week 3 2025

This week, we're excited to share Part B, which continues to explore practical strategies to help every child build strong foundations for reading and writing.

At school, teachers and speech pathologists work closely together to support every child's journey into reading. One of the most powerful ways we can help children build strong early literacy skills is through shared reading, reading a book together while talking about what's happening, pointing to words, and exploring sounds and letters.

The Department of Education's video “Supporting all learners through shared reading" highlights simple but effective strategies that families and educators can use to build these foundational skills.

During shared reading, we can observe what a child finds easy or challenging. For example, tracking words from left to right, identifying sounds in words, or recognising letters. What we do next, in response to what we see, has the greatest impact on a child's learning.

Here are a few easy ways you can support your child at home:

• Track the words together: As you read, point to each word from left to right. This helps your child learn that print has direction and meaning.
• Play with syllables: Try clapping out the beats in words like family (fa–mi–ly). This builds awareness of how words are made up of parts.
• Listen for sound:. Ask questions like, “What's the first sound in chook?" (/ch/). Talk about the sounds you hear and model them clearly.
• Spot letters: Look for letters in words and name them together - “Can you find the letter 'h' in have?"

 These small, everyday moments add up to big learning. When families and educators use consistent, responsive strategies like these, children strengthen the skills that underpin reading and writing success."

Here is the video for Part B of this series: