At the heart of our Junior School’s mission is a commitment to nurturing confident, curious and capable readers. Teaching children to read is far more than decoding words – it’s about guiding them to become meaning makers and critical thinkers who can engage deeply with texts and the world around them.
This term began with a powerful professional learning experience for our entire Junior School teaching team, from ELC to Year 6. During our Staff Conference Day, we engaged in a two-hour workshop led by our Literacy Leader of Learning, Paula Heenan. The session focussed on deepening our collective understanding of the complexities involved in teaching reading and reaffirmed our shared commitment to literacy instruction.
Central to our approach is the Active View of Reading model, as described by Nell Duke and Kelly Cartwright. This model recognises reading as a dynamic and multifaceted process. It emphasises the importance of active self-regulation, motivation and engagement, and strategic thinking. These elements interact with and influence both word recognition and language comprehension. This framework, which aligns to our school’s strategic priority of Personalised Learning, allows us to be responsive to our students’ diverse needs and ensures that our instruction is both evidence-informed and student-centred.
Within the domain of word recognition, phonics knowledge plays a vital role – but it is important to acknowledge that it sits within a broader category that includes other essential components such as phonological awareness, orthographic knowledge and fluency. Our commitment is to address all elements of reading instruction, not privileging one over another, but ensuring a comprehensive approach that meets the needs of every learner.
In the Junior School, every teacher is a committed teacher of literacy. Our ongoing professional learning ensures that our educators are equipped with the knowledge, tools and strategies to support all learners effectively. By engaging with the Active View of Reading, we are not only enhancing our instructional practices but also demystifying the current rhetoric around how reading should be taught. We move beyond oversimplified views and embrace the complexity and richness of reading development.
As David Pearson (an emeritus faculty member in the School of Education at the University of California, Berkeley) reminds us, ‘The ultimate goal of reading is not to decode words, but to understand and use what we read.’ This quote underscores the importance of meaning-making as the central purpose of reading, while also reminding us that decoding and comprehension are interdependent processes – each requiring thoughtful, intentional instruction.
To continue this conversation, Paula will lead a professional reading group for teachers working in Prep to Year 2, centred around the work of Heidi Anne Mesmer, specifically her book Letter Lessons and First Words. This initiative will further support our shared understanding of early reading development and strengthen our collective capacity to teach foundational literacy with precision and care.
Emma Chiera
Deputy Head of Junior School – Personalised Learning
