23 May 2005
Reading Recovery tutors look to future in annual workshop
Helping the children in Reading Recovery who need longer-term literacy support is a topic under discussion this week at
a gathering of the country’s Reading Recovery tutors – those who teach teachers in schools to work with individual
children. Reading Recovery is an intensive reading and writing programme for six year-olds and typically involves 20
weeks of work with an individual child.
The annual Reading Recovery Tutor Development Week is taking place at the Faculty of Education, University of Auckland,
hosted by the National Reading Recovery Centre. Twenty-nine tutors are meeting on the Epsom campus for four days of
intensive professional development in workshops and presentations.
Dame Marie Clay, the founder of Reading Recovery, will lead a discussion on an article “The two positive outcomes of
reading recovery”, about to be published in the Journal of Reading Recovery in the United States.
“In Reading Recovery, the first positive outcome is to prepare a very high proportion of children to work effectively
back in their classroom programmes. But not every child can achieve this in a limited number of lessons – a small number
need ongoing individual lessons.
“Therefore, the second positive outcome is that we are able to identify clearly for schools within the 20 weeks of
intensive tuition, the children who will need continuing help,” she says.
Two years ago Dame Marie instigated a panel in Washington DC of international Reading Recovery trainers, to discuss ways
of successfully bridging children from early intervention to further assistance.
“We are going to study what the Americans are doing, not with the intention of copying them but to make us think hard
about how we deal with the issue here. The solutions will not be the same.”
In New Zealand, it is most common for children to be referred to Resource Teachers of Literacy, specialised teachers
working with older children. There are questions about whether the continuing provision is sufficient yet, says Dame
Marie, and there is a particular challenge to help rural schools.
“There needs to be several different kinds of continuing provision, and schools must become good at working out what
will be needed for their pupils. What must be stressed is the importance of transferring quickly to another source of
help so that what the children have already learned in Reading Recovery is not lost during weeks or months of waiting.”
At the conference participants will also hear about the Government’s literacy strategy priorities in 2005, and
highlights of a major research project on the effectiveness of Reading Recovery for Maori and Pasifika children
presented by NZCER researchers.
A feature of the week, says Chris Boocock, Acting Head of the National Reading Recovery Centre, is for participants to
observe and discuss live Reading Recovery lessons. Observation of lessons behind a one-way screen is a core component of
Reading Recovery training at all levels.
“The week is highly valued by the tutors as their chance once a year to closely scrutinise theory, practice and the
latest research as it impacts on children’s progress in learning to read and write.”
ENDS