Last Friday the Government announced that all New Zealand Schools will be teaching Structured Literacy by the beginning of 2025

As many of you will be aware Darfield Primary School began investigating this approach three years ago.  We began our journey with our Pikopiko Team (New Entrant to Year 2 Students) and then spread the practice across our whole school.  We have already invested a lot of time and money into learning more about Structured Literacy and we are thrilled that the Ministry of Education will be providing some future funding to support our school's ongoing implementation of this approach.  

The PTA has also supported us in implementing this approach by supporting the purchase of many decodable reading books - a cornerstone of this programme.

Currently, we are implementing Structured Literacy across our whole school to ensure all of our students are thoroughly familiar with their letter sounds, blends, and spelling patterns.  Our aim is that in the future our students will receive Structured Literacy in their early years so that they can become really confident readers and writers as they progress through the school.

Below are some of the many ways we are implementing Structured Literacy - including our teachers learning from experts, students learning in a class or with a teacher aide, students learning from each other and students practicing their new words.