Leading Literacy Data Gathering and Analysis

Session 1: Welcome and Overview to Module 3

Session 2: Round Table Discussion

This session was designed to allow Principals to share what happened in their schools when they undertook the homework tasks from Modules 1 and 2.

Session 3: Principals Leading Literacy Learning: Data Gathering Around the Dimensions of the Leadership for Learning Blueprint (Neil Dempster)

Neil distributed a booklet titled Evidence and Ideas Gathering Techniques for School Leaders which contains a range of ways Principals can gather data in their school.

In this session, Neil highlighted particular pages which were linked to the processes of data gathering for each dimension of the Leadership for Learning Blueprint. (couldnt find link)

The examples Neil used were:

Page  5: How strong is the school’s evidence base?
Page  7: Examining aspects of the school’s moral purpose
Page  8: Judging the quality of professional development
Page  9: Understanding conditions for learning
Page 13: Understanding orientations to the school’s curriculum and to children’s teaching and learning
Page 16: Finding out about parent and community connections
Page 17: Example of a survey tool for parent and community connections
Pages 18 & 19: Examining distributed or shared leadership

Neil then shared a number of examples of data gathering that had been developed and used by Principals who had been involved in previous PALL programs.

The examples provided illustrated each dimension of the Leadership for Learning Blueprint.

Principals were given time to discuss each sheet and ways they would use it or modify it for their own schools.

Neil did not have time to use every example but they have been included as relevant examples of data collection around the Leadership for Learning Blueprint.

To assist Principals find each relevant sheet throughout the session, a colour code was used and they are as follows:

Professional Development and Curriculum Teaching (Bright Green sheet)
Conditions for Learning  (Blue sheet)
Curriculum and Teaching Example 1  (Gold sheet)
Curriculum and Teaching Example 2  (Cream sheet)
Curriculum and Teaching Example 3  (Lilac sheet)
Shared Leadership  (White sheet)
Connecting with Parent and Community Support (Pink sheet)
Who Does What in Reading Assessment (White sheet)
A Classroom Reading Assessment Calendar (White sheet)

Session 4: Leading Literacy Assessment for Diagnostic Teaching

During this presentation a range of reading assessment processes for each of the Big Six were handed out to Principals.

1. ORAL LANGUAGE

Assessments

• Oral Language Assessment
• Class Overview – Student Receptive and Expressive Language Checklist
• Teaching Rating of Oral Language and Literacy (TROLL)

2. PHONOLOGICAL AWARENESS

Assessments

• Sutherland Phonological Awareness Test – Revised
• The Yopp-Singer Test of Phoneme Segmentation
• Bruce’s Word Analysis Test
• Assessing Phonological Skills

3. LETTER SOUND RELATIONSHIPS (PHONICS)

Assessments

• Decoding Checklist
• The Non-word Reading Test / The Regularity Test
• Alphacheck

4. VOCABULARY

Assessments

• Teacher Developed Vocabulary Assessment
• Vocabulary: Production / Antonyms / Synonyms / Score Sheet
• Oxford Word List

5. FLUENCY

Assessments

• Assessing Fluency
• Assessing Prosody

6. COMPREHENSION

Assessments

• Assessing Comprehension of Text
• Simple Formative Reading Survey
• Oral Reading Fluency and Basic Word Identification Skills

Appraisal of Standardised Tests

Anne Bayetto provided this tool for Principals to use to appraise the relevancy of any standardised tests they were using or considering using in their school. The appraisal helps Principals with issues of validity, reliability, percentile scores and standardised scores.

In Deslea’s PowerPoint slides 60 to 65 she highlights what teachers can do if children are experiencing difficulties in any of the Big Six. Anne adapted and extended this original concept from the PALL Pilot Project in the form of a rubric which was handed out to Principals to use with their staff.

If Students are … then they need

This has been designed to support teachers to know what practical strategies they can use to support students who are experiencing difficulties in the areas of Oral Language, Phonological Awareness, Letter-Sound Knowledge, High Frequency Sight Words, Vocabulary, Comprehension and Fluency.

Session 5: Leading Literacy Assessment for Diagnostic Teaching

Neil provided a one page sheet which was originally developed by the Cambridge University Assessment for Learning Network. It sets out the role and responsibilities of both Principals and Classroom Teachers in the development of a whole school reading assessment plan.

Who does what in reading assessment?