Highland Literacy Project and Reading

[JennyPen]

The school my dd daughter goes to uses the highland literacy project to teach reading. It focuses on learning the word rather than reading the word. It hugely focuses on comprehension of all books, fiction/non-fiction and is in line with the new scottish curriculum for excellence which is now in place.

Do any teachers out there have experience of this? is this a good thing?

My dd is 6 and is becoming quite a good reader now. she reads herself every night, loves books about mischievious girls, but is still reading the early easy chapter books. she loves the kitty books by bel mooney which someone previously on here suggested to me. She loves the daisy books by kes gray. at school she is very bored with her reading but it is her homework and i encourage her(and tell her) she has to do it. She unfortunately is on biff and chip but presently is reading non fiction which is boring her.

The other issue that I wanted to ask about is the literacy project only allows for 3 reading groups in the class, out of 30. so dd has 12 in her group and because within this group(which is the top group i think)the children range from ort stage 6 to ort stage 10 they have to meet in the middle and all do the same book. one day 6 read and discuss with the teacher and the next they do paired reading. is this a good way of learning?

So, a bit long winded but anyone have any thoughts? Dd is basically able to read ort stage 10/11 but is presently reading 6/7 so I wondered if I should discuss that with the teacher?? What would you do??

I am not sure why you think it focuses on 'learning the word rather than reading the word' and I'm nopt sure what you mean by that.

Doesn't the school also teach Jolly pHOnics in P1-3?

The children will still be taught to decode through a separate programme such as JP, I would imagine. The HLP then provides a framework to teaching comprehension.

The HLP pulls a lot of techniques and resources together and it's a good framework, yes.

It recommends three groups because any more than that becomes unmanageable. You say the teacher works with a group of 6 at a time - yes, this sounds like a very good way of doing it. It is easy to focus on 6 children and pick up where their strengths and weaknesses lie.

Your dd should also have the opportunity to choose and read non-ORT books which she may find more enjoyable. I wouldn't worry that the ORT book is a little 'easy'. It is how the book is used during the group session that is important. And lots of class reading work doe snot focus on teh scheme book.

Thanks for reply, thats all reassuring.

I wasn't sure what it meant either, its just the way the teacher explained the method of reading!

Yes, teaches phonics also which dd does really well with.