An Outline of the 2002 Programmes – Foundation Learning

For children to succeed in their later education, they must have gained a strong foundation in literacy and numeracy and become confident learners as a result of their early childhood education and during their first four years at school. Progress in these early years is critical. Howard Fancy (2001). Departmental Forecast Report 2001/2002. Wellington: Ministry of Education.

Foundation Learning
Early Childhood Education (ECE)	For 2002, early childhood professional development contractors will continue to provide national opportunities for all ECE teachers. The contractors are expected to focus on the implementation of Te Whāriki, the Revised Statement of Desirable Objectives and Practices, Special Education 2000, and The Quality Journey: He Haerenga Whai Hua (available from Learning Media Customer Services, item 23827). The Ministry intends to encourage professional development programmes that reflect the key government policy directions. These programmes will include a focus on early literacy and numeracy, quality pedagogical practice, effective personnel management, and kaupapa Māori in mainstream early childhood education.
Literacy Leadership	The national professional development programme that commenced in 2000 will continue in 2002. This programme enhances the professional leadership in literacy provided by principals and strengthens the role of teachers who provide literacy leadership in schools. It provides a mentoring programme for leaders in schools that enables them to make sustainable changes to teacher practice and also to provide materials to help teachers to deliver their literacy programme. For further information contact Lyn Bareta at Learning Media Limited. telephone: (04) 472 5522 email: lyn@learningmedia.co.nz Opportunities for secondary principals and their senior management teams to participate in Literacy Leadership workshops are being planned for 2002. More details will be provided later in the year.
Numeracy	2002 is the second year in a five-year professional development strategy to improve the teaching of mathematics in New Zealand schools. The Early Numeracy Project – years 1 – 3 will continue, with places for a further one thousand teachers. Smaller schools in rural regions will be encouraged to consider a whole-school development. The Advanced Numeracy Project – years 4 – 6 will be available to about 2200 teachers in schools that participated in the Early Numeracy Project this year. The Numeracy Pilot Project – years 7 – 8 builds on the Early and Advanced projects, and will be limited to teachers from those schools that are retaining or enrolling year 7 students who have participated in the Advanced Numeracy Project this year. A limited number of new places will be available in the Numeracy Exploratory Study – years 9 – 10. All the numeracy projects will continue be coordinated by the School Support Services.
Learning Through Language	The Learning Through Language programme has been used successfully in many secondary schools over the past decade. It is currently being developed into a series of modules to underpin a professional development programme that will be offered to secondary schools in 2002. Schools will receive further information about Learning Through Language in term 4 2001.
Enhancing Education for NESB Students	Another component of the literacy strategy, the professional development programmes for teachers of NESB (non-English-speaking-background) students, aims to develop effective teaching strategies to improve both English language proficiency and learning across the curriculum. Further information about the 2002 programmes will be published later in the year.

 

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