Building
professional capability: the literacy network
The Literacy Strategy recognises that the most important factor in a student's learning is the quality of interaction between the student and the teacher. Teacher capability is influenced by the quality of governance, management, and leadership within the school as well as by the quality of support available to the teacher from a network of advisers, consultants, and facilitators. It is important that the members of this network are both expert and experienced.
There are three main providers of support for school and classroom literacy policies and practices. They advise and assist principals, literacy leaders, and teachers. They are:
- the resource teachers: literacy (RT:Lits);
- the literacy advisers based with School Support Services;
- the Literacy Leadership facilitators.
Their work adds to and is complemented by that of other specialists, including: the Reading Recovery tutors, who deliver specific intervention for students needing a programme beyond that offered in the classroom; the resource teachers: learning and behaviour (RT:LBs); and the speech-language therapists.
The resource teachers: literacy
Each RT:Lit works with a cluster of schools to help the principals and literacy leaders to monitor and maintain effective practice. They provide general advice and support, and they advise on interventions to meet the needs of specific students. They also provide expert tuition for a small group of students from each school in the cluster. The RT:Lits will continue to develop their familiarity with the policies and programmes operating in each of their cluster schools.
The literacy advisers
The School Support literacy advisers are employed by the colleges/schools of education. Their main focus is on classroom practice. They run workshops and provide in-class modelling of aspects of effective literacy practice for all students, including Māori, Pasifika, and NESB students in the mainstream. For example, they can help to select a pathway of texts to meet the instructional needs of specific children. They support teachers in primary and secondary schools to develop a literacy plan, adopt new practices, and gain a deeper understanding of specific strategies.
The Literacy Leadership facilitators
The Literacy Leadership facilitators are engaged by Learning Media
Limited to implement a national professional development programme
to help principals and literacy leaders lead, manage, and sustain
change in their schools. For more details, see the Literacy
Leadership programme for primary schools.
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Effective professional development for teachers
There is clear evidence that effective professional development needs to:
- establish links between theory and practice;
- be relevant to and owned by teachers and focus on their everyday concerns;
- involve "situated" learning, that is, learning located in the real world of teachers.
Effective professional development leads ultimately to a change in teachers' knowledge, beliefs, and expectations so that pedagogical practice is modified and transformed.
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