Groundbreaking school readiness program will boost outcomes for vulnerable children

A new program is being trialled in five Y WA services, designed to give children from disadvantaged areas a ‘leg up’ in the critical years before school through teaching phonics and other pre-reading skills. 

As well as academics, the program supports children with social and emotional literacy skills, and will be rolled out across the Y WA’s 14 early childhood education and care (ECEC) services in 2024. 

Benchmark testing is built into the program to measure how children’s skills are developing. 

Y WA chief executive Tim McDonald said the program differs from other school readiness initiatives in that it has an explicit focus on developing oral language and vocabulary as precursors to reading.

“We’re doing it in a very structured, intentional teaching way,” Dr McDonald told The West Australian. “We have got great evidence and research behind what we’re doing.”

Despite the academic focus of the program, Dr McDonald said there has been no interruption to the typical play based learning which happens in services. Educators work to combine the children’s learning with typical daily activities in the service. 

Children also participate in formal and scripted lessons which teach them about language sounds, print awareness and knowledge of the alphabet. A shared reading approach is also used with children to engage them with books and stories. 

Dr McDonald believes the program will equip children with the skills and building blocks they need to be able to read and do maths when they enter compulsory schooling, along with the behaviours which enable learning, such as how to sit, listen and co-operate and follow instructions.

“We need to lessen the disadvantage gap in Australia by building the habits of behaviour that enable young children to learn,” he added. “The children that have these skills and habits as they enter formal schooling will learn and continue to learn. Those that can’t will not learn and fall further behind the children that can control their behaviour.”

To read the original coverage of this story please see here.