Curriculum

Common Instructional Model

At Bagdad Primary School we believe in a consistent, explicit and quality approach to teaching our students. The Bagdad Primary School Common Instructional Model was co-designed by all staff and is used in the explicit teaching of all lessons across our school. Our common instructional practices are evident in the clear display of learning intentions and success criteria, explicit instruction, guiding questions and celebrations of learning.

Teaching of Fluency

Fluency is a vital component of reading instruction as it has a strong relationship with reading comprehension. When students read fluently, they have reached a level of automaticity that enables them to focus on meaning rather than decoding words.

Research has shown that students comprehend better when they are more fluent and are likewise more fluent if they comprehend the text.

At Bagdad Primary School fluency is taught explictly each day in our morning literacy block. During this time students will be taught fluency through 4 main reading techniquies including Choral, Repeated , Echo and Cloze.

Teaching of Word Recognition (Phonemic awareness, Phonics, Morphology and Etymology)

At Bagdad Primary School we use PLD (Promoting Literacy Development) as our school wide word recognition approach. PLD is an evidence based, multisensory structured synthetic phonic program, which promotes literacy, oral language and motor/movement, being maximised when used together to target student learning.

At Bagdad Primary, we believe phonics is taught so students can become confident lifelong learners in reading, spelling and writing. Teacher knowledge and understanding of effective pedagogy is crucial to empower students to deepen their knowledge and skills across learning contexts. We understand that phonics is best delivered in an explicit and structured manner, as per the PLD teaching manual sequence. Teachers use agreed assessment screeners which target differentiation of student phonic need for both reading and spelling.

Because we understand word recognition is very important you will see…

All students, K-6 engage in phonic lessons daily.
All teachers following the PLD sequence/student common errors format (spelling).
Supporting resources being used and displayed.
Phonics imbedded into reading and spelling.
Differentiated groups across classes.
Consistent language being used when teaching digraphs, trigraphs, split digraphs etc.
K-2 using hands on materials when teaching phonics.

Click here for more information on PLD

Readers Workshop

At Bagdad Primary School we believe reading is an important component of our teaching practice to support students to become life-long readers. The Readers Workshop model gives learners opportunities to engage with a variety of quality texts and to follow reading interests which supports them to become motivated and self-directed readers. As educators, we provide opportunities for all learners to read and view for a range of reasons, particularly enjoyment, building upon fluency, comprehension skills and curriculum knowledge.

The teaching of reading through Readers Workshop is underpinned by our school Common Instructional Model which uses the Gradual Release of Responsibility model (I do/we do/you do).

Click here to view more information via the DECYP Literacy Page

Home Reading

At Bagdad Primary School, home reading is an important part of supporting students reading development to become independent readers. By having a school wide home reading program, we foster the opportunity for students to share their learning with their families and practice skills and strategies they are being taught at school.

Home reading is used as a tool to continue to develop and strengthen students’ language, fluency, decoding and vocabulary skills and develop a love for reading and sharing of books.

All Kindergarten to Year 6 students will be engaging in home reading by the end of week 2 term 1.
Prep – Year 2 home reading focus is decoding skills.
Year 3-6 students can choose library books as home readers or engage in SORA once decoding/blending/whole word reading skills are mastered.
Students receive a book prize and certificate for reading for 50, 100, 150, 200, 250 nights. Certificates for 100, 200 and 300 nights are handed out in assemblies.

Term Overview – Class and Specialists Teachers

The Term Overview provides an snapshot of what is being taught in your child’s class for the term in all curriculum area. This is sent out to all parents at the beginning of each term and display on the classroom message board.