Support for Ministry of Education’s New Approach for Dyslexia

Friday 31 July, 2020. View pdf here.

Support for Ministry of Education's new approach to dyslexia

A lobby group advocating for change to the way children are taught to read, Lifting Literacy Aotearoa, is applauding the Ministry of Education’s new website on teaching dyslexic children.

A survey done by the group in June on the state of dyslexia education in NZ heard from 680 parents and teachers. The results showed that 80% of parents did not feel that teachers are adequately trained or resourced to support students with dyslexia and a staggering 95% of teachers did not feel that their initial teaching training or in service training adequately prepared them to identify and support dyslexic children.

The website, https://www.inclusive.tki.org.nz/guides/dyslexia-and-learning, offers information and resources which are in line with what science tells us is best practice for learning to read and write.

The group is now urging the Ministry to take further steps and support these resources with training for all teachers and to extend the approach to all students - not just those with dyslexia.

They also recommend this work be guided by an Expert Advisory Group comprising practitioners, researchers, and speech language therapists.

Neuroscience has for decades shown that the brain learns to read best if it follows a structured literacy approach, where children are first taught letter sounds, or phonemes, in a specific order.

It is supported by using reading books known as decodable texts which support this sequence. This is particularly important for dyslexic children.

For too long the New Zealand education system has not followed a science of reading approach, using a bit of phonics and a bit of whole language, known as the three cueing system.

This has not worked at all for at least 15 percent of children, and is hampering the potential of many others.

“We applaud the Ministry of Education for looking at the science and following an evidence-based approach. The science works for all children, and if more teachers follow this approach more children will learn to read and write. It’s that simple.” Carla McNeil, a literacy consultant and former school Principal, who provided advice to the Ministry last year on the science of reading and is a member of Lifting Literacy Aotearoa.

Lifting Literacy Aotearoa would like to see a structured literacy approach used to teach all children entering the New Zealand education system, not just as an intervention for those diagnosed with dyslexia.

“Introducing the science of reading and structured literacy as the primary approach in the Dyslexia Kete is a great start. Now the Ministry must turn their minds to how to train teachers with urgency. They must also lead the way and encourage schools to adopt structured literacy across the entire school so that every student has the best literacy instruction possible. This is not just about dyslexic children, it’s about lifting literacy in New Zealand. It’s about creating brighter futures for all our children.” Alice Wilson, Lifting Literacy Aotearoa Steering Group Member.

We encourage all school leaders and teachers to look at this website and understand how the Science of Reading works.

Lifting Literacy Aotearoa supported a petition, which was presented to Parliament in June 2020 and referred to the Education Select Committee, calling for teachers to be trained to teach reading in an evidence-based way.

[ENDS]