See PLD website (12 June) for more details.

The Minister of Education announced on 2 May 2024, $67 million in new funding for professional learning and development (PLD) and teaching resources in structured teaching approaches over the next four years. $54.436 million of funding will be for PLD and will initially be available (terms 3 and 4 this year) to year 0–3 teachers, beginning with those who have not yet had any training in structured teaching approaches. It will extend to year 4–6 teachers once the year 0–3 teacher cohort is covered.

PLD will run over three consecutive terms, with 3 day of facilitated workshops and then 8 Community of Practice sessions over the three terms. There will be two cohorts, one starting in Term 3 and running to end of Term 1 next year, and the second cohort starting in Term 4 and running to end of Term 2 next year.

For PLD for Teacher Aides you can access the Teacher Aide PLD fund that was negotiated as part of the Collective agreement. See pld website for more details. Not all training must be completed by 31 December 2024.

PLD is being provided by external providers. Approved providers are listed on the MOE PLD website.

There are two opportunities for schools to secure PLD for Year 0–3 teachers who have had no prior training.

Either from one of a selection of providers or, from the Better Start Literacy Approach (BSLA) run by the University of Canterbury.

So schools DO NOT have to do BSLA training. This might have been unclear to some schools.

The timing of the two rounds of applications is staggered, with applications for BSLA PLD opening earlier, on May 6, and closing 30 May 30, with decisions communicated to schools 14 June.

Then applications for the second round of Other providers open on 18 June and close 1 July (for Cohort 1 applications).

Prospective PLD providers and their facilitators went through a procurement process (advertised to existing Ministry accredited PLD providers on 26 May).

They had to be already accredited PLD providers with the Ministry.

Those providers submitted a proposal and a panel then assessed against them against a set of criteria. This included determining the depth of expertise and understanding of the science and teaching practice behind a structured literacy approach of each facilitator.

The working definition of Structured Literacy set out by the Ministry is:

"The elements of structured literacy approaches, including: 

• phonemic awareness, 

• systematic synthetic phonics teaching and knowledge, 

• using a scope and sequence, 

• fluency, 

• comprehension, 

• oral language, 

• vocabulary, 

• handwriting, 

• syntax, and

• text structure for the purpose of reading and writing".

The teaching principles include:

• explicit and intentional teaching, including being systematic, precise, repeated and varied,

• cumulative, 

• diagnostic, responsive, based on formative assessment leading to reteaching when necessary, and

• gradual release of responsibility."

Approved providers (for Term 3) are listed on MoE PLD website.

Read our Post on Finding a Structured Literacy PLD provider and our post on Assessing Evidence-Based Claims.

We have also compiled this table setting out all the workshops offered by each of the approved PLD providers for Cohort 1 (term 3) and Cohort 2 (term 4)

If you are new to Structured Literacy, check out our ‘Explainer’ on what Structured Literacy is, and watch the linked video.

Applications for funding are made to the Ministry of Education. These have now closed for Cohort 1 (starting in Term 3).

Applications for Cohort 2 (to commence in term 4) are expected to open in early September. See PLD website.

Once your application has been approved by the MOE, you can then contact your preferred approved provider to discuss enrolling staff with them. For Cohort 1 this needs to be done by 31 July.