Literacy and Numeracy

At Totara Grove School, we believe in a balanced approach to both literacy and numeracy.  These are taught daily. All learners are unique individuals who deserve a differentiated rather than a one size fits all approach to their education.  

Literacy

Our school is very grateful to be supported by literacy expert Louise Dempsey who provides outstanding professional development to our teachers to ensure we are using best practice pedagogies in literacy.  Here is a link to Louise's Literacy Place website  https://www.theliteracyplace.com/.  Along with Sheena Cameron, Louise has authored several best selling books in literacy that we also use to guide our teaching and learning including; The Writing Book, The Reading Book, The Poetry Book and The Oral Language Book.

In the Teina Y1-3 area of our school we use Yolanda Soryl's Primary Phonics to enhance our teaching and student learning.  All of our junior teachers attend professional development courses in phonics to support their learning and knowledge as well  https://yolandasoryl.com/

In the Tuakana Y4-6 area of our school we use Joy Allcock's research and resources to support our teachers with student learning and developmentt in phonics and spelling https://joyallcock.co.nz/

Numeracy

As part of our balanced approach to teaching maths at Totara Grove School, teachers include the following in their classroom programmes:

*Number

*Algebra

*Geometry

*Measurement

*Statistics

In our Tuakana team, we also use Maths Whizz to help accelerate students' learning in maths.  Maths Whizz provides effective learning for students in a wide range of maths contexts  https://whizz.com/