This week, the Queensland Department of Education released a statement announcing their new Commitment to Reading. Across state schools in Queensland, the department has committed to ensuring that all students are taught to read using consistent, evidence-based instruction, grounded in the science of reading.
This statement advocates for reading instruction that emphasises the explicit and systematic teaching of phonics, strengthens students’ vocabulary and language comprehension skills, and builds background knowledge.
The release was accompanied by a position statement, a literature review highlighting key components of quality reading instruction, a brochure for parents and carers, and an online portal of resources for educators. These changes will align with the Australian Curriculum version 9, due to roll out in 2025.
QUT’s Centre for Inclusive Education (C4IE) congratulates the Queensland Department of Education on what they have achieved through this statement and are in full support of their position. We agree that reading is a skill that must be explicitly taught and acknowledge the vast body of evidence in favour of a systematic, explicit approach to the teaching of reading.
When students do not acquire foundational reading skills, due to ineffective classroom instruction or to not receiving appropriate supplementary support, they miss out on crucial learning opportunities across the curriculum.
Recent research led by C4IE Director Professor Linda Graham highlighted the consequences of early reading difficulties going unidentified and unaddressed. In a study tracking 118 children from 7 QLD disadvantaged state schools in Grade 1 to 3, the team found children’s reading skills declined over time relative to age-norms, particularly in phonemic decoding, and that teachers were not accurately identifying children’s needs for reading support.
Queensland’s new Commitment to Reading and implementation of the screening tools and measures to support it, like the Year 1 Phonics Check, will help prevent reading difficulties, as well as assist teachers to quickly and accurately identify these difficulties when they emerge.
In the upper years of school, reading skills are still developing, as vocabulary becomes more complex and specific to different subject areas. C4IE researchers are currently investigating the reciprocal relationships between vocabulary knowledge and word-level reading, with preliminary findings indicating that better vocabulary is linked to stronger reading in subsequent years, and vice versa.
Findings such as this indicate the importance of high-quality Tier 1 classroom reading instruction, not only for beginning readers, but throughout the schooling years, and across all discipline areas.
Another current project led by the co-leader of C4IE’s Curriculum and Learning Program, Dr Callula Killingly, is investigating how middle and secondary school teachers approach reading instruction and support in their classrooms. If you are a teacher in Queensland, we want to hear from you!! Find out more about how to participate at this link.
Importantly, there are some students who continue to experience reading difficulties in these years, and who may benefit from high quality intervention and supports. Dr Killingly is also conducting a systematic review and meta-analysis to evaluate recent interventions for students in Grades 4-12 to determine the most effective ways to support older students with reading difficulties.
To find out more about the research on reading happening at C4IE, contact Dr Callula Killingly at c.killingly@qut.edu.au or Professor Linda Graham at linda.graham@qut.edu.au.
Dr Callula Killingly is a Postdoctoral Fellow on the Accessible Assessment ARC Linkage project. Her PhD was in cognitive psychology and her research interests include reading development and intervention, learning and memory processes, and overrepresentation in suspension and exclusion.
Professor Linda J. Graham is Director of The Centre for Inclusive Education (C4IE) and a Professor in the Faculty of Creative Industries, Education and Social Justice at QUT. Her research investigates the role of education policy and schooling practices in the development of disruptive student behaviour and the improvement of responses to children that teachers can find difficult to teach.
Thanks for the update?
Does anyone know who the panel of experts in literacy education were who composed the independent literature review into the teaching of reading for the DoE and if the same field experts composed the literature review?