What underpins our structured literacy approaches courses?
By Kaye Brunton on May 14, 2025 in Local curriculum design
How curriculum-first design and evidence-informed practice are helping schools accelerate learning
If your school is focused on ensuring every learner can access the curriculum at their year level, structured literacy approaches are likely high on your priority list. With the refreshed English learning area in the refreshed New Zealand Curriculum, school leaders are looking for PLD that helps teachers teach more deliberately — and with greater impact.
That’s why we’ve developed our structured literacy approaches courses: two Ministry-approved, curriculum-aligned, evidence-informed professional learning opportunities — one for Years 0–8 and one for Years 7–8. Each is designed to build teacher capability to plan, assess, and teach oral language, reading, and writing in a way that accelerates learning and deepens confidence.
This is not a programme to implement. It’s professional learning designed to strengthen the expertise of the people who teach.
Curriculum first — always
Our structured literacy approaches courses are built on the structure and intent of the English learning area in the refreshed New Zealand Curriculum. Teachers work with the refreshed English learning area — not in parallel to it. Each course supports participants to use the Understand - Know - Do framework, analyse progress using curriculum phase guidance, and plan explicitly using sequence statements and progress outcomes.
Rather than introducing a new programme, the courses help teachers get more from what they already have. We show how to integrate familiar texts — School Journals, Junior Journals, Ready to Read — more effectively, and how to use Tāhūrangi tools and exemplars to guide instruction.
Two pathways, tailored to need
Our structured literacy approaches courses are offered in two streams. Both are structured across three workshops, with a Community of Practice (CoP) for supported planning and reflection.
The Years 0–8 course is ideal for teachers across the primary range, including those leading literacy. Workshops focus on curriculum understanding, reading and spelling, and composition — drawing clear links across strands and phases.
The Years 7–8 course responds to the needs of teachers supporting older learners. These sessions go deeper into oral language development, sentence structure, cross-curricular writing, and responsive teaching for a wide range of readiness levels.
In both courses, participants apply their learning between workshops, returning to refine their practice with peer feedback and facilitator support.
What teachers walk away with
These courses equip teachers to make informed, confident decisions about what students need to learn, when, and how. Every session is hands-on and grounded in classroom reality.
Teachers leave with:
Structured planning tools aligned with Te Mātaiaho
Templates and models for oral language, reading, spelling, and writing
Assessment guidance to identify next steps and monitor progress
Tools for universal, group, and targeted instruction
Practical strategies for accelerating learning — including for students who are not yet at curriculum level
This is not a top-up. It’s a deepening of practice that supports impact from day one.
Evidence-informed - and deeply practical
The course content draws from a wide evidence base — not just in reading research, but in learning science. Facilitators work alongside teachers to unpack and apply key frameworks:
The Simple View of Reading and Scarborough’s Reading Rope, used to plan instruction that targets both decoding and comprehension
The Writing Rope, which supports instruction across transcription, fluency, sentence structure and composition
Cognitive Load Theory, applied to manage complexity in lesson design
The Gradual Release of Responsibility, woven throughout workshop design
The Science of Learning, including spaced practice, retrieval, and interleaving
These aren't referenced for credibility — they’re used for planning, sequencing, and targeting. For example, when discussing fluency, we explore how it draws on vocabulary, background knowledge, decoding, and oral prosody — and what to do when one of those strands is underdeveloped.
Oral language is a key focus throughout. Teachers learn how to assess it, build it, and teach it explicitly — not just to support reading comprehension, but to strengthen writing fluency and confidence. We explore oral rehearsal techniques, structured talk scaffolds, morphology instruction, and vocabulary strategies across all phases.
Designed to accelerate learning
At the heart of our structured literacy approaches courses is a clear purpose: to help teachers accelerate progress for every learner — particularly those not yet working at curriculum level.
Through structured, responsive professional learning, teachers are supported to identify learner needs, interpret assessment data, and respond with precision. Rather than defaulting to one-size-fits-all strategies, they plan based on the English curriculum’s sequence statements, using progress outcomes to guide next steps.
We focus on deliberate instructional design — ensuring learning builds cumulatively and explicitly, reducing cognitive overload and increasing retention. Teachers learn how to structure lessons that are not only well-sequenced, but also purposefully scaffolded for success.
The courses also address what to do when students are not progressing as expected. We provide practical strategies for targeted instruction in decoding, vocabulary, sentence structure, and spelling. These approaches are integrated with classroom teaching — not separate from it. The goal is always the same: more students making more progress, more quickly, through teaching that is informed, deliberate, and aligned to the curriculum.
For leaders who want impact
Choosing the right PLD is a strategic decision — one that can influence teacher confidence, student outcomes, and how well your school adapts to the refreshed curriculum.
Our structured literacy approaches courses give leaders confidence that their investment in professional learning will translate into classroom change. These courses are:
Curriculum-first — aligned with the refreshed New Zealand Curriculum, designed to embed the sequence statements, strands, and sub-strands of the English learning area into everyday teaching
Evidence-informed — shaped by well-established research on literacy acquisition, language development, and the science of learning
Practical — focused on real classrooms, with planning tools, exemplars, and tasks that transfer directly into practice
Responsive — facilitated by experienced educators who understand the diversity of New Zealand schools and the challenges of implementation
This is not generic PLD. It’s a strategic lever for lifting progress, deepening internal capability, and embedding the curriculum shift in a way that’s lasting and scalable.
Want to know more?
If your school is focused on building teacher capability, aligning to the refreshed English curriculum, and accelerating learner progress — our structured literacy approaches courses are designed with your goals in mind.
We’ll be delivering cohort five in Term 3 through a mix of face-to-face and online workshops. We’re also available to work directly with individual schools and kura where interest allows — just get in touch to talk through what would work best for your team.
Reminder: Ministry applications close 26 May. Once approved, schools have one week to nominate their provider.