K-6 Educational Resources — Board of Studies, New South Wales, Australia
Primary Matters
Primary Matters - February 1998
From Board Bulletin, February 1998
Update on English K-6
Consultation on the draft English K-6 Syllabus and support documents, undertaken in Term 4, 1997, included the collection of data from:
- focus group meetings in 12 locations in NSW;
- staff interviews in nine schools;
- written submissions (27) and oral submissions (6);
- a survey sent to all schools and relevant organisations and institutions.
The Office of the Board of Studies received a total of 666 survey returns and 43 faxed comments. Feedback on the documents was very positive, with a high approval response to all aspects on the survey. There was strong endorsement at focus group meetings and staff interviews for the design and layout of the documents, the clarity of the language used throughout the documents, the number and nature of the outcomes, the approach to grammar and the level of support provided by the modules of work and work samples.
The major suggestions for improving the syllabus and support documents were:
- to make a clear distinction between the content and outcomes, incorporating clear direction for what teachers will teach;
- to provide specific direction for teaching spelling, handwriting and phonemic awareness;
- to provide more relevant and practical advice in the ‘Meeting the Needs of All Language Learners' section in the Modules support document and in the ‘General Principles for Planning, Programming, Assessing, Reporting and Evaluating' section in the syllabus;
- to include models of each text type in the Modules support document;
- to include additional information about each work sample in the Work Samples support document.
The Board will meet early in February to consider the English K-6 Consultation Report and the amended syllabus and support documents for English K-6.