Why literacy and numeracy skills are important early in life

A woman assists a child in solving a word puzzle, both focused and engaged in the activity together.
Imagine your child not being able to fill in a form properly or read emergency instructions, all because they struggled with literacy skills at school and never ‘caught up’. What about reading a bus timetable or working out how much money grocery items cost? Literacy and numeracy skills are vital to thrive in life and, at SPELD SA, we work to empower students with learning difficulties.

Foundation skills in literacy are the first skills that need to be mastered for a child to become a successful reader and speller.

Children need to become skilled at working with individual sounds in words and practice blending and segmenting sounds. Alongside this, they need to be taught the connection between sounds and spellings, for example, the symbol ‘m’ represents the mmm sound.

A vast amount of research into how children learn to read has enabled us to use methods that are proven to effectively teach these skills and code knowledge. This ensures children learn to read as efficiently as possible, which is critical if they are lagging behind their peers.

Once children have foundation skills and can read books, they are able to focus more on comprehending text and learning new concepts and vocabulary. Their accuracy and fluency will continue to develop.

Poor readers that do not access all the rich and varied words and concepts found in books also tend to have poor comprehension and vocabulary throughout high school and beyond.

Teaching foundation skills ensures students have what they need to continue developing as a reader and speller.

Similarly, foundational maths skills include an understanding of the connection between numbers and symbols, for example 3 represents three objects. Students are then assisted to undertake numerical operations, starting with simple concepts and using concrete materials to support learning.

Often students who struggle at school have missed out on these foundational skills that enables further development.

A woman and a boy are sitting at a table, focused on playing cards together.

Early intervention is key

The Literacy and Numeracy Clinic provides 1:1 intervention focused on building foundational skills for reading and spelling, and maths, for students of all ages. Students attend at our Frewville Clinic or online.

Available in the clinic or online, the Literacy and Numeracy Clinic, staffed by qualified and experienced teachers and led by a speech pathologist, features:

  • Individual tuition for literacy and numeracy tailored to your child’s needs.
  • Experienced educators who provide engaging and interactive sessions.
  • A high quality, evidence-based program delivered by qualified and trained practitioners.
  • Weekly 45-minute sessions, face-to-face or online.
  • Ongoing monitoring, assessment and feedback.
  • Access to high quality, evidence-based resources.

Places at SPELD SA’s Literacy and Numeracy Clinic are now available. To book, call 8431 1655 or visit speldsa.org.au/pages/literacy-clinic

 

 

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