Letter from Leanna Traill...

Dear Educational Administrators,

Tena koutou katoa. Our warmest greetings to you all.

Literacy Learning (NZ) Ltd is pleased to bring you an update on our Summer Institute trail.

We now offer a choice of four Institutes: •The Literacy Teaching and Learning, •The Writing and Spelling, •The Reading & Writing Connections and •The Instructional Leadership. Each Institute stands alone as a complete professional development event. However, all are linked within the same philosophical and theoretical framework. Each focuses on presenting research based effective instructional and leadership practices, but from different perspectives and with changing emphasis depending on the Institute chosen.

The Institutes are designed to immerse participants in comprehensive, cross-cultural, professional development experiences by way of presentation, demonstration, participation and reflection. Participants interact and learn with, and from, educational colleagues and with New Zealand teachers and administrators of extensive experience, expertise and knowledge in all aspects of effective instructional practices in elementary and middle schools. Each Institute is customized to include District and State curriculum standards and benchmarks and Federal requirements.

Each morning a general session will set the research and theoretical theme for the day. This is followed by two-hour in-depth strand sessions which take the theory into grade appropriate practical classroom application. The afternoons offer choices of specialized skills workshops which enable teachers to refine teaching techniques, and time spent in reflection and dialogue helps clarify and confirm new understandings and directions for individuals and teams from schools.

Throughout the week there are many opportunities for participants to extend thinking and understandings about children, language and learning, and to enhance knowledge and skills in:

·       building child-centered responsive classroom environments

·       effective curriculum planning and implementation

·       integrating oral, written and visual language across the curriculum

·       focussed oral language development

·       the reading and writing processes

·       planning and using key teaching approaches - shared, guided, independent

·       enhancing comprehension, accuracy and fluency in reading and writing

·       strategies for differentiating instruction

·       accelerating learning for struggling learners

·       comprehension and publishing ideas

·       classroom management and organization - the students, learning centers, time, resources, assessment

·      selecting and utilizing resources effectively

·    effective assessment procedures and differentiating instruction

·       strategies for comprehensive school reform

As the week progresses each Institute will unfold as a cohesive framework shaped by child-centered philosophy and consistent theory; many elements skilfully interwoven, one with the other, to make up the fabric of effective teaching and learning and leadership school-wide.

Over the past nine years in seven states of the USA, evaluations and letters from participants confirm that attendance at our Institutes has impacted greatly on their educational thinking and teaching practices and has been instrumental in helping principals and teachers in many schools move more quickly towards the goal of school-wide reform

Participants tell us they feel affirmed, confirmed, challenged and informed. They return to their schools with enhanced vision, knowledge and commitment to improve the quality of teaching, learning and achievement for themselves, for their colleagues and most of all for the children they teach.

Our institutes can be brought to your school district by your invitation only. Please contact me if you would like to begin a conversation about hosting, or co-hosting, an institute in your school district during June, July or August of any year.

Noho tino ora mai ra. Stay very well.