2024 Conference Program

Thursday 17 October 2024

8:30am Welcome to Country

8:35am Reading: Learning, Meaning, Pleasure – Why is this more critical than ever in 2024?

Why are learning, meaning and pleasure all pillars of a reading conference?
What are we anticipating for the 2 days ahead of us?

Associate Professor Helen Adam, Edith Cowan University, and Director, PETAA

8:45am Keynote: What does it take to improve reading achievement?

Introducing The Wheel of Reading improvement – what changes can be made to raise children’s reading achievement?
Exploring the most powerful influences on academic learning and the levers of change
Effectively teaching literacy using the science of reading

Professor Timothy Shanahan, Distinguished Professor Emeritus, University of Illinois

9:45am Keynote: Identifying and supporting struggling readers in the classroom: Ensuring a safety net

Even with excellent evidence-based instruction in the classroom, a small proportion of children will still struggle with the basics of learning to read. An ongoing challenge in classroom contexts is to identify those children who are having difficulty as early as possible, while at the same time not over-testing those who are progressing normally.

Using a cognitive model of reading as a 'roadmap' for teachers, to provide a safety net for identifying struggling readers and guidelines for a detailed evaluation of their difficulties
Ensuring that assessments for reading difficulties are not onerous in the broader classroom context
Using a structured, scaffolded approach, guided by a strong understanding of the reading process, to provide the support needed to all children in your classroom

Professor Anne Castles, ARC Laureate Professor, Australian Centre for the Advancement of Literacy, Australian Catholic University

10:30am Morning tea

Classroom Teachers Stream

School Leaders Stream

11.00 Explicit reading instruction in the early years: Orchestrating meaning, metalanguage and phonics through talk and play

Developing understandings about the ways text, grammar and image are structured to make meaning, whilst maintaining an explicit and systematic approach to developing students' phonic knowledge
Applying the affordances of dialogic pedagogy, metalinguistic understanding and multimodality to the design of highly scaffolded, whole class explicit instruction and small group games-based learning experiences
Additionally providing students with extensive practice reading decodable texts aligned to the taught sequence of phoneme-grapheme correspondence in the classroom

Imogene Cochrane Bond, Assistant Principal Curriculum & Instruction, and Paris Trapalis, Kindergarten Teacher, Wilkins Public School

11.00 Supporting a whole-school approach to excellence in reading instruction

Embracing GRR to ensure all students in a linguistically diverse school receive an excellent literacy education
Empowering teachers through targeted professional development
Implementing a community-involved literacy journey

Lenore Parodi, EAL/D Leader, Vita Pittavino, Assistant Principal and Anabella Gonzalez, Instructional Reading Coach at Sacred Heart Catholic Primary School, Cabramatta

11.40 Exploring the use of picture book talks to foster intercultural understanding

Why is developing our students' intercultural understanding so critical?
Exploring the role of dialogic talk in driving student engagement with culturally diverse Australian picturebooks

Lotte Ten Hacken, Teacher Librarian and PhD student at University of Queensland

11.40 Leading change in reading instruction across your school

Unpacking the implications for change in teaching practice with a new curriculum
Supporting teachers at all stages of their career to implement best practice teaching strategies for early reading
Identifying small steps that can be taken to ease reluctant teachers along the journey

Aaron Johnston, Assistant Principal Curriculum and Instruction, Ettalong Public School

12.20 Podcasts as multimodal texts in primary classrooms

Analysing the element of high-quality podcasts to assist teachers in understanding their potential for the classroom
Using podcasts as multimodal texts for interpretation (listening, reading and viewing)
Demonstrating how podcasts can be made in classrooms, engaging students as producers (speaking, writing and creating)

Samantha Turnbull, Writer and Podcast Producer, Children's Department at the ABC

12.20 Selecting best-fit reading assessment tools and methods

Identifying the right reading assessment tools for your school's context
Setting a school-wide strategy for incorporating diagnostic, formative and summative assessment into reading
Continual improvement - understanding how to continually hone and improve your assessment data gathering

Zahara Forte, Assessment Lead - English, Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority

1:00pm Luncheon

2.00pm Keynote: All kids can be readers!

2024–25 Australian Children’s Laureate Sally Rippin knows firsthand what can happen if, despite all your efforts, reading doesn’t ‘click’ for a child. As a parent, author, and advocate for children’s literature, she believes strongly that all kids can be readers, if they are given the correct support.

Putting a spotlight on the importance of literacy for school and life, and why we need to take the burden off the children and focus on changing the world around them
Creating more understanding around learning difficulties, as well as neurodivergency in the classroom to create a much better chance of ensuring no child falls through the cracks

Sally Rippin, Australian Children's Laureate 2024 - 2025

Thank you to the Australian Children’s Laureate Foundation for supporting Sally’s appearance at the conference.

2:45pm Keynote: Reading for pleasure

Delve into academic research and anecdotal evidence on the role of school libraries in promoting reading for pleasure and supporting reading in the curriculum
Learn from practical outcomes and plenty of real-life examples, and leave strategies to collect data on the impact of reading for pleasure
Consider how school library staff can extend beyond the walls of the library to engage their community and support students, educators and parents as lifelong learners, global citizens and readers

Megan Daley, Teacher Librarian, and published author

3:30pm Afternoon Tea

4.00pm Panel discussion: Reading for meaning IS reading for learning

Are reading for learning and reading for meaning really different reasons for reading?
When using reading in learning, how do we foreground particular meanings and purposes of texts?
Which instructional practices underpin our ability to teach reading for meaning in learning?

Moderated by: Associate Professor Helen Adam, Edith Cowan University, and Director, PETAA