Improving reading in Australia’s Outback

 Six teachers believed they could significantly improve reading skills in some of Australia’s most remote communities via Reading Recovery principles and school-community partnerships. They did.

The power of one teacher to change a child’s life is the stuff of legends. The power of many educators working together passionately to change the lives of hundreds or thousands is epic. This real-life epic story began in 2006 when six classroom teachers who weren’t satisfied with the learning outcomes for indigenous children in the Kimberley in the far northern edge of Western Australia decided to act. This seemingly simple and appropriate response, the type made by many teachers around the world, began a journey that would result in a groundbreaking partnership between governments, corporations, communities, and education systems.

These teachers, all from the Catholic Education Western Australia (CEWA) school district, employed an evidence-proven approach to literacy intervention to improve literacy outcomes and thus dramatically increased the life chances of young Australians in the Kimberley. In the beginning, theirs was strictly about establishing Reading Recovery™ in the Kimberley. Then they added three more elements to create a four-part solution: sourcing and channeling government grants, developing community and elder support, and finding a visionary company willing to commit for the long-term.

About the Kimberley

The Kimberley is Western Australia’s most remote region and one of the world’s last great wilderness areas. The Kimberley has fewer people per square mile than almost any other place on Earth — only about 40,000 people live in an area as large as the state of California (about 163,000 square miles). The region has only two main roads, only one of which is paved. Information about visiting the area is replete with warnings about the extreme distances between towns, the lack of facilities and fuel, and the chance of encountering stray and deadly animals. The region is known for large swaths of wilderness, rugged mountains, dramatic gorges, deserts, and isolated, stunningly beautiful coastal areas.

Within the region’s small population, about 44% of the residents are Aborigines who speak 34 distinct languages. There are about 198 Aboriginal communities in the Kimberley, although many Aboriginal people also live in towns. Catholic, government, and independent schools are located throughout the Kimberley in small remote Aboriginal communities and towns with populations ranging from 40  to  14,000, most on the lower end of the scale. The transient nature of families within these towns and communities evokes particular challenges for teachers and schools.

The Kimberley is no easy place to try an authentic, tailored, educational solution. Implementation is fraught with difficulties for educators and students: Low school attendance, low levels of home literacy, high staff turnover, deep economic disadvantage, population transience, and huge distances of up to 1,000 miles separating schools and communities are just some of the difficulties restraining program traction and sustainability. This location also is subject to dramatic seasonal conditions including cyclones during the “wet season” and extreme heat during the “dry,” adding complexity to accessing and supporting teachers with a new implementation.

The Kimberley implementation of Reading Recovery is a lesson for all of us about individual commitment and partnership collaboration.

In 2005, as part of the Western Australia Catholic Education Office Kimberley Literacy Project, six passionate teachers who were working in Kununurra, Wyndham, Djarindjin-Lombadina, Derby, and Broome, (Aboriginal communities throughout the Kimberley) met to discuss ways that they were trying to tackle illiteracy in their schools.

Patricia Bremner, one of the six and working in Broome, explained to the group that she was using her understandings about Reading Recovery (RR) to support the literacy learning of her students (Clay, 2005). Knowing that RR is rooted in the study of how young children learn and that its lessons can readily cross cultural divides — ethnic or income — the six teachers chose to continue their collaborative conversations and ultimately Bremner began RR teacher training in 2006 with the support of Janet Scull, lecturer in language and literacy education at the University of Melbourne and a RR trainer. Together, Bremner and Scull developed and piloted a remote RR teacher-training model. This model was adapted to overcome the vast distances between schools in the Kimberley and reduce travel costs.

The teachers with the support of the Reading Recovery tutor were already familiar with the significant effect of Reading Recovery, which has been well documented (e.g. Sharratt et al., 2013). Reading Recovery is an intensive intervention for children who struggle with reading and writing during or after their first year of formal schooling (Clay, 2005). The daily, one-to-one, 30-minute tutorial intervention is based on the psychology of early childhood learning. The intervention is carefully designed to increase the literacy levels of selected students so they can function within the average class range after 12 to 20 weeks of instruction. Specially trained Reading Recovery teachers adapt a general lesson framework to meet each student’s unique needs, aiming to develop the student’s learning skills so each can make continual progress in classrooms that also reflect a balanced literacy approach.

As part of the agreement, classrooms whose students receive RR assistance must provide opportunities for those students to model and practice the skills they learn during the tutoring sessions. This expectation makes a difference for all students in the early years.

“Students who complete their RR lessons continue to build on foundations of new knowledge and new strategies that were minimal prior to entering the program,” one Kimberley classroom teacher said. “Those students return to the classroom with new confidence. Given their circumstances, some have a long journey ahead, but the program remains a rock for their development in many ways and is their only way forward in some cases.”

Beyond necessary changes in classroom practice to mirror the Reading Recovery approach, schools with an RR teacher soon discover they have gained much more than a leader in reading intervention (Sharratt et al., 2013). Reading Recovery teachers connect with other classroom teachers as literacy specialists, making their expertise available to support literacy development throughout the school, a powerful driver of student achievement (Leithwood & Seashore-Louis, 2011; Hargreaves & Fullan, 2012; Sharratt & Harild, 2015).

About 128 students participated in Reading Recovery in 14 Kimberley schools in 2014. The lowest performing students in Grade 1 classrooms who had a complete series of lessons returned at or above the classroom average in reading and writing. Keep in mind that these students once were at risk of literacy and school failure. The table below shows the sustained gains of discontinued students in Text Reading Level from 2006-14 when level 16 is the expected level at the end of grade 1.

Since 2006, more than 790 students in the Kimberley have been provided with individualized literacy support through their participation in Reading Recovery. They have been given a second chance. Over 45 teachers have qualified as Reading Recovery teachers, and the program has been implemented in four Aboriginal independent community schools, one Department of Education school, and 13 Catholic schools. The Kimberley implementation also supports schools in other regions, including Port Hedland in the Pilbara and Wadeye in the Northern Territory.

Beyond the data that showed the success of the Reading Recovery intervention, the community recognized the improvements.

The implementation of Reading Recovery in the Kimberley offers additional substantiation of the cost-effectiveness of this early intervention for a school system. As observed here, the cost effectiveness of Reading Recovery lies in having a trained Reading Recovery teacher on staff — one who sees part of her or his responsibility to be spending time working with the primary division (K-3) colleagues sharing expertise so that the infusion of teacher knowledge affects all early-learning classrooms. Reading Recovery is a powerful intervention acknowledged as a worthwhile initiative for school districts. Not only are the earliest struggling learners brought quickly to reading and writing, but trained Reading Recovery teachers, like in the Kimberley, affect the teaching and learning of the whole staff and often a whole district through the ongoing literacy professional learning that they lead. It builds literacy and leadership capacity across schools, across systems.

Beyond the data that showed the success of the Reading Recovery intervention, the community recognized the improvements. One parent whose son participated in Reading Recovery said, “When he reads to me, I am astounded by how much he has learned in the last six months. At the parent-teacher meeting in July, I was in tears and very worried about how he was doing with his schoolwork. Now I’m almost in tears with happiness. I am so proud.”

The program got a big boost when a prominent Aboriginal leader who saw the benefit of Reading Recovery for Kimberley children. This leader’s buy-in was a game-changer.

Getting to Reading Recovery

Introducing Reading Recovery into their schools was a far more difficult task than typical, complicated both by the extreme distances and isolation in their region, funding shortages, and overcoming potential cultural objections.

The first challenge was the distances teachers had to travel — 100 to 600 miles for face-to-face training and ongoing professional learning. These distances over dirt roads or by chartered aircraft meant finding funds to support this travel and accommodation. Undaunted, CEWA leaders, such as Education Directors Ron Dullard and Tim McDonald, were won over by the plan and began a systematic implementation of Reading Recovery that included senior CEWA staff, principals, teachers, local indigenous organizations and members of the Kimberley RR Advisory Committee. To support the introduction of Reading Recovery in the Kimberley, the six teachers also sought assistance from colleagues in Victoria and developed important connections with Reading Recovery trainers at the Catholic Education Office of Melbourne and at Melbourne University. These links enabled them to develop the alternative remote training approach that has been endorsed by the International Reading Recovery Trainer Organization (www.irrto.org).

After the school site-based training in RR was established as a recognized Professional Learning qualification for teachers, Catholic schools designated Reading Recovery as the literacy intervention of choice, which resulted in its adoption by over 90% of Catholic primary and composite schools across Western Australia. RR is the impactful component of their systemwide approach to improving literacy in the early years. As one principal said:

“Reading Recovery assists our students requiring the most support to develop literacy skills. It increases resilience and social and emotional well-being of individual students and in turn supports whole-class development. Reading Recovery students are supported out of the classroom intensively by being able to re-enter and access the curriculum alongside their peers. Having trained Reading Recovery teachers as our literacy specialists in our school settings allows collegial support for our teachers and ensures that quality first-wave intervention is able to occur for all students. The positive partnerships between students and Reading Recovery teachers, classroom teachers, Aboriginal teaching assistants, parents and guardians, extended families, and the wider community promote a love of learning and a belief that each and every child can achieve success in their learning. Reading Recovery ensures that each and every child who participates in the program feels like they belong at school and can access the language of learning and be engaged in the educational journey.”

Funding

At the same time as the initial six teachers began their implementation plan, the Australian federal government changed how it funded programs designed to serve disadvantaged communities in remote Australia. That ensured that much-needed funds would be focused on areas like the Kimberley. Financial support was sought for the program from the Kimberley Land Council, an important link that would eventually secure funds from the Australian government from 2009 to 2012.

The Kimberley Reading Recovery Advisory Committee was developed with representation from all three education sectors (Catholic, state, independent), plus Melbourne University, and the Kimberley Land Council. Creating this cross-sector partnership ensured that the Australian government would recognize this program’s legitimacy and that it would handle the ongoing funding judiciously. At the same time, a collaboration with Mary Ward International Australia (a Catholic charity that works in disadvantaged communities in Australia and around the world) resulted in further funds for the RR program in the Kimberley.

Classrooms whose students receive Reading Recovery assistance must provide opportunities for those students to model and practice the skills they learn during the tutoring sessions. This expectation makes a difference for all students in the early years.

Australian government funds were used to train local teachers as Reading Recovery teachers and tutors. This ensured continued support for Reading Recovery by specifying that a sizeable amount of funding would go to all schools participating in Reading Recovery. These funds were directed toward travel and accommodation so Reading Recovery teachers could attend Broome-based inservice sessions, often from nearly a thousand miles away.

Breakthrough corporate partnership

Community commitment and students’ growth and achievement were key underlying factors in being able to create a link to sustainable literacy improvement for all students in the Kimberley. Woodside Petroleum (Australia’s largest oil and gas company) recently agreed to support the Reading Recovery program for all struggling early learners across the three education sectors in the Kimberley, an example of corporate social responsibility where the community, education, and corporate partners all benefit (Sharratt & Harild, 2015).

Summary

What was borne of the questions of six dedicated teachers 10 years ago is now the celebration of an established, highly effective program of literacy intervention and professional learning across remote northwestern Australia. This epic story is about how a focused group of teachers was determined to learn what had to happen in order for them to make a difference with students and then made it happen.

“I have been very fortunate to be a part of Reading Recovery since its inception in 2006,” said one of the six founding teachers. “The training and professional support structures that we develop over time are invaluable. The relationships that we develop with the students allow them to feel safe enough to be open to tasks that to this point have been challenging  . . . Reading Recovery has certainly challenged my ideas about teaching and learning, and I believe that I have become a better teacher for it.”

Another of the six focused on how Reading Recovery brought communities together. “Aspirations of the people and relationships of the families became a driving force for us as teachers,” she said. “We experienced parents and caregivers coming in to our schools — places they had avoided because their kids were always getting into trouble. Now they came into our schools to hear good things about their kids . . .  and they became advocates of our RR program.”

The teachers’ tireless work led to getting the necessary players around the partnership table at the same time: all education sectors — local, regional, and national — noneducation government entities, business, parents, and other community partners to make a difference (Sharratt & Harild, 2015). It is about the collective moral imperative, the importance of vision, caring, dedication, and commitment to what matters most: putting faces on the data to ensure that all students can and do learn to read and write (Sharratt & Fullan, 2012). The Kimberley implementation of Reading Recovery is a lesson for all of us about individual commitment and partnership collaboration.

References

Clay, M. (2005). Literacy lessons, part 1. Auckland, NZ: Heinemann Education.

Hargreaves, A. & Fullan M. (2012). Professional capital: Transforming teaching in every school. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.

Leithwood, K. & Seashore-Louis, K. (2011). Linking leadership to student learning. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Sharratt, L. & Fullan, M. (2012). Putting faces on the data: What great leaders do! Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin.

Sharratt, L., Coutts, J., Hogarth, W., & Fullan, M. (2013). Reading Recovery: A high return on investment for cost-conscious and student achievement-oriented education systems. Journal of Reading Recovery, 13 (1), 53-60.

Sharratt, L. & Harild, G. (2015). Good to great to innovate: Recalculating the route to career readiness K-12+. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin.

Citation: Sharratt, L., Hayes, P., & Coutts, J. (2015). Improving reading in Australia’s Outback. Phi Delta Kappan, 97 (3), 18-22.