Rationale:        

In accordance with the Department’s Policy Statement we recognise that students’ difficulties with learning “vary in cause, nature, intensity, and duration”.  Factors include learning styles, rates of learning, social and cultural backgrounds.  We recognise that enabling all students to achieve their potential is the responsibility of each teacher and the school as a whole.

Mechanisms for identification and appropriate intervention:

• Information from feeder primary schools is examined by the STLA (Support Teacher Learning Assistance) and school counsellor at the time of Year 6 transition to Year 7.
  
  

• Students arriving without feeder school reports or other information may be tested by the school counsellor if referral by staff is initiated.
  
  

• All incoming Year 7 students are given a broad screening test to assess approximate reading ability.  Students thus identified as having difficulties are helped through small group intervention by the STLA, team-teaching in content area subjects and occasional tutorials with parent/community volunteers.  Parents of students identified are invited to attend STLA - run meetings to share ideas for helping students with literacy development.  Volunteers participate in these meetings to communicate and learn strategies.

• Class teachers in all key learning areas (KLAs) are encouraged to refer students with identifiable learning difficulties (including attention, organisational and motivational difficulties) to the school counsellor or STLA.  These difficulties are dealt with through individual intervention, group lessons or team-teaching in the regular classroom across the KLAs.
  
  

• Class teachers are encouraged to use readability screening tests to identify difficulties within specific subjects or texts and to use the expertise of the STLA or English as a Second Language (ESL) teachers consultatively or in team-teaching mode to help students to use these texts.

• All Year 7 students complete the National Assessment Program in Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN), usually held in May of each year.  Results will be used by the learning support team to identify individual and group needs, communicate them to class teachers and plan appropriate programs to meet their needs.  These programs will be implemented in mainstream classes and through some small group intervention.  Year 7 teachers of students with notably low literacy scores will be offered inservice time to develop appropriate strategies.

• Some individual students may require adaptations in their work to meet special needs and may be assessed accordingly rather than in mainstream testing.  These students may be offered transition education interviews and programs.