Supporting your child

NSW Centre for Effective Reading offers different ways for parents and carers to learn more about reading - how to support their children, different websites and organisations that offer advice and readings, and how they can advocate for their child.

If you have concerns about your child's progress in reading, please contact your school.

Who can I talk to at my child's school?

Your child's teacher is the first person to talk to if you have concerns about your child's progress in reading.

When should I contact the school if I am concerned?

When do I contact the school?

It's never too early to ask questions about your child's progress at school. We are committed to supporting you and making sure your child gets the best possible education. Your school's teachers will talk to you about your child’s strengths, needs and interests, and they can make adjustments to the way they teach in the classroom to help support your child’s learning.

Does my child need a diagnosis to receive support?

Your child does not need a formal diagnosis of disability to receive support in mainstream classes. The school's learning and support teamworks with students, parents and carers, classroom teachers and other professionals to identify students who would benefit from support – at any stage of a student's school life.

Talk to your local school - whether or not you have a diagnosis for your child - if you feel that they may have additional learning and support needs. Click herefor more information.

Support for students with disability and their families

Disability Advocacy Futures Program (DAFP)

You and your child can access a free support service to help you navigate the education and broader service system and access support for your child.

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Reading

NSW CER has easy to read articles available on supporting children with learning to read.

Phonics

Phonics is the link that joins the sounds of spoken language to the letters that we read. This articleexplains the importance of phonics and some simple activities that parents and carers can do at home with their children.

Phonological Awareness

Phonological awareness is the ability to hear words in sentences, hear and join in rhymes and hear letter-sounds. This articleexplains the link between phonological awareness and learning to read. There are also some simple activities that parents and carers can do at home with their children.

Oral language

Oral language that supports reading involves talking with your children and engaging with print, both oral and written. This articlesshares simple ideas that parents and carers can do with their children as part of their busy days.

Vocabulary

Vocabulary is a term used to describe all the words in a language. This articleshares the link between vocabulary ad reading, and provides simple ideas to support vocabulary development. There are also some helpful website included.

Fluency

Reading fluency is often referred to as the bridge between word reading and comprehension. There are three components that make up fluent reading. These are:

Accuracy
Rate
Prosody

This articleexplains the importance of reading fluency and how we can improve this.

Comprehension

Comprehension is understanding what we read and hear. To comprehend what they read children must be able to accurately read words and they must be able to make sense of what they have read. This articleexplains the skills required to comprehend texts, as well as simple activities that can be done at home with your child to assist with comprehension.

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NSW Department of Education - Parent Hub

NSW Department of Education has an online parent hub available to share information and provide support options. This hub offers information on:

Inclusive learning support:This page also provides information on parent advocacy, school roles and responsibilities, and definitions of different words or processes you may hear when talking with your school.
Mental health and wellbeing:This page provides practical advice and information to learn more about mental health, to help your child and to care for your wellbeing. This includes pathways for immediate help, mental health resources, Disability provision for HSC exams and supporting your child after a natural disaster.
Going to school:This page includes the Department of Education calendars, information about high schools, learning resources and resources to help when starting a new school year. There is also a link to the NSW Education Parent App.
NSW Student learning library:The NSW Student learning library is a suite of learning resources which are accessible for teachers, parents and carers, and students to be used in class or at home. The library currently contains K-2 English and Mathematics learning resources.

Jill Sherlock Memorial Learning Assistance Library

An initiative of the NSW Department of Education and Communities and the Sherlock Family. This free online library provides resources to assist teachers and parents with the education of students with learning difficulties. The Library also works in partnership with the NSW Centre for Effective Reading by providing specialist teaching and learning materials to professionals and families supporting children with reading difficulties. Online catalogue available.

AUSPELD Understanding Learning Difficulties Guide for Parents

This Guide has been designed and produced to provide parents and carers with current information about the nature of learning disabilities in children, and to offer practical guidance on the most appropriate identification, intervention and support.

Click hereto download a printable guide for parents.

Literacy Hub

Find information about phonics, your child's literacy development, how schools teach literacy and fun activities to do at home. The Literacy Hub is funded by the Australian Government Department of Education and managed by Education Services Australia.

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Wellbeing

At our school, student wellbeing and learning go hand in hand. We want students to feel safe, included and ready to learn. We know that when children find it difficult to learn to read, their wellbeing is often impacted.

How NSW CER supports student wellbeing

Supporting each student’s mental, emotional, social and physical wellbeing is part of everyday school life.

We do this through:

teachers and staff who help students feel welcome and included when they are accepted for support
access to school counsellors, school psychologists and specialist staff
help for students who are changing year levels or moving to High School
supporting students as they transition into and out of reading intervention sessions
clear expectations for behaviour and respectful relationships when working with school tutors
staff who get to know each child and work closely with families
working closely with partner school staff to understand the challenges that students may be facing at school
open communication about wellbeing and support.

Visit Our principal and staff to learn about our wellbeing and specialist support staff.

How families can support their child's wellbeing

Growth Mindset

A growth mindset is the belief that a person's abilities can be improved through effort, learning, and persistence. People with a growth mindset are more open to challenges and are more likely to view failure as an opportunity to learn.

Examples of growth mindset sentences:

•Mistakes can help you learn

•I'm not good at this...yet

•I'm still learning how to do that

•I can see that's really frustrating for you – what things can we try together that will help you learn?

•Give them some examples without solving it for them

•Celebrate achievable, little goals

Make reading fun

Reading can be hard. For some books, we can help to make them more engaging by:

•Deliberately making mistakes for them to correct

•Using funny voices

•Adding sound effects

•Word/sentence tennis (taking turns with reading words/paragraphs)

•Acting with toys/puppets

•Recording it on iPad with funny voices (apps with voice filters)

Our 'Reading at Home' page includes some tips for when you read with your child at home.

Choose WHEN the right time is to read with your child

The first step is to understand your child's learning window. This shows us if there are 'extra' things we need to do so that our children can be ready to read with you.

Green zone - you shouldn't need anything extra
Yellow zone - they may look irritated, withdrawn or huffing and puffing. You can say 'I can see that you're trying really hard', or 'I can see that this is a really difficult book'. It may be time to suggest that you take a break and go and do some other either enjoyable work/ change of scenery/brain break and then come back to it afterwards.
Red zone: is not a time to get work done or to force this – ensure safety, keep sentences short and let them gradually calm down.

Co-regulation

Sometimes children need help to regulate, and to calm down. Emotional regulation can be taught, and one way to do this is by modelling, through co-regulation. This means doing it WITH your child. Some ideas are:

Blow bubbles (deep breathing)
Drinking cold water
Singing their favourite song
Walking slowly next to your child, with a deliberate and regular pattern to your steps.

If there are things that you think you might try, It is important to speak to your child and practice them with your child when they are open to taking it on. Context will give your child an understanding of why you have suddenly start singing their favourite song and build on their skills to be able to independently regulate in time or when they are not with you.

Need support for your child's wellbeing?

The NSW Department of Education provides practical advice and information to learn more about mental health and supports available in primary and high schools.

Ways you can help your child with their mental health

ReachOut School – tools, advice and resources for students in Year 7 and beyond.
headspace: 7 ways to support a young person’s healthy headspace – Young people often need extra help to maintain a healthy headspace. Here are some ideas about how families and friends can provide that extra support.
ReachOut: One-on-one support – If you feel you need some specialised support, there are many people and services out there to help. You can start with ReachOut's free one on one support, accessed through their website.

Get in touch to talk about the right support for your child.

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Have a question for our principal or teachers?

Our friendly office team can help you get in touch.

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