Please see below for a brief outline of some of our current research projects.
SOLAR Lab and AERO Professional Learning in Schools project
The SOLAR Lab have just established a major research collaboration with the Australian
Education Research Organisation (AERO), with La Trobe staff Professor Pamela
Snow, Professor Tanya Serry and Eamon Charles working on the project. Our
collaboration with the Australian Education Research Organisation examines
the impact of providing school-based coaching alongside online professional
learning courses on teaching practice and student outcomes. The study will
focus on examining the overall effectiveness of coaching, as well as
identifying which aspects of coaching are most effective. The evidence-informed
coaching and online professional learning are targeted at Foundation to Year 2
teachers, education support staff and educational leaders and focus on supporting
the implementation of structured and explicit early reading instruction.
The study findings will inform the delivery of resource-intensive professional learning
(specifically coaching) at scale. These findings could be used by teachers and
leaders, professional learning providers and policymakers to make informed
decisions about participating in, organising and funding professional learning
for sustained practice change.
Foundation to Year 2 teachers, support staff and educational leaders across all participating
schools will receive online professional learning (SOLAR Lab online short
courses in structured early reading instruction) and structured literacy
resources, in addition to participating in an online workshop demonstrating
effective use of these resources. Teachers at about half of the participating
schools will also engage in regular coaching through the SOLAR Lab coaching
program. We will measure teachers’ knowledge, confidence and evidence-based
practice regarding structured literacy, as well as literacy outcomes for their
students over the course of the study.
To examine the impact of coaching, we will compare outcomes for participants in coaching
schools with those of participants in schools where coaching was not provided.
We will also explore participants’ experiences of the professional learning and
coaching, with a focus on identifying enablers and barriers to successfully
implementing evidence-based practices for structured and explicit early reading
instruction. AERO and the SOLAR Lab are conducting this study with schools
in Victoria across 2023 and 2024.
Diocese of Ballarat Catholic Education Limited Structured Literacy Project
The SOLAR Lab is collaborating with researchers from the Diocese of Ballarat Catholic Education Limited (DOBCEL) to broadly evaluate the implementation of Structured Literacy interventions across a number of select schools within the diocese. This scaled project arose out of an original action research partnership between two Catholic primary schools in Sunraysia, Northern Victoria (St Joseph’s, Red Cliff and St Paul’s, MIldura) and Catholic Education, Ballarat, which was known as the ‘SunLit Project’. The SunLit Project was implemented across the two schools to improve Literacy outcomes through an intentional, scaffolded transition from Balanced to Structured Literacy instruction, from Foundation to Year Six.
Warakirri School, Sydney
This project explores the role of speech-language pathology intervention in strengthening school connection and academic achievement for vulnerable adolescents.
Warakirri College is an independent flexible high school for young people completing Year 10 and Higher School Certificate (HSC) studies, with multiple campus located across Sydney in Blacktown, Campbelltown and Fairfield. Warakirri College is for students aged 15–22 who have disconnected from mainstream education or do not feel comfortable in a traditional school.
The aim of this research project is to identify, implement and evaluate a language-based literacy intervention that will enable vulnerable Year 10 and 11 students to improve their reading and writing, in the context of a modified Response to Intervention framework.
Archdiocese of Canberra-Goulburn CATALYST project
The Catalyst is an evidence-based professional learning program for principals, school leaders, teachers and support staff being implemented system-wide across all schools in the Catholic Education Archdiocese of Canberra and Goulburn.
Catalyst is informed by the Science of Learning and Science of Reading, and aims to ensure every student in every classroom across the Archdiocese has access to high-quality teachers who deliver engaging and impactful lessons through a consistent research-informed approach to teaching and learning.
SOLAR schools project
We are partnering with schools to explore the benefits and impact to literacy educational practices of a bespoke, whole-school professional learning and coaching program based on the science of language and reading.
Our aim is to add to the contemporary understanding of how best to help educators improve their knowledge of language and literacy constructs. The partner schools include
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- Charles La Trobe College (consisting of Charles La Trobe College Secondary, Charles La Trobe College Primary, Olympic Village Primary School, Quantum School, and The Pavillion School)
Running Records
A Running Record is a popular assessment tool used to document student’s reading. We have investigated views from classroom teachers and reading researchers about the utility of Running Records as an assessment tool. Participants were interviewed individually and results are currently being analysed using thematic analysis.
To date, our data indicates that support for Running Records is mixed with some participants finding the tool useful to gauge their students’ reading performance while others finding Running records does not provide valuable information when assessing students or planning next steps for teaching. At the core, this divide appears to be linked to a theoretical divide held be participants who align with a meaning-based approach to reading instruction or a structured literacy-based approach.
We will be presenting the results in JULY 2023 at the SSSR conference and hope to publish our findings by the end of the year.
Transforming practice survey
A growing number of primary schools across Australia are adopting evidence-based reading and spelling instructional practices aligned with contemporary science of reading knowledge. In this research project we are exploring the processes that such schools have adopted to initiate and propel instructional change and develop actionable protocols that can be shared with other schools.