Specific guidance from the Education Directorate on how to teach literacy and numeracy could lift student results and reduce teachers' workload, the expert panel running an inquiry has heard.
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Chair of the expert panel Professor Barney Dalgarno said the inquiry into literacy and numeracy in the ACT received 94 full submissions and 280 complete survey responses before the February 28 deadline.
The expert panel members visited about 50 ACT schools and met with principals and stakeholder groups online and face-to-face to gathering information on how schools teach literacy and numeracy.
"We've observed quite a big diversity of practice across the schools that we visited, and that diversity is most noticeable in primary and most noticeable in literacy education," Prof Dalgarno said.
Currently, ACT schools have a high degree of autonomy in terms of how teachers deliver the curriculum.
Professor Dalgarno, who is the executive dean of education at the University of Canberra, said some submissions have called for greater specificity from the Education Directorate around what practices should be used, especially when there is a clear evidence base behind them.
"I think one of the things that the panel has been discussing is the question of whether just clarifying the scope of that autonomy could be valuable. So the idea that perhaps in certain core areas of literacy and numeracy there could be greater specificity leading to improvements in quality without necessarily taking away autonomy in other areas," he said.
"We've heard arguments that greater specificity could lead to more predictability for parents and, possibly, if that greater specificity also came with greater support from the Directorate for teachers to implement practices within those specified areas, we've heard from some stakeholders that that could reduce teacher workload."
The panel has looked at how schools have been assessing and monitoring student progress, from developing their own spreadsheets to purchasing diagnostic tools.
"We're also aware that other systems such as NSW have very sophisticated, centrally-provided systems and a very consistent use of diagnostic tests, which makes it a lot easier for teachers to do that kind of diagnostic testing and mapping of children against the progressions," Prof Dalgarno said.
"And so we have been discussing the question of whether providing some kind of central support for that could really make that easier for teachers to do."
While the inquiry is focusing on literacy and numeracy performance in public schools, the panel has visited some Catholic schools and met with the Catholic Education Canberra Goulburn to discuss how it designed and implemented its Catalyst initiative.
This program aimed to align all teaching to the science of reading and the science of learning and involved extensive and ongoing coaching for teachers.
"If we do recommend changes in ACT public schools, having some other nearby examples of systems that have undertaken changes or tightening of specificity in practices could help in terms of thinking about that implementation," Prof Dalgarno said.
The panel also met with the Association of Independent Schools of the ACT and reached out to key education groups, such as the Australian Education Research Organisation, the Australian Education Union and ACT Council of Parents and Citizens Associations, for submissions.
The panel is planning to release a summary of what it has heard in hundreds of responses before the final report is released.
The final report is due to be presented to the Education Minister by April 30 and it will be tabled in the Legislative Assembly by the last sitting day in June.
The inquiry was established in October 2023 after the achievement gap between advantaged and disadvantaged students widened.
Prof Dalgarno said he loved visiting schools as part of the inquiry.
"I've seen so many passionate school leaders and teachers really keen to talk in depth about their practices," he said.
"We've had opportunities to walk around the schools and see classes in action, and we've seen some really interesting and some really high quality practices."