Taking data seriously at Port Pirie West Primary School

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Australian Education Ministers' 2010 Biennial Forum

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Port Pirie West Primary School in the Upper Spencer Gulf region of South Australia was identified as a Supporting Improved Literacy Outcomes SILA Project School due to the multiple disadvantaged factors, including high levels of poverty in the community, and large numbers of students with disabilities. Data from NAPLAN results confirmed that this school needed additional attention.

A key feature of each SILA Project is a diagnostic review to ensure that improvement strategies meet school needs. SILA Projects acknowledge research that shows that improved literacy achievements require effective leadership, sound literacy teaching methodology, and strong connections with the early years at both school and classroom level.

SILA is an acronym for Supporting Improved Literacy Achievement. It’s part of the National Partnership Pilot initiatives. It involves 32 low SES schools throughout South Australia and it works on the following model. Basically diagnostic review of all the schools involved in the project initially. That’s followed with coaching intervention work involving, for every site, a three tiered approach to coaching. A literacy coach, an early years connections coach, and a leadership coach who work with the school leadership teachers and early years teachers to bring about improvement in literacy outcomes.

Before the SILA review that took place in October 2007, we were actually a school that was quite struggling. There were a lot of things that were contributing to that. I guess we took on an assumption that things were going okay, and it wasn’t until the review and the report came out that we realised that we needed to do of things to make a lot of improvements.

With some of the approaches that we trialled here at Port Pirie West Primary School, what I’ve been able to do is take those approaches and document them. Now we’ve actually been able to prepare them and distribute them widely across the State.

The big thing was the support from the Quality Improvement and Effectiveness Team. They came up, they supported us in developing staff cohesion, where to be a member at Port Pirie West Primary School meant that everyone worked together. For the first time we had a latitudinal and a longitudinal understanding of students’ learning. We also had teachers that were opening up their classrooms and becoming demonstration teachers, and supporting each other.

The most useful type of data is data that is purposeful. I found running records particularly great because they provide me with really comprehensive information. I found writing rubrics really effective as well because they provide my students with a clear criteria for success.

Well we have a rubric and we do our pre-test before we start learning part of what we’re doing. Then once we’ve learnt it we do a post-test, and on the rubric it was our pre-test results and our post-test results, and to know what we need to improve and how we do it. We keep learning more when we move up grades and.

As a result of using the data we are now able to target specific areas needing work.

That’s the significance of this whole program, that we have proved that with high expectations you can make a difference to a child. Our journey has only just started. Although we’ve seen the improvement we know the more you know, the more you realise how much you don’t know. It’s about recognising that and moving forward.

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