Heggerty is a Phonological and Phonemic Awareness programme intended for use from pre-school to 1st Grade. It is an oral and auditory programme that focuses on the sounds of the English language.

Recent PIRLS results saw Ireland among the top-performing countries in the world in literacy. This is indeed a good news story, but looking a little deeper into the results gives us cause for concern.

Plain Talk was my first conference in the United States. I thought it might be useful to share my experiences and takeaways for anyone who is thinking about taking the plunge themselves.

2022 has been a busy, and interesting year for me. Before I take a little trip down memory lane, I want to take the opportunity to thank you all for your support, and wish you all the very best for 2023.

This blog post is the view of an Irish Primary School Teacher in response to Emily Hanford’s podcast series, Sold a Story: How teaching kids to read went so wrong.

When teaching phonics, it is important to incorporate Phonemic Awareness into your lessons. Here are the steps I follow when introducing a new letter sound. 

A sight word in any word that you can read instantly and without effort. An adult has tens of thousands of sight words stored in their brain.

In order for children to become skilled readers and writers, it is important that they are able to tune in to the speech sounds of the English language. This can be tricky for some, but a focus on listening skills before learning to read will help.

A core reader is a reading book that a whole class will read together. The text in these readers usually includes lots of high-frequency words and some topic-specific words, which may or may not be decodable for the children.

Ikea is a teacher’s playground. I defy you to visit and not purchase something for school. Here’s a list here my favourite Ikea in the classroom purchases; from the cheap (less than €1) to the investment (€70+).

It’s that time of year again, with ‘Back to School’ displays accosting us in every shop we walk into, despite it only feeling like 5 minutes since we got our holidays.

Outdoor play allows children to take risks. It fosters creativity. It provides an environment that is rich in learning experiences. But most of all, it’s FUN, and goodness knows, the children need that now more than ever.

Once we had done the groundwork, I introduced E.a.R.L. to the class. There was much excitement. We used E.a.R.L. with a floor mat of a street scene, which was ideal for our first activity, as the journey is clear and easy to see.

It’s that time of year again! Primary School Teachers up and down the country are scanning the pages of InTouch magazine and scrolling online to find a Summer Course to secure the much-loved EPV days.

Maths learning resources are a solid investment for any early years classroom.  Of course, written Maths is important, too. Children need to learn number formation, and begin to construct number sentences.  Do you need a workbook for this?

Setting aside time for reviewing and assessing children at play is beneficial in many ways.  It will tell you much about the children themselves, allow them to self-reflect, as well as informing planning for further play sessions.

A decodable reader or book is one that only contains words that can be ‘sounded out’ and the letters use their most common sounds.

The main features that I use in Comhar Linn are the Budget Account and Personal Loans. The loans are pretty self-explanatory but I’ll go into more detail on the specific benefits later on. I’ll start with the life-saving Budget Account.

Within the infant school day, it is incredibly beneficial for the children to allocate an hour a day for child-led play. Although it is child-led play, the teacher’s role is crucial for planning, modelling, supporting, observing and assessing the play.

Treasa Bowe, AKA Between the Covers of a Good Book, and I have compiled a list of some of our favourite picturebooks for older children (senior classes). 

STEM education is an integrated, open-ended approach to Science and Maths, using the Engineering Design Process. STEM Challenges begin with a real-world question or a problem, and the children take the lead to find a solution.

Treasa Bowe, AKA Between the Covers of a Good Book, have compiled a list of  suggested picturebooks to assist with teaching History. 

Most of us know that there’s no benefit to a Friday Spelling Test; there have been many studies to prove it, yet the practice still continues! We find ourselves presenting the children with a list on a Monday and telling them to ‘learn’ them by Friday.

Treasa Bowe, AKA Between the Covers of a Good Book, have compiled a list our favourite picturebooks for young children (age 3-7 or Preschool, Junior & Senior Infants).

STEM Challenges can engage a wide variety of children, with minimal planning, set up or fuss. But how can we go about it?