Tuesday 23 October 2012

National Accelerated Literacy Program



 The National Accelerated Literacy Program (NALP) aims to remove the educational divide faced by students who are struggling in the areas of English and Literacy. Between the years 1998 and 2003, Dr. Brian Gray and Ms Wendy Cowey of the University of Canberra, ran a pilot program across 30 schools in five states and territories to examine the effectiveness of the NALP. The partners noticed significant improvements in the literacy of Indigenous students. The NALP was then established in 2004 to take the teaching methods from the program in attempts to meet the needs of other Indigenous students in the Northern Territory. The program was originally designed to tackle low literacy levels in remote communities around Australia, particularly Indigenous communities in the Northern Territory. However, with the adoption of Vygotsky’s scaffolding theory of teaching and learning, the NALP has now been delivered in other parts of Australia with successful results.

The teaching methodology of the NALP requires educators to take on an alternative way of teaching literacy that may place teachers out of their comfort zone. However, NALP is believed to create a supportive and structured learning environment that will help even the students with the most emergent needs to learn in a positive way.

References:

National Accelerated Literacy Program (NALP). (2010). What is NALP? Last accessed: 18/10/2012, http://www.nalp.cdu.edu.au/whatisnalp.htm

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