Our phonics-based reading programme follows the Orton Gillingham approach of teaching struggling readers.

(For more information on the Orton-Gillingham Approach, please refer to the resource page.)

A child who

• is unable to read despite having been instructed in phonics

• does not recognise a word that he has read

• guesses at words, instead of sounding them out

• does not have the strategy to sound out unfamiliar words

• able to read the words but does not understand the text

• makes frequent spelling errors, despite having learned the words

Yes. We base our instruction on what research has revealed regarding how our brain learns to read and how a structured literacy approach is most effective in helping struggling readers.

(For information on the research, please refer to the resource page.)

We follow a scope and sequence, directly teaching each letter-sound correspondence, from the most basic level of phonics to the more advanced spelling rules and morphological concepts.

Student does not move on to a new concept until he is ready. When we proceed with a new concept, we will continue to review the older skills, thus solidifying the learning.

We build our students' confidence in their reading skills by first using decodable text (texts which contain sound patterns that they have learned) for reading practice and eventually moving them to reading authentic texts.

Our lessons are individualised, targeting each student’s specific areas of weaknesses and learning gaps.

We have created our own proprietary teaching materials, worksheets, text passages and online resources to support the research-based approach of multi-sensory, explicit instruction.

We also use decodable books to provide the opportunity for our students to apply their decoding skills to a book.

A child who:

• consistently makes spelling, capitalisation and grammatical errors when writing

• writes mostly short, choppy sentences

• writes sentences that begin in the same way

• uses similar, 'boring' words in writing

• writes sentences that are characterised by fragments, run-on and rambling

• does not know how to organise his story

• includes irrelevant information in the story

Yes. We base our instruction on what research has revealed regarding how explicit instruction and breaking down the complex writing task into small comprehensible steps is effective in helping struggling writers.

(For information on the research, please refer to the resource page.)

Writing is a daunting task for a struggling writer. Therefore, we :

• teach by breaking down the process, working on one strategy, one skill, one part at a time before expecting the student to compose a story

• use mentor texts to model good writing

• teach sentence expansion because sentences are the building blocks of writing

• expand the vocabulary of vivid words to replace commonly used words

• directly instruct the various processes of writing such as planning, organisation of ideas, writing and editing

• teach show-not-tell techniques to enhance a story

Our lessons are individualised, targeting each student’s specific areas of weaknesses and learning gaps. Therefore, the target instruction and focus for each student may differ.

We have created our own proprietary teaching materials, worksheets and online resources to support the research-based approach of multi-sensory , explicit instruction.

Yes, we do conduct online lessons for reading and writing. However, the effectiveness of the lessons will depend on individual student's ability to focus. For younger children, parental involvement will be a great plus.

We teach our students the skills and strategies to read, comprehend and write. We will provide practice for them to apply what they have learned to meet the requirements of the school's curriculum.