On 18th June 2014, Graeme High School staged a meta-literacy event involving subjects from each of the 8 curricular areas within Curriculum for Excellence. The whole of the new S2 year group attended this event, with new S6 pupils acting as facilitators at each of the workshop stations. The event was a culmination of development work by teachers in every subject area looking to extend literacy across learning strategies. Click here to see the rota of activities.

Caroline Harper, principal teacher of English worked with colleagues in school to develop teaching strategies which enriched and deepened awareness of  literacy across learning and helped pupils transfer and apply their skills more effectively.  

The activities experienced by pupils during the meta-literacy event developed skills such as: mind-mapping, note-making, summarising, visual words, using “post its” and extending vocabulary. Each subject area devised a task which was relevant to their course content, and pupils rotated each 15 minutes. The activities were facilitated very ably by the S 6 pupils and school staff  visited the event to see how other departments integrated these literacy skills. The event provided valuable ideas which could be applied in a range of contexts and shared practice very effectively.

Pupils were engaged throughout and gave very positive verbal feedback. The literacy experience was enriched by this event and pupil awareness of how to apply their literacy skills was enhanced. There was a lovely collaborative and exciting atmosphere during the event which added to the positive ethos within the school. Caroline and her colleagues were pleased that the event widened their exemplification of literacy across learning, and acted as a showcase for staff development work. Read more in Falkirk’s Literacy Strategy blog http://glo.li/1luPT26