Year7 brochure ammend2way, considering any hidden messages in texts such as stereotyping or bias, e.g. how a particular group is represented in an advertisement will affect people’s

Helping your child

in year 7with literacy

and numeracy

Ideas to use at home

Celebrating literacy and numeracy

Year7 brochure ammend2 26/7/04 4:24 PM Page 2

1 National Literacy and Numeracy Week

What is literacy?Literacy is the ability to read and use written information and to write appropriately in a range of situations. It involves theintegration of speaking, listening and critical thinking with reading and writing.

In Year 7 your son or daughterwill be working with differentteachers in different subject areas.Each subject has its own literacydemands, e.g. writing up anexperiment in science is quitedifferent to writing about anevent in history. Subject teachersteach students how to read andwrite in their own subjects.

Your son or daughter’s learning in allsubject areas will be supported by:• talking and listening

• reading

• writing.

Parents have a key role insupporting their children tofurther develop and practiceliteracy skills. Here are someideas that you can use at home.They do not rely on knowledgeabout the school subjects.

What does literacy mean in high school?


Celebrating literacy & numeracy 2

High school classroomtalking and listening

In high school,classroom talking& listening involves:

• listening for main ideas

• defending or supporting apoint of view

• understanding other people’sdifferent points of view.

What can you doat home?Talking and listening helps people to express and furtherdevelop ideas. Through talkingwith and listening to your son or daughter you can show thattheir opinions and ideas arevalued and acknowledged. Talking and listening in yourhome language will also helpyour son or daughter’s Englishliteracy development.• When listening to your son

or daughter, focus on themessages being shared withyou. Find out more by askingquestions such as:

“What makes you think that?”

“What if…?”

“How could this be different?”

“Are there other possibilities?”

• Ask your son or daughter toexplain homework tasks toyou. Talking about tasks canhelp your son or daughterclarify what needs to be done.Illustration by Fernleigh Adams, Year 11.



In high school,classroomreading involves:

• reading widely to gaininformation, e.g. in visual arts,using a variety of sources tofind out about an artist andtheir work

• reading for specific detail, e.g.in history, locate details aboutwhere and when an eventoccurred

• reading in a questioning way, considering any hiddenmessages in texts such asstereotyping or bias, e.g. how aparticular group is representedin an advertisement will affectpeople’s opinions about thatgroup

• reading a wide range of textsand reading texts closely forcritical analysis, enjoyment andpleasure.

What can you do at home?In high school, your son ordaughter will need to read widely for different purposesacross subject areas. Studentshave to be able to work out what is being said and readbetween the lines to work out what is not directly stated.Effective readers need to makejudgements about informationand ideas included in texts, the way the ideas are presentedand what information has been left out.

High schoolclassroom reading



Before reading• Ask your son or daughter to

explain their reason forreading, e.g. for enjoyment, tofind specific information, to beable to make or do something.

• Ask your son or daughter totell you what might be includedin the text. This helps them tothink about the topic beforethey read.

After reading• Ask if it is the most useful

thing to read. What else couldbe used? Is it helpful?

• Talk to your son or daughterabout what information can befound directly in what they arereading. What information canbe worked out from what theyread, but is not directly stated?

• Ask your son or daughter totell you about the informationpresented in graphs, diagramsor images. Why is thisinformation presented in this way?



In high school,classroom writinginvolves:• producing organised,

well-written pieces of writing that respond to a task

• producing a paragraph of writing in response to a question.

What can you do at home?Through writing, students expresstheir understandings of newlearning, opinions and ideas indifferent subject areas. The way a text is written depends on thereason/s it has been written.

For example, in English, students may write short stories,responses to books and films,and descriptions of characters. In geography, students may write descriptions of differentenvironments, explain how

landforms are created andtransformed and write argumentsabout issues from differentpoints of view.

• Help your son or daughter tounderstand information readfrom reference materials bytalking about the information,then deciding what the mainideas are. These ideas can thenbe written down in point form.

• Read your son or daughter’swriting and talk about a fewthings they have done well,e.g. clearly organisedinformation, easy to follow,accurate spelling. If somethingis unclear, ask your son ordaughter about it. It can behelpful to have someonedifferent read your work.

• Encourage your son ordaughter to re-read theirwriting to check for wording,spelling and punctuation.Sometimes it is easier to findways to improve the writingwhen it is read aloud.

High schoolclassroom writing


What does numeracy mean in high school?


In Year 7 yourson or daughterwill be workingwith differentteachers indifferent subjectareas.

What is numeracy?Numeracy is the capacity to use mathematics in everyday situations athome, at work and for participation on community life. This involvesapplying mathematical knowledge such as when estimating, measuringand interpreting information presented in text, tables and as graphs.

Illustration by Fernleigh Adams, Year 11.



Each subject may draw uponspecific mathematical ideas, e.g.creating a graph in geography,reading or developing a timelinein history, measuring aningredient accurately in foodtechnology.

There are some aspects ofnumeracy that support learning inall the subject areas. These include: • making calculations and

working out simple numberproblems

• estimating and measuring

• reading and creating graphsand tables

• critically interpretinginformation presented as graphs.

Parents have a key role in supportingstudents to further develop andpractise numeracy skills. Here aresome ideas you can use at home.They do not rely on knowledgeabout the school subjects.

In high school,making calculationsand working outsimple numberproblems involves:• solving number problems

using efficient mental and written methods. For example, to multiply 299 by 3, an efficientmethod is to calculate 300 by 3and then to subtract 3.



What can you do at home?• Show your son or daughter

short cuts to solving numberproblems, like rounding offnumbers to make the problemeasier, then adjusting the finalanswer.

• Talk to your son or daughterwhen you are solving everydaynumber problems such as:- how many kilometres left in ajourney- how much change to expectafter paying a bill- working out a discount on thecost of an item- comparing the cost of twoitems.

This will help show theconnections between what islearnt at school and how thiscan be applied in daily life.

• When you are working out anumber problem, discuss themethod you used so that yourson or daughter can see howyou approached the problem.There is usually more than oneway of solving a numberproblem and you may have adifferent method from thoseused at your son or daughter’sschool.

In high school,estimating andmeasuring involves:• knowing when to be accurate

(with information such asdates, times andmeasurements) or when usingan approximation is sufficient.

What can you do at home?• Talk about words such as

approximately, about, nearly,and the fact that this means theinformation is not exact, e.g.approximately 50 people, about200 years ago, nearly everyone.Discuss why these words areused at different times.

• Discuss situations where it maybe vital to be accurate withmeasurements or numbers, e.g. in medicine. Think aboutother situations when a highlevel of accuracy might not beneeded, e.g. estimating howmuch wrapping paper is neededfor a gift.

• Ask your son or daughter to usethe scale on a map to estimatethe distance to be travelled.



In high schools,reading andcreating graphs andtables involves: • representing information in

different ways • interpreting information

from tables, such as on a train timetable, or findinginformation from graphs such as when interpreting the annualrainfall represented visually on a graph rather than as text.

What can you do at home?• Show your child different

examples of graphs and tables.Newspapers, magazines andadvertising brochures oftencontain a variety of graphs andtables. Talk about whatinformation is given in thegraph or table. Ask why theinformation has been presented like this.

• Ask questions to help your son or daughter to explore theinformation in a graph or table, e.g.What facts can be gathered fromthis graph? What information isnot included on the graph?

In high schools,reading andcreatables involves:• Encourage your son or daughter

to consider graphs and tables as a way of presenting informationin each subject, e.g. if a survey is completed for homework,talk about the best way topresent this information.

In high school,questioninginformation involves:• developing skills in questioning

numerical information to see if it is valid

• checking that the source ofinformation is reliable.



What can you do at home?• Encourage your son or

daughter to ask questionsabout advertising, e.g. if a salesign says up to 70% off, doesthis mean that everything is70% off, or does it mean thatmany items may only be 10%off, with a few items 70% off?This type of information isoften deliberately left out.

• Use newspaper, television andadvertising examples wherenumbers are used. Look fordetails about where the

information came from, e.g. in opinion polls or surveys, how many people were asked?How were these people chosen?Would the results be different if different people were asked?

• Talk about information used inadvertising food products, andwhy the company has chosen to show this information. Does it make the food look healthy? Is the company trying to hidesomething? For example, aproduct advertised as 97% fatfree is low in fat, but may havehigh levels of sugar and salt. This information may not be highlighted.


■ Council of Catholic School ParentsPhone (02) 9287 1590Fax (02) 9264 [email protected]

■ Federation of Parents and Citizens’ Associations of NSWPhone (02) 9360 2481Fax (02) 9361 [email protected]

■ NSW Parents’ CouncilPhone (02) 9955 8276Fax (02) 9954 [email protected]

www.nlnw.nsw.edu.auTranslations of this brochure are available at

Funded by grants from the Australian Government Department of Education, Science and Training as part of National Literacy and Numeracy Week.


Documents

Year7 brochure ammend2way, considering any hidden messages in texts such as stereotyping or bias, e.g. how a particular group is represented in an advertisement will affect people’s