By Bridie Smith
All state school students from prep to grade 2 will learn to read using the same explicit teaching method within two years, after the state’s powerful teachers’ union reached a deal with the state government over how the new educational mandate would be rolled out.
The new agreement was forged following last year’s public fallout between the union and Education Minister Ben Carroll during which the union instructed its members to ignore a government directive to transition to the method, because it had not been consulted.
The new agreement means that from 2027, all state school students will learn to read by using phonics.Credit: Wayne Taylor
The Sunday Age can reveal that under the new deal, the government will pay an extra $5 million for resources to aid schools’ transition to the compulsory systematic synthetic phonics teaching method.
The money, to be distributed to schools through their Student Resource Package by the end of the financial year, can be spent on mini whiteboards, letter tiles and decodable texts, which are used as part of the literacy program. Each school will be able to chose how it spends the money.
However under the agreement, schools will have less time to introduce the compulsory changes, with the government crunching the timeline from three years to two.
The revised timeline means that by the start of the 2027 school year, all state primary and specialist schools will be expected to have implemented the systematic synthetic phonics approach, which teaches children the sounds of the English language and the letter combinations that make them.
Some schools already use the explicit teaching method, but the directive marks the start of a statewide approach in which all prep to grade 2 students in public schools are taught to read using structured phonics.
Students will receive a minimum of 25 minutes of daily, explicit teaching of phonics and phonemic awareness.
Carroll’s announcement, made at The Age’s School Summit last June, prompted an irate response from the Australian Education Union, which ordered its members to disobey the directive and accused Carroll of failing to consult the profession, which it said was a breach of the 2022 Victorian Government Schools Agreement.
The union also said the announcement exposed Carroll’s apparent lack of understanding of the curriculum, given explicit instruction was already used by numerous schools.
Months of meetings followed between the education department and the union before a fresh agreement was struck.
Newly appointed Australian Education Union Victorian branch president Justin Mullaly, who took up the post last month, said teachers’ expertise was at the heart of meeting students’ classroom needs and that the profession should be central to any decisions involving teaching and learning.
“Following the AEU’s call for the minister and department to undertake proper consultation with the profession, there are improved supports and resources being provided,” he said.
“Although the profession would have been much better equipped to implement the changes if proper consultation had occurred in the first place.”
Mullaly said the union, which represents more than 50,000 teachers, principals and support staff in Victoria, would maintain its demand that the state government treat the profession with respect.
The accelerated introduction of explicit teaching also coincides with the introduction of a revised maths curriculum, with some in the profession concerned that too many changes could the compromise outcomes.
Opposition education spokesperson Jess Wilson said students would be taught by “disproven teaching methods” for the next two years.
“These latest revelations have exposed the education minister’s inability to implement evidence-based learning in Victorian classrooms,” she said.
Carroll, who is also the deputy premier, acknowledged when making June’s announcement that he might be “stepping on a hand grenade” and that the reading wars might not be over.
However, he has stood by the mandate and said via a statement on Saturday that evidence showed explicit teaching and the use of systematic synthetic phonics got results.
“Speeding up the transition of the phonics rollout from three years to two is a priority,” he said. “The additional funding will enable primary schools to purchase resources.”
Last month Victoria signed a new school funding deal with the Commonwealth, which will deliver state schools an extra $2.5 billion over 10 years. A portion of that money will go towards phonics lesson plans.
As part of the funding deal, which comes into effect next year, Victorian state schools will have to undertake a series of initiatives, including phonics checks for year 1 students.
Schools will also have to increase the proportion of students in the “strong” and “exceeding” proficiency for reading by 10 per cent.
Last year’s NAPLAN results showed that 71 per cent of Victorian year 3 students were reading at either “strong” or “exceeding” levels, compared with 66 per cent nationally.
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