Shows
Knowledge for TeachersS03E03 - Liana McCurry on Mathematical Practices in High Performing CountriesIn this episode of Knowledge for Teachers, Brendan Lee speaks with Liana McCurry, a passionate advocate for primary school maths education. Fresh from her Churchill Fellowship, Liana shares findings from her research into mathematical practices across six countries.
Listeners will gain insights into the systemic issues contributing to Australia's declining maths performance and discover how to bridge the research-to-practice gap. Liana delves into key topics, including:
Mathematical modelling and its surprisingly misunderstood place in the curriculum.
The power of multisensory approaches to unlock conceptual understanding.
Why fluency in maths is a foundational skill that needs renewed...2025-02-081h 04Knowledge for TeachersS03E03 - Liana McCurry on Mathematical Practices in High Performing CountriesIn this episode of Knowledge for Teachers, Brendan Lee speaks with Liana McCurry, a passionate advocate for primary school maths education. Fresh from her Churchill Fellowship, Liana shares findings from her research into mathematical practices across six countries.
Listeners will gain insights into the systemic issues contributing to Australia's declining maths performance and discover how to bridge the research-to-practice gap. Liana delves into key topics, including:
Mathematical modelling and its surprisingly misunderstood place in the curriculum.
The power of multisensory approaches to unlock conceptual understanding.
Why fluency in maths is a foundational skill that needs renewed...2025-02-081h 04
DyscastiaWhat high-performing countries are doing in maths. With Liana McCurryIn this episode, we have Liana McCurry back to talk about her Churchill Fellowship findings on what the top PISA performing countries are doing with maths instruction and how we can use that information to improve outcomes for kids living with learning difficulties.
Show notes
Liana McCurry’s Churchill Fellowship has come just in time. Liana travelled abroad to investigate best practices in teaching mathematics that provide the best outcomes for all students.
Australia’s PISA ranking plummeted from 10th internationally in 2003 to 30th in 2018, where it fell below the average for the first time. How w...2024-04-051h 20DyscastiaThe Importance Of Daily Review
In this episode, we chat about daily review with David Morkunas, current head of teacher efficacy at Brandon Park Primary School, previously a teacher at Bentleigh West Primary School.
David Morkunas is a primary school teacher from Melbourne and currently works at Brandon Park Primary School, where his role is to help support whole school improvement in maths. David first made a name for himself by speaking about the importance of Daily Review at conferences, including Sharing Best Practice and ResearchED. David is a fierce advocate for evidence-based teaching and learning, with a particular interest in how knowledge is transferred t...2024-01-181h 14DyscastiaSLDs And Individual Learning Plans
Sue Griffith
Sue is a registered teacher with many years of experience in primary teaching. She has specialist Maths training in programs designed to support students experiencing difficulties or delays in Maths skills, including students with dyscalculia and/or dyslexia.
QuickSmart Numeracy Intervention
Ron Yoshimoto Multisensory Maths program – based on the Orton-Gillingham principles
Singapore Maths
Sue designs individual courses that are explicit, structured, multisensory and manipulative-based for students who are underachieving in Maths. Programs utilised are all evidence-based interventions. Students learn to think mathematically and develop understanding beyond rote memorisation. Programs focus on fostering a positive attitude to...2023-11-151h 37DyscastiaMaths and learning difficultiesIn this episode, we chat with math teaching expert Liana McCurry. We delve into best practices for all students when teaching maths. We hope Liana's insights will help create inclusive learning environments where every child can succeed.
For the full show notes, including Liana's R-6 scope, sequence and content breakdown, visit our website.
https://dyscastia.com/episodes/episode-14-maths-and-learning-difficulties/
2023-07-211h 15DyscastiaADHD and learning difficultiesIn this episode, we talk with Psychologist Benita Ranzon about one of the most misunderstood and stigmatized conditions that affect kids and adults - ADHD.
About Benita
I have been working in private practice at Fullarton House since 2005. The focus of my practice is on educational issues for students and adults.
I offer diagnosis of specific learning difficulties such as dyslexia, dysgraphia, and dyscalculia.
I provide learning and support strategies for home, school and work to enable people with reading, spelling, writing or maths difficulties to be successful.
I offer diagnosis and advice to parents of...2023-05-211h 56DyscastiaThe Teaching Morphology Rabbit Hole and Word Cracking
Show notes
In this episode, Bill, Michael and Sally discuss morphology teaching and begin to demystify a body of knowledge that sometimes feels like the next frontier for teachers. Most of us have got our heads about the importance of phonemes and training young brains to work with them at a highly proficient level (phonemic awareness), and how to teach synthetic phonics in more effective ways.
Most teachers also get the importance of explicit and highly structured modes for teaching how phonemes map onto graphemes and the additional important stuff to do with English spelling conventions. However...2023-02-131h 16DyscastiaThe Importance of Handwriting, with Debbie DraperIn this episode, we chat with educational consultant Debbie Draper about handwriting, why it's back and what we need to do to set kids up for successful writing.
About Debbie
When Debbie was in year five at primary school in rural South Australia, she decided she wanted to be a teacher. After 17 years in the classroom, Debbie decided to switch her focus to assisting educators to do the best for their students.
Debbie now works as a specialist consultant with the goal of reaching out to school leaders and teachers who ne...2022-12-271h 01DyscastiaMental health and specific learning difficulties
In this episode, we chat with clinical psychologist Kirrilie Smout about the emotional challenges of living with specific learning difficulties. Kirrilie givestopert advice for parents and teachers on how to set kids up for success and support them when things get tough.
Show notes
Not keeping up at school and feeling like you aren’t able to do what the other kids can do is soul-destroying for young people. It’s also incredibly hard for those who care for them, most obviously parents and caregivers, but also educators who are in the lives of kids who struggle to learn to r...2022-09-201h 10DyscastiaNDIS funding for specific learning difficulties
In this episode, we chat with Kate Cole, a determined parent who managed to secure NDIS funding for her child living with dyslexia. Kate tells us exactly how she did it!
In this episode, we chat with Kate Cole, who tells her NDIS funding story. Kate tells us why she applied and how she navigated multiple rejections to ultimately have her funding approved.
It’s a story we hope you will find encouraging, useful and enlightening, as we did. So, if you live in Australia and know or support somebody living with a spe...2022-07-1549 minDyscastiaHow well do universities prepare teachers for literacy instruction?
Show notes
In this episode, we chat with two wonderful pre-service teachers, Lara (left) and Robert (right), who have just completed level one of Teaching Students with Dyslexia (TSD1). We thought this would be the perfect opportunity to ask Lara and Robert to reflect on what they’d just learned at TSD and how this contrasted with what they were learning about teaching literacy at University.
Lara
Lara is currently a student at Flinders University, undertaking a Bachelor of Primary of Education. She has previously been a Police Officer here in South Australia, as well as a...2022-06-1848 minDyscastiaLearning to teach kids living with dyslexia. How to get started and what training you need.In this episode, we talk to Bill, Sally, Karen, and Louise who run specialist dyslexia teacher training. We find out what’s involved and help you decide whether you should take up the challenge.
Sally Andrew
holds a Postgraduate Diploma in Dyslexia and Literacy from the University of York, UK. Sally has been tutoring students with dyslexia for 20 years and has trained many parents and educators in evidence-based multisensory interventions for dyslexia. Sally is the director of By Your Side Tutoring.
Karen Hodson
is a Director of Fullarton House – Assessment Therapy and...2022-05-1354 minDyscastiaHow to choose a school for kids living with learning difficultiesIn this episode, Michael and Bill discuss a blog that Bill wrote called Schools that teach Reading and Spelling in a Research Informed way: Picking a Winner.
In the episode, we focus on tips for parents to get beyond the sales pitch to make an informed decision about whether the school might be a good fit.
The first part of this episode discusses six red flags to look out for that may indicate that the school doesn't have a scientific approach to its teaching of reading and spelling.
The six red flags are a...2022-03-211h 17DyscastiaWhat’s changing with the teaching of reading in Australia (and why?)This episode answers the common questions schools and parents have when changing from a whole-language or balanced literacy way of teaching to one supported by scientific evidence.
“Why wasn’t my older one taught reading this way”
“Why have the take-home readers changed and why do the new ones look so basic compared to the old ones?”
“Where have the levelled readers and Running Records gone?”
“What’s this stuff about phonological awareness?”
“Why are the students and teachers doing activities that look like ‘rote learning’ and ‘drill’ in the classroom?”
“What happened to “chunky monkey” and “flippy dolphin” and why must we insist o...2022-02-131h 11DyscastiaDyslexia advocacy, with Dr Sandra MarshallIn this episode, we talk to Dr Sandra Marshall, BMBS FRACGP Dip Child Health, a General Practitioner in South Australia and Chairperson of Code Read Dyslexia Network. Sandra shares her insights for parents and teachers on advocating for kids living with learning difficulties.
Show notes
Dr Sandra Marshall realized that there was a problem with how reading is taught in Australia when her own sons started to struggle in primary school. After trying to get help for her sons, Sandra found perhaps her most important calling and knew that the journey ahead wouldn’t only mean advocating fo...2022-02-071h 10DyscastiaWhat is dyscalculia?Dyscalculia literally means disorder in calculation. It's real and it impacts about 5-7% of the population. It is also one of the Specific Learning Difficulties (SLDs) so we need to talk about it.
It’s so common to hear people say “I’ve just never had a head for numbers” or “I’m terrible at maths” that we don’t flinch when we hear it. But, what would you think if you heard someone say “I’ve never had a head for letters and speech sounds” or “I’m dreadful at reading”? When you think about it, you realise that it’s far more comm...2021-12-3145 minDyscastiaWhat are dyslexia and dysgraphia?In this episode, Michael and Bill do their very best to arm parents and educators with information about dyslexia and dysgraphia so they can better spot a good intervention and avoid precious time and money on unproven and disproved treatments.
Dyslexia and dysgraphia – huge enough on their own and often live together in one brain making life doubly hard for people. There’s just so much misleading information out there about these Specific Learning Difficulties. It was just the other day Bill gave some advice to a very grateful tradesperson about not paying a nutritionist who had clai...2021-12-3144 minDyscastiaSLDs and how to talk about themIn this episode, Michael and Bill delve into what Specific Learning Difficulties are and the advantages vs the disadvantages of using terms like learning difference, disability or disorder to describe them.
So what do we call it when a person can’t learn to do something like reading, writing or maths as easily as what is considered normal?
It’s a touchy subject and to be honest, it probably depends on the context you’re in when talking about it and whom you're talking to. Sometimes our context is trying to get funding schools to better s...2021-12-3138 min