LEARNING MADE EASY WITH LEXIA
 

Coleraine Park Primary School is situated in Tottenham, north London. It has a committed team of 53 members of staff who provide educational support to 420 children, taking them from reception to Year 6 (the completion of Key Stage 2). In addition the school has a special needs department and a dedicated speech and language unit to provide specialist tuition. There are currently 158 pupils who require learning support at the school.

Coleraine Park Primary School has a strong commitment to introducing new and proven technologies to benefit its pupils and staff. It has a total of 40 PCs averaging two per classroom, and a dedicated ICT (Information Communication Technology) suite that the children are timetabled to visit. The PC provides an ideal learning tool as it is capable of delivering an audiovisual experience in a familiar environment that promotes self-learning and self-confidence.  This audiovisual resource is particularly important when teaching and understanding phonetics, as it enables the child to comprehend the association between letters, letter groupings, words and pronunciation.

Independent learning through ICT interaction is a great way of building and maintaining confidence and enthusiasm, whilst providing a stimulating and motivational learning environment. With the decision to further invest in new educational software, the school went in search of a proven learning software package that would allow the children to access literacy resources in a fun, familiar and engaging way. The software would need to be capable of assisting pupils of all abilities to progress towards Level 4 of the National Curriculum’s requirement for literacy, and be capable of adapting to the needs of each individual pupil.

It was the school’s educational psychologist who first recommended the Lexia Reading System to Coleraine Primary School Teacher, Kate Ivory.  Lexia Reading System is designed for students to work independently listening to verbal instructions and clicking on images with a mouse or typing. The interactive exercises branch off automatically depending on the student’s performance, providing practice on specific areas of difficulty when needed. Lexia allows the progression on to more advanced areas only when the student is ready. The teaching assistants may override the automatic branching function at any time to specify program units or customize exercises for individual pupils. The activities are intriguing for the students and require only a basic use of the keyboard and mouse, allowing them to focus 100 percent of their attention on each activity.

Fully trained teaching assistants work with the children to use the system and each child receives three sessions per week for 15 minutes each lesson, either at the beginning of the day or during assembly time. Its site license ensures that the Lexia Reading System is available on every PC in the school.

“Using the Lexia Reading System we have seen an increase in reading ability and an increase in the pupils’ confidence. It is an invaluable resource and allows each child to work independently, visualize their achievements and work towards realistic goals,” comments Kate Ivory. She adds, “This type of program has knock-on effects in other lessons as well. An increase in self-esteem can be seen in many pupils who have been using Lexia, which is hugely satisfying for the teaching staff.”