About PLD Literacy
PLD provides an Australian, evidence-based approach to Structured Synthetic Phonics (SSP) for primary school educators. Aligned with the Science of Reading, PLD’s SSP approach extends from the junior primary years through to upper primary years and thereby facilitating a whole school approach.
PLD’s method is derived from the disciplines of speech pathology, occupational therapy and education. As an Australian publisher and professional development provider, PLD advocates that literacy and learning outcomes are maximised for children when their Literacy, Oral Language and Movement & Motor skills are targeted.
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Diana Rigg started her career as a teacher in 1992. Early on she identified that her tertiary training had not prepared her for the literacy and learning needs that she encountered in the classroom. It wasn’t long before she decided to pursue post graduate studies to extend her knowledge.
While completing a Masters in Education, Diana became aware of the significant lag between research being published and findings being applied in curriculum and ultimately the classroom. This was the catalyst that motivated Diana and to this day Diana strives in her consultancy and publishing work to ensure the most current research is finding its way into Australian classroom practises.
After completing her fourth degree, Diana decided that her next step was either an education based PHD or to look for answers from another discipline. In 2004 Diana completed her Masters in Speech Pathology.
While completing a Masters in Education, Diana became aware of the significant lag between research being published and findings being applied in curriculum and ultimately the classroom. This was the catalyst that motivated Diana and to this day Diana strives in her consultancy and publishing work to ensure the most current research is finding its way into Australian classroom practises.
From the outset PLD operated as a clinic, a consultancy and a publishing house. In addition to delivering services to children, the clinic assisted the publishing house, by trialling and testing of the devised programs. The success of the publishing range can be attributed to the clinic’s trialing of the programs.
In 2011, Diana made the decision to close the clinic, which serviced one child at a time, and focus on the bigger picture in education. She realised that there were so many children in schools that were not lucky enough to benefit from the PLD clinic. Her focus turned to equipping educators with evidence-based programs and techniques developed by her team of Speech Pathologists, and Occupational Therapists.
To this day Diana has worked with thousands of schools, continuously striving to bring evidence based programs into the classrooms and to the children of Australia. Her work in this area has continuously been proven to improve student outcomes.
PLD has a range of almost 100 evidence-based programs and resources aimed at the Early Years, Foundation, Year 1 & 2, and Year 3, 4, 5 & 6. PLD was awarded Australian Primary Publisher of the Year for four consecutive years in 2018, 2019, 2020 and 2021 by teachers in Australia.
Established as a Literacy and Learning clinic in 2007, PLD has gone through substantial changes over the years. It is this constant change and adapting how we operate that has allowed PLD to reach where we are today. Find out more below.
Literacy
“The capacity to read and spell accurately and fluently is dependent on knowledge of the phoneme-grapheme relationships underpinning English orthography. The body of knowledge (phonics) needs to be taught systematically, sequentially, cumulatively and on a daily basis – to the point of automaticity” (DSF Bulletin, Volume 58:2022).
Oral Language
Oral language refers to the act of speaking and listening. The main components for the oral language skill set includes word knowledge (vocabulary); sentence structure (grammar); language understanding (semantic and comprehension ability); and structured thinking (or the ability to elaborate, organise and sequence thoughts).
While poor oral language skills do not prevent children from reading, the long-term impact is concerning. By middle primary school, when both the curriculum and reading material increase in difficulty, a significant number of students will struggle to keep up with the demands of the curriculum if they have poorly developed language skills.
Movement & Motor
The way students organise their body and use their muscles to respond to what they hear is a big part of literacy. Often a physical response is required. A classic example is the ability to follow instructions and compose a written response. A range of physical skill development supports the functioning within a classroom and includes skills such as pencil grip, cutting skills, letter formation and handwriting.
Why the need to focus on all three areas?
Literacy involves more than just recognising words on a page. To be truly literate students need to be able to speak well, interpret what they’re hearing, and transfer all of this information into written language. It’s this broad three skill focus that sets PLD’s resources apart.