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Oak Hill's programme is highly structured and provides a
framework for students to reach their potential.
Your child will experience success
Oak Hill provides a secure and supportive environment in which your child will experience success. Students are assessed using the Hill Learning Center testing tools which inform each child's individualised programme in a class with a teacher-to-pupil ratio of 1:4.
Oak Hill's programme is highly structured and provides a framework for students to reach their potential. Three intensive lessons in reading, written language and mathematics are delivered five days a week, in half-day sessions. Students spend the other half of each day at their regular school. This allows them to participate in the mainstream curriculum and extra-curricular activities offered by the Home School.
Oak Hill aims:
To provide a stimulating environment in which students can
- reach their full academic potential
- develop as independent learners who value life-long learning and who seek success, both in an educational setting
and the wider world - nurture individuals who have respect for others and who celebrate cultural and intellectual differences
- foster strong links with parents/carers and the home school, in order to best meet the individual needs of each student.
What is Hill methodology?
Oak Hill uses a proven methodology which has been developed by The Hill Learning Center over the last 40 years. It is an appropriate programme for students with Specific Learning Differences and/or Attention Deficit Disorders. The research-based Hill Methodology curriculum consists of reading, written language and maths instruction in a half-day programme. Oak Hill teachers are highly qualified and experienced and have completed The Hill Learning Center training (accredited by the International Structured Language Education Council – IMSLEC).
Hill Learning Center instruction which is based on the work of Dr. Samuel Orton and Anna Gillingham, consists of a systematic, individualised, structured-language approach to reading and written language. Hill Methodology combines several aspects of the precision-teaching method, which uses direct and daily measurement of student progress, along with individual analysis of student skill acquisition. Through multi-sensory instruction, a student is able to utilise his or her strongest learning style as the dominant pathway for learning, while simultaneously strengthening weaker channels.
This approach strives to assist each individual in realising their potential by developing strengths, remediating weaknesses and experiencing success.
• Micro teaching
• Direct instruction
• Explicit teaching of skills
• Building resilience
• Active Learning
• Automaticity
• Immediate feedback
• Setting achievable targets
Strategies Used at Oak Hill:
Your child's day
The lessons and components of each day follow a predictable routine, enabling students to feel secure and organised. Each lesson is 50 minutes long, with a 5 minute break between reading and written language and a longer play-time before maths.
The components of each lesson are as follows:
WRITTEN LANGUAGE
- Oral Drill
- Oral Spelling
- Written Spelling
- Copying or
- Sentence/Paragraph Dictation
- Handwriting
- Composition & Creative Writing
- Grammar & Mechanics
All components are covered daily, ensuring a multi-sensory, structured-language approach in which immediate positive reinforcement gives students a real sense of achievement. The reading class uses systematic phonics instruction for word attack and emphasises word recognition through phonological awareness activities, decoding, vocabulary development, fluency drills, oral and silent reading, as well as reading comprehension.
READING
- Oral Drill
- Phonological Awareness
- Word Attack
- Timed Tests
- Vocabulary
- Oral Reading
- Comprehension
Oral drill and oral and written spelling are practiced daily and copying and dictation take place on alternate days. Aspects of the remaining components are selected each day, to ensure students develop the skills to write in a variety of genres.
MATHEMATICS
- Oral Drill
- Timed Tests
- Number Dictation
- Number Reading
- Problem solving
- Computation/Application
Maths classes provide multi-sensory instruction with emphasis on automatic recall of maths facts, developing number concepts, following mathematical procedures, speed and accuracy in computation and increased problem solving skills. Drill and timed tests are practiced daily, and number dictation and reading take place on alternate days. For computation and application work, Oak Hill follows a programme, in which skills and concepts are introduced in small steps and practiced to automaticity in subsequent lessons.
