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Could you read the word âintravenousâ when you were in grade 3? Did you know the superlative suffix for âprettyâ?
Itâs Wednesday morning at Chelsea Primary, a state school in Melbourneâs south-eastern sandbelt, and these questions are being put at rapid pace to a composite class of grades 3 and 4 students.
Students at Chelsea Primary School learn to read using synthetic phonics.
Credit:Simon Schluter
The children sit in rows, engaged in a half-hour game of call and response with their teacher that is part reading exercise, part endurance test.
Words are broken down into root components â âruptâ, for example â then made whole by adding prefixes and suffixes: âerupt, interrupt, corrupt, ruptureâ. The students chant together as the teacher points at each word on a white screen.
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