THRASS FOLLOW-UP COURSE,
GTG, SOUTH AFRICA, JUNE 13, 2009

Alan brought it all together. I feel confident that I will be able to help the teachers I work with. Everything was really helpful and deepened my understanding. I am convinced that this is suitable for South African children with many different language backgrounds and is systematic and intelligent. I am so looking forward to working with the teachers to implement this. An inspiring programme. 

A typical THRASS Workshop, where every second counts! I benefited a lot. Lots of grey areas cleared. The accent issue – the GCA and the additional resources received most helpful. The lesson analysis used at the beginning was great! 

Thank you for your commitment to helping us in South Africa. I’ve enjoyed both courses. Today’s ironed out a few ‘hiccups’ and I do feel more confident that I’m doing exactly what is expected. Have you thought about a reading scheme to supplement and reinforce the phonic programme? 

Good refresher course! 

I now have some ideas and games that I can use to extend my learners. Good for me to see that I am teaching THRASS well in my class and my learners are good at using it. 

I really learned a lot today. A lot of things fell into place. Thank you for your hard work. I would love to come to another course (especially as I am an Afrikaans-speaking person teaching in an English school!) I appreciate your passion for THRASS. 

Brilliant. We are definitely going to use the interactive software at our school. I learn more and more every time and will make time to play more THRASS games in my class. I learned something valuable about ‘le’ in ‘little’ which I can pass on to my own child! 

Wow! A great course. I learned so much – it was great learning exactly what to do with the SING-A-LONG book and getting various examples. I can’t wait to go and try this in my classroom. I’m also really glad I know about ‘le’ – it’s so much clearer. 

Very well presented. Work fell into place. Understand better where to begin and move forward. Understand how to link up life skills with the spelling programme. Looking forward to teaching the children that are ADD. 

Reinforced my knowledge and it showed me that I am doing THRASS correctly. For example, I have taught my learners both the words ‘phoneme’ and ‘sound’ and use them interchangeably. I wish that our school had the money to buy a desk-size picturechart for each child, as we are struggling to teach it with only the wall-size chart in the front and the photocopiable pages that lack pictures. However, the learners pick up the new terminology easily and have no problem with words like ‘digraph’, ‘grapheme’, etc. I do find that some of them have trouble getting away from the ‘old phonics’ where one letter equals one sound, especially since the ones I teach only started learning THRASS in Gr 4, 5 or 6. 

Great to be able to put ideas, concepts back into perspective. I would like to know more about teaching THRASS to deaf learners using the auditory-oral approach. What research has been done? Is there a need for more case studies? I am very interested in this. 

It was an eye-opener for me, although I attended the to-day course last year. I was very impressed with the work being done at a school in Limpopo, yet they don’t have as many resources as we do in Gauteng. I had the impression that THRASS is a bit difficult with children who don’t have English as their first language, but the school in Limpopo allayed all my fears. 

Interesting. It helped to solve some of the questions, problems and concerns we had when implementing THRASS at school. I think that it’s good to have a follow-up. It helps a lot, because during the course, you always think that you have everything, but when you get to class and come across all those different ideas and questions, it is then that you realise that you don’t! 

Excellent, inspiring. Ready to try new ideas. Motivated to inspire those teachers who won’t change! 

Key points clarified. It was good to have an update. Really enjoyed the videos – it is inspiring. 

Some of the previously misunderstood pieces of the puzzle fell into place! Enjoyed the videos, too! 

Refreshed key points taught in first course. SING-A-LONG songs are excellent. Scheme of Work will be good guide. Learners definitely benefit from the THRASS programme. 

Refreshed core concepts. Bit long. 

Very informative and I’m now confident to implement THRASS. 

Wonderful, once again! 

I really enjoyed the course and have learned a lot. I found it more practical than the first. I am going to try and implement everything you’ve taught me. 

It was a brilliant idea to return. I feel more confident going back to school and helping learners who have great difficulties. 

Great course. Will improve spelling and literacy skills dramatically. Am trying to introduce it to my school. Will definitely implement with my young grandson! 

I was unsure of so many things and got clarity on all of it. Love the resources, such as the THRASS-IT CD. Keep up the wonderful work you are doing for the world and especially in South Africa.

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