Excellent, excellent, excellent! Thank you very much. It is obviously a methodology that Laola feels passionate about and is extremely knowledgeable about. The presenter on both days was great. It was easy to understand and the stages were clearly explained. I am eager to try it out on the learners. What is so wonderful also is that it can be integrated in all the learning areas.

I was privileged enough to have been part of this fantastic course through ABSA. The course was a real eye opener as I have learned so much with how THRASS works, what it is used for and how beneficial it really is. I was able to grasp a lot of information which will be very valuable to both me and my learners one day when I start teaching. I have also realised how much easier spelling and reading could become with the help of THRASS. I actually wished we knew about THRASS when we were in Foundation Phase as it could have lead to fewer problems. I will be a great help in the future and I am really grateful!

Very interesting. It has made me aware of so many different aspects of teaching. Education should be fun and exciting allowing the children to grow in their development. What better way than by using this program. I have grown from this experience and hope to learn more.

Entertaining, thought-provoking and spirit-lifting. Super for new ideas and realized that kids can! Loved it!

This has been an amazing, stimulating and most informative course but will require a real paradigm shift on my part as have been teaching for many years! I will be very keen to use the material, love the Sing-a-Long CD and am sure our students will be stimulated to learn over and above what we have been teaching. Due to the diversity of our children and their backgrounds we will have to adopt and slot in what we can at pace that suits students. Thank for an eye opener to what can be done!

A very interesting course. I’ve learnt a lot. I enjoyed the Sing-a-Long CD, the games and the interaction with us the whole time. Time flew so fast I can’t wait to go on the web.

The facilitator was well prepared, excellent presentation. I personally learned a lot, well done!

Excellent! Learned a lot! Thank you for all the great ideas and methods, we will try this certainly!

Enjoyed the course very much! I learned a lot and cannot wait to start this at our school!

Well presented. I learned a lot! This methodology makes so much sense to me. So much fun too! I think my children will love learning English this way!

Relevant and very well planned. Amazing attention to detail! Wonderful reference to multi-modalities into learning styles! Looking forward to a Sing-a-Long workshop, if possible!

Interesting and enlightening. I thoroughly enjoyed it and am now confident and excited to teach this new tool in my classroom. Laola was a great facilitator and easy to listen to during the course of the two days. Not only am I more confident with spelling but also reading and other aspects of the English language that our children need to learn and understand to succeed. I am hoping that we will have an opportunity to take part in a Sing-a-Long workshop to extend our THRASS knowledge.

I appreciated the idea that it is a multi-sensory, holistic approach. I learned a great deal about sounds. I know that the learners love the music and the rap as I have tried that already. Now I will be able to introduce more of the programme into our school.

I enjoyed the course as we are from a disadvantaged community the multisensory approach is essential. The course was well structured and the facilitator was well prepared. The music and rap is an excellent medium for my learners, can’t wait to try it!

Found the course so informative and beneficial. It was well presented and the resources given were easy to use and understand. It has been so good to learn something new. It is a very different approach to what we are used to but we are looking forward to implementing it and seeing results. Can’t wait to sing the songs with our students!

Very interesting and informative. It’s great to have fresh new and exciting ideas. Especially for English language as this is used throughout all school subjects. The course I found covers every aspect imaginable and therefore leaves one with an overall understanding of what THRASS involves.

Thank you so much for all the information. Although I was a bit tired but it was worth it. I like the voice on Sing-a-Long CD. Janine sings beautifully! This is a good English teaching method but I wish you can have English readers and I’m a bit worried about new handwriting rules. I will try my best to implement them.

Extremely interesting. I really found it like a real paradigm shift from the way we are used to teaching phonics. Mrs L. Altschul really needs to be commended on her professionalism and the way she conducted the course. I just feel I need to know more!

The course was very good for me, and I hope that this THRASS course can help me because I am a second language speaker. The preparation was good everything was perfect. The resources, the way of introducing the lessons to the children!

This has been a most informative course, which I have learnt a lot from. THRASS will benefit me with my future teachings. I enjoyed learning about THRASS and find it very interactive.

Very interesting, gave lots of information and insight. I am now more confident. Was enjoyable and enjoyed being involved and seeing footage of THRASS being put in practice. I really enjoyed it and look forward of putting it into practice on myself and other learners.

Having done some practical aspects of THRASS, this brought everything together. It was informative and truly beneficial. It was conducted in a fun manner which I know the children will enjoy!

Very informative! Lots of new knowledge was learned and greater insight into new ways of teaching. Found that some of the information presented was not absorbed as much as the time was very limited. I was introduced to THRASS but never really understood the purpose of it! But after the course I understand why it was done. I think it’s a great way of teaching as it caters for all different learning areas. I look forward to putting it into practise!

Very interesting course! It’s great to learn about the different ways of teaching phonics. The course was conducted well! It was very informative and time was managed well! I do have one concern and that is the cost involved in implementing the programme in South Africa when most of our schools are poor schools!

This has been a very informative session. I definitely gained a lot especially as a second language speaker. However I do feel that I personally needed more time to understand it better as I am a second language speaker and did not have the luxury of going to model schools. As a future foundation phase teacher I am going to make sure that I use THRASS and even find a way of doing it in my own Xhosa language.

The course was very interesting indeed and I enjoyed every part of it! I have learnt a lot in THRASS and I am hoping that every learner will enjoy it as we did and a challenging course and I think learners will enjoy it if they can save it and try!

Very informative and also useful! I find it connecting with Xhosa phonics. I do not find THRASS far away from Xhosa. Teachers who take Xhosa can use it for their children. It also helped me because during school experience I did not know how to approach phonic teaching. My accent was a problem. I think THRASS has given me the confidence to teach them next year!

Very worthwhile. I really enjoyed it and I have learnt so much! I really hope that the school I teach at one day will do THRASS, if not I would strongly recommend it! The course lecturer was very knowledgeable and knew exactly what she was talking about and was able to answer every question that was asked. I thoroughly enjoyed the course!

The course was educating and interesting and the THRASS programme looks like a very good thing in young learners lives but found hard to see many used in higher grades but has some good ideas and can see how it helps with recall memory and later on in live with exams!

Fantastic course which opened my eyes to new possibilities! I am glad that I now understand fully what THRASS is and how it works. I have given me much more insight into language learning. Even though I will be teaching Grades four to six and I think I could use some principles of THRASS.

Wow! Thank you THRASS for opening my eyes to a new and exciting tool! A most informative and worthwhile training session.

Considering I have been a student teacher in THRASS lessons, I have felt that this course has helped me put theory into practise. The course was very interesting and definitely worth my while!

I really enjoyed this course; it was lovely to learn about THRASS in depth. This course has helped me to clarify my misconceptions about THRASS. I have learnt about concepts that I had never thought about! I now see the true value of THRASS!

I enjoyed this very much, I have had the honour to work with THRASS before but now I understand what and why it’s being done. I’m grateful for this and will hold my head high! It is insightful to know the THRASS way of teaching, spelling etc... I have now seen the importance of THRASS.

Attending this course was an enriching experience for me. It has given me the in-depth knowledge of what THRASS is about and how to teach it. I’ve learnt that THRASS is a fun (great) way of teaching handwriting, reading and spelling skills!

Previously I had not heard good comments from fourth year students on the THRASS programme, but now that I have sat through training I have my own opinion that this is a fantastic idea. I am very excited to teach it one day soon. The course was very well presented and very worth while!

The THRASS course was interesting and helpful. I didn’t know about THRASS and now I do, it certainly helped me to think of how I can teach handwriting, reading and spelling.

Exceptionally helpful - as a future educator. Now that THRASS has been explained to me so in-depth I now understand the stages of THRASS as well as the methodology for literacy education. The planning and the work that was involved to make this course possible were amazing. I thoroughly enjoyed it and appreciate the wonderful opportunity to have learned more about THRASS!

This has been an important course that one finds valuable to have for learners. It is more important even to us teachers. I will be able to teach the learners using THRASS in future when I have completed my degree. I feel like having practice for this in class. I also wish to implement it in my country Lesotho. We had a perfect and nice presentation from the THRASS co-ordinator!

I learnt so much from this course as I did not realize that there was any other way of teaching literacy than using the traditional Letterland. I feel extremely privileged to have had this training and feel that even if I do not ever use THRASS in it’s entirety that there will definitely be aspects of this training that I will use in my practice teaching as well as when I have my own classroom one day! I thank you so much for your time and patience.

The course mainly brought in new information. Time schedule of the course I think needs attention because doing it in two days is not enough! The presentation was perfect and interesting.

The enthusiastic and interesting course which teaches about the spelling choices and phonemes that is vitally important for creative writing. Also important for building the learner the communicative language skills like interaction, listening, speaking and thinking! A fantastic course that I’ve never seen before, which encourages and motivates the student teacher as well and develops knowledge!

Absolutely amazing and what an eye-opener. I have learnt so much, as a life-long learner and as a future teacher. I have realised that this way of teaching provides children with so much more understanding, with reasons of why and how one spells! I will definitely, if given the opportunity, use THRASS because I have seen that it provides and teaches children so much more than through Letterland as I was taught. I have now found new meaning in the future.

A real eye-opener and I have learnt a lot. I now see that literacy can be fun and children can enjoy things such as song and dance when it comes to learning literacy. Thank you so much!