Keynote - Professor Annette Woods
| Saturday, July 11, 2026 |
| 3:45 PM - 4:15 PM |
| Sirius & Pleiades Room |
Details
Learning literacy: Given what we know what else might we ask?
Literacy and how it is best taught and learnt is arguably one of the most researched areas within the field of education. Education researchers, researchers from outside our field, policy makers, politicians, think tanks, associations, parent groups, commercial publishers and educators all have strong opinions about how literacy should be taught in schools, especially as it relates to early reading. But what do we know about what children and young people understand learning literacy to be, and what they think about how it is taught? In this presentation I will draw on findings from a diverse range of research projects to consider this question, and provide practical ideas for researchers and educators to consider as they seek to include children and young people in their curriculum and pedagogy planning.
Speaker
Professor Annette Woods
University of New South Wales
Keynote Presentation
Biography
Annette Woods is a Professor at the University of New South Wales. She is currently working on the Culturally Nourishing Schooling project, led by Professor Kevin Lowe, that involves Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander educators, Community members and Elders, school leaders and teachers, and researchers working together to consider schooling reform which centres the best interests of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and young people across diverse contexts. For almost 15 years before becoming an academic, Annette taught across primary, adult literacy, and early childhood contexts, and held a number of system advisory positions. Since completing her doctoral research, she has taught and researched across literacies, digital literacies, curriculum and pedagogy, social justice and school reform. She was a Chief Investigator in the Centre for Excellence for the Digital Child (2020-2025).
