English holds a high priority at St. Leo’s. All children participate in a daily two-hour uninterrupted Literacy block focused on developing reading and writing skills.

The principles that underpin Literacy are ‘High Expectations for all Students’, ‘Focused Teaching’ and ‘Engaged Learning’.

The English Curriculum, aligned with the Victorian Curriculum 2.0, aims to teach Reading, Writing, and Speaking and Listening through a balanced and structured approach where student progress is continually monitored using established assessment techniques. The school has implemented the use of DIBELS (Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills), which provides regular screening of foundational reading skills such as phonemic awareness, fluency, and decoding, allowing teachers to quickly identify and support students’ early literacy development. In addition, PAT-R (Progressive Achievement Tests in Reading) is used to measure reading comprehension and growth over time, supporting teachers to track student progress and plan targeted instruction.

Students engage in structured and explicit literacy instruction supported by Ochre, which provides a consistent framework for daily review, explicit teaching, and whole-school instructional routines to strengthen student learning. The school also uses UFLI (University of Florida Literacy Institute) Foundations to deliver a systematic, explicit phonics program that develops students’ decoding, spelling, and word recognition skills.

St. Leo’s also implements the MiniLit Sage  intervention program in the junior years, which provides targeted small-group instruction for students who require additional explicit teaching in foundational literacy skills such as phonics, phonemic awareness, and reading fluency.