Scaffolding Literacy
Integrate STEM ideas into writing to support cross-curricular learning.
Future You's Scaffolding Literacy resources apply evidence from recent research into literacy, to help students build writing skills through STEM learning. The resources provide practical activities and clear instruction that strengthen writing skills while engaging students in real-world science, technology, engineering and maths so the purpose is easy to see.
While primarily designed for use in education settings, carers can also use these resources to support skill development outside the classroom.
Scaffolding Literacy for Year 3 is now available. Upper year levels will be available in the future. Be sure you've subscribed to our newsletter to hear when that happens!
These resources support teachers and improve student outcomes using proven, evidence-based techniques. These lessons integrate literacy skills with vocational science content and align with the Australian Curriculum V9.0. To see which codes in the curriculum these resources link to, please click the button below.
The research
Research from the Australian Education Research Organisation shows that teaching writing across all subjects improves student results.
Schools that embed writing into science, maths, and physical education see significant improvements in students' writing performance. The research shows that writing helps students think more clearly about what they are learning, and it gives them more chances to practise key skills in meaningful contexts. Teachers also report stronger understanding and retention of subject content when writing becomes a regular part of learning.
Key findings from the research
- Writing about content improves learning across subjects because students must sort ideas, explain thinking, and make decisions about what matters.
- Regular writing tasks such as summaries, explanations, and reflections build both writing fluency and subject knowledge.
- Explicit teaching of subject-specific text types strengthens students' ability to communicate scientific, mathematical, or practical ideas clearly.
- Writing embedded in real classroom tasks helps students use vocabulary accurately and link new information to what they already know.
- Increased opportunities to write across the curriculum lead to measurable gains in overall writing quality and confidence.
Lesson sequence
Each lesson includes a PowerPoint presentation and teacher instructions, which can include student handouts, templates, and assessment criteria.
The lessons are built with a consistent structure to support gradual skill development and scaffolded learning:
- Hook & introduction
- Individual/group work
- Stretch and share
- Reflections/wrap-up
- Assessment opportunities
To see which codes in the curriculum these resources link to, please click the button below.
Download the Year 3 lessons
Expand each accordion below to download the free teacher presentation and teacher instructions for all 8 lessons.
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Students are introduced to a Future You Pathfinder, Louise, who is a heavy vehicle mechanic. She writes informative reports for her customers. Students discover that they will be learning how to also become excellent report writers. In lesson one, students engage in group activities to brainstorm and categorise relevant verbs and nouns, supporting differentiated learning and vocabulary expansion.
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Students explore year-level-appropriate sentence types, learning how different structures communicate ideas clearly and effectively.
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Students learn to recognise independent and dependent clauses, experimenting with ways to join and expand them for more detailed writing.
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Students explore how punctuation separates ideas and how conjunctions connect ideas to improve clarify, flow and meaning in written texts.
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Students learn that well-constructed paragraphs open with a topic sentence that signals the main idea, and the rest of the paragraph expands on that idea in different ways.
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Students participate in role-play and sentence-building activities to develop ideas and begin structuring their fault reports.
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Students map out a plan for their reports utilising the skills and knowledge learnt in previous lessons. This lesson is an opportunity for peer-to-peer sharing as well as a check-in with the teacher to ensure all the elements for the informative report are present in the plan.
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Students draft and refine their reports using structured sentence types and relevant vocabulary, with opportunities for peer review and reflection.
Learning outcomes
At the end of the lesson sequence, all students will be able to:
- communicate scientific ideas clearly and effectively.
- enhance clarity and precision in scientific writing.
- apply correct grammar and punctuation to improve the readability and accuracy of scientific texts.
In addition, some students will be able to:
- communicate scientific findings effectively, an essential skill for careers in science, research, and STEM-related fields.
Future You is hosted at UNSW Sydney and co-funded by the Optiver Foundation and the Faculties of Science at UNSW Sydney and The University of Sydney.
