Katie Huggard has taken her passion for children’s literacy to the next level with the establishment of an interactive story-sharing program, which skilfully supports parents in instilling a love of reading in their children.

This free community program aims to provide parents with real-life, hands-on, age-appropriate literacy experiences for parents and children between three and five years old. 

Under the careful guidance of Katie, the Read and Grow program allows children and parents to immerse themselves in a rich literary session, with parents able to learn new skills alongside their child.
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The Read and Grow program offers parents the opportunity to be directly involved in their child’s learning, building positive partnerships and giving both parents and children the skills necessary to succeed in the classroom. 

Katie’s support goes beyond the story reading though, providing follow-up activities, open-ended questioning ideas and take-home sheets and activities to help parents continue their shared learning experiences at home with their children.

To support the program, Katie developed Read and Grow book packs for the entire Prep year, including comprehension questioning, role play and language extension ideas for parents.

These packs ensure that every child has easy access to high quality reading books, while supporting parents’ inclusion in their child’s education by providing fun and engaging oral language literacy activities to do together at home.

Katie is a passionate and dedicated teacher who, for many years has made an outstanding contribution to the Worongary school community in the areas of literacy development and parent involvement.
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Her work with the Read and Grow program, Early Learning Centres and the wider school community ensures early learners are confident and ready to succeed in the classroom. ​

“My son, Noah, started Read and Grow with Mrs Huggard when he was 4.  The programme was fantastic.  Each week Mrs Huggard would have a range of different activities set out for the children getting them all involved.  It really helped Noah, who has previously struggled with any sort of change, build his confidence and independence, making his transition into Prep so much easier!” ~ Jess & Noah

“Read and Grow allowed my son to begin to feel comfortable in a classroom environment and get really excited about all of the wonderful this he’d be learning about at school.  Katie is nurturing, kind and understanding and I believe that my son’s flying start to his schooling can be attributed to attending the R&G program” ~ Brooke & Joey

“My daughter has loved the Read and Grow program.  I honestly believe that Natiya would not be at the reading level she is today without this program and the dedication of her teacher Katie Huggard.  Thank you for giving her such a great start.” ~ Lisa & Natiya

​Congratulations Katie on your nomination for the QCT Outstanding Contribution to School Community Award.