AI-Driven Structured Literacy Programme Delivers Impressive Results In NZ Schools

While the past five years in education have been defined by declining literacy rates, increasing truancy, and teacher burnout, NZ schools using a homegrown AI literacy programme are reporting a different story—one of student and teacher engagement, confidence, and strong academic outcomes.

The release of the new Common Assessment Activities (CAAs) has highlighted persistent inequalities in our education system. When the literacy CAA was trialled in 2022, less than 3 per cent of decile one students passed the writing assessment, while today many high schools report students struggling to pass the base writing task.

Yet, these statistics have been reversed considerably in schools using NZ High Teach Award-winning literacy programme Writer’s Toolbox. The ground-breaking educational programme, using a locally-built AI, has been engineered to teach literacy (rather than give answers) and works to deepen a student’s metacognitive capacity, along with their reasoning and writing skills. As deeper thinking skills are developed, student confidence, self-efficacy, and engagement all lift.

For classes using the AI writing programme in Tawhiti School (Taranaki), the incidence of incomplete sentences among boys was halved across years, from 21% in 2023 to 10% in 2024. Boys also showed exceptional drops in the percentage of struggling writers, decreasing by 74%.

In 2024, Tamatea Intermediate (Napier) ran four focus classes for their intermediate students. Over the course of a year, three out of the four focus classes saw a lift in student writing results (one class achieving a 23% increase year-on-year).

Early adopters of the Writer’s Toolbox platform, St Peter Chanel Catholic School in the Waikato, saw significant progress in the writing abilities of their year 8 students. At mid-year 2022, 50% were writing at or above the expected standard, but by mid-year 2023, this had increased to 83.33%.

At Moanataiari School in Thames, the total year 3 students writing at or above the expected standard in Term 1 of 2022 was 0. After using Writer’s Toolbox, this had climbed to 56% in Term 3 – an outstanding achievement in just a matter of months.

Irene Ogden, Principal at Henderson North School in Auckland explains the impact Writer’s Toolbox has had on their young learners. “Students love writing now. They have a better understanding of expectations and are more self-managing when given writing tasks. All ability levels have benefited from the structured approach and have experienced success.”

Simultaneously this is having a profound effect on teachers’ competency and confidence in teaching writing.

Tikorangi School Principal, Kerry Nancarrow, says, “The biggest impact has been increased confidence in the teachers. They know where they are going with teaching writing and have a clearer picture. Teachers have the ability to convey the skills of writing to the students and this is empowering for teachers and students alike.”

Improving outcomes for Māori students

During this time, there has been discussion in education and policy circles about how to lift reading and writing levels for Māori students. In 2023, 28.3% of Māori school leavers did not achieve NCEA Level 1 (versus 14% of Pākehā students), and only 63.6% of Māori youth remained in school until age 17 (versus 79% of non-Māori).

After using Writer’s Toolbox, Thornton School in the Bay of Plenty found that incomplete sentence usage had decreased for all year levels, with Māori decreasing the most: from 47% to just 4%. While all year levels had an excellent decrease in struggling writers, notably Māori students dropped from 50% to 0.

It highlights the need for innovative interventions like these to achieve cultural and educational equity for Māori students, with the impact reaching far beyond the classroom.

Taking a structured approach to teaching writing

New Zealand technology company Writer’s Toolbox, was founded by academic and educator Dr Ian Hunter in 2012. Its unique and structured approach to teaching writing and thinking has seen it adopted in six different curriculum systems across ten countries. More than 4.7 billion words a year of student writing are assessed by the company’s AI engines, and that number is growing at the rate of 66 million words a week.

Dr Hunter says, “Literacy is too important to be left to chance. Writing, like other skills, can be explicitly taught in a structured, scientific way. And when we do, we empower the development of the whole person.

“Research shows that writing skills are integral to an effective knowledge economy and have powerful impacts on a student’s confidence, creativity, resilience, creativity, and the future adaptability of our societies. The reason is simple: When we write we think: and in that process, our thinking is deepened and amplified,” adds Dr Hunter.

Education Minister Erica Stanford recently affirmed the importance of structured literacy in raising achievement and closing equity gaps in New Zealand schools. Writer’s Toolbox echoes this urgency and highlights how this change is not only possible but already happening.

Says Hunter, “At a time when educators are stretched and national results are under the microscope, it’s exciting to see real, sustained improvement. No one should be held back in their life aspirations by an inability to write well. The solution is within our grasp.”

© Scoop Media