Usborne Phonics Readers - 12 Book Set

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In all of the schools, librarians were part of school initiatives to increase pupils’ reading and they supported reading-for-pleasure initiatives across the school. One literacy leader stressed how valuable the school librarian was:

What pupils said also confirmed the schools’ use of diagnostic reading tests and targeted teaching for specific components of reading. A pupil in Year 7 said the school had assessed his reading and put in place additional teaching to improve his reading fluency. Pupils described how help with reading was improving their confidence and motivation to read. For instance, one Year 7 pupil said that a strategy to ‘break down syllables’ they were practising in reading classes helped ‘boost my confidence to speak fluently in class’. This pupil therefore wanted to read more in class.While there is a need for hands-on printables and workbooks, I believe a child greatly benefits from owning their own small Phonics Reader Set. To be able to hold their own books, and be able to synthesize the words without struggling, children will grow confidence! This school is a mixed urban academy converter with a sixth form. It has 1,600 pupils, of whom 24% speak English as an additional language. Around 34% are disadvantaged. Training supported an ethos that valued and understood the importance of investing in reading and staff working together to help struggling readers. This culture of collaboration was evident in our discussions with staff. One reading support teacher said:

Try and read other books at the same level as your child’s reading book. Look at Reading with Oxford or our free ebook library for inspiration In schools where teachers were trained to understand and spot reading problems, subject teachers better understood the knowledge pupils needed to become proficient readers, and the gaps in knowledge that might affect this. In one school, it was evident that teachers understood how pupils might struggle with different components of reading, as one of the mathematics teachers explained:

How do secondary schools with strong outcomes for struggling readers identify these pupils’ particular reading needs? Teaching children to blend the sounds of letters together helps them decode unfamiliar or unknown words by sounding them out. For example, when a child is taught the sounds for the letters t, p, a and s, they can start to build up the words: “tap”, “taps”, “pat”, “pats” and “sat”. Word reading is the foundation for reading comprehension, which relies on a reader’s oral language abilities once they can recognise the words. [footnote 7]