So, you’ve read the Government document about ‘getting the whole school reading’ and you know you need to prioritise the progress of your struggling readers…but where do you start in readiness for September 2023’s intake? Well, take a step back, break down the process into small steps and think about one element at a time…
- Implement a robust reading screening process – it makes perfect sense that you need to test all of your incoming students’ skills in reading – you need a baseline, of course – but given ‘reading’ comprises different skills, what should you use? Those settings who have been OFSTED-ed recently will know they’re immensely keen to check that, as a school, you are fully aware of which students are still struggling to acquire reading accuracy skills, and so need intervention to develop their phonics and instant word recognition, and then which ones may be having more difficulty extracting meaning, and so need support with comprehension skills. This means that assessment in September needs to ensure this is possible. A single word reading test will help you to establish who needs reading accuracy support and text-level reading assessments which usually include questions to tap into what the student has taken from the passages would enable you to work out who needs assistance with comprehension. Whilst some schools favour online reading tests – as they can be administered relatively easily, are marked for you and provide lots of easy-to-sort and analyse data – my experience is that some students don’t always give their best in these or they whizz through the test (resulting in scores which are not genuinely representative of their skills) and I also think that the quantitative data is almost useless without qualitative information. So, my preference is always for carrying out some further 1:1 assessment once the online screening test is completed…but this all takes time!
Tests you could look at include:
- Set up age-appropriate, targeted intervention – there are always lots of questions surrounding aspect of the process e.g. What will the support look like? Which schemes are suitable? Who’s going to deliver it? When? How? As a SENCO, you would be there to coordinate and facilitate reading intervention – it isn’t your job to deliver it or do everything! And, it is a challenge – finding age-appropriate schemes is not easy. Here are a few links for you to look through if you’re wanting to update your resources or investigate a full programme of support:
- Phonic Books – Catch Up Readers for 8-14 year olds who need to track right back to basics
- That Reading Thing – evidence-based scheme for teens, included in the ‘What Works’ publication (Greg Brooks)
- Catch-Up Literacy – for 6-14 year old developing readers
- Accelerated Reader – favoured by lots of secondary schools I work in
- Paired Reading – more an approach than a scheme, but great for use with older students as they can choose their own reading material (and you can recruit willing 6th formers to help!)
Finding the right time to deliver any intervention is a challenge in high schools, not least because no member of staff feels that the students should be removed from their lessons! It is definitely something that needs discussion with your SLT, as whenever it is scheduled for, it needs full buy-in from all parties.
- Measure the effectiveness of the intervention – it goes without saying that you’ll need to measure the impact of the targeted support you provide for students with reading accuracy and reading comprehension difficulties. This means informal observations made in each session - which are invaluable for report-writing and information gathering (e.g. as evidence for exam access arrangements in KS4) - and formally retesting, either at the end of the programme or school term, or even the year. You will need to consider what will work for you, in terms of staffing, cost and time. Essentially, you need to know that what you are doing is working… otherwise, it needs to be reviewed!
There is clearly no ‘one-size-fits-all’ when it comes to this whole process, but what we do know is that time and money has to be invested in developing our students into fluent and accurate readers. Yes, we can (and should) offer assistive technology, such as scanning pens and text-to-speech software, but this should be alongside good quality intervention.
For more information about how I can support you and your setting to implement the above, please get in touch using the contact form at the bottom of the page.
Useful links:
Literacy and numeracy catch-up strategies (publishing.service.gov.uk)
The reading framework - teaching the foundations of literacy (publishing.service.gov.uk)
Support for secondary school pupils who are behind with reading (slideshare.net)