Teaching Struggling Readers
A Call for Accuracy
Disagree if you like, but let’s get the facts right. One thing that I have enjoyed about Twitter…
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SEND the right message
It seems that SEN is the Cinderella of education. Both physically and metaphorically, SEN provision is often relegated…
Read articleLiteracy Leadership
Are all reading interventions created equal?
Does it really matter which one we choose? Surely it’s the fact that we are doing something that…
Read articleTeaching Struggling Readers
Schools, Character and Justice
Schools cannot teach character while we perpetuate injustice. I’ve just read some fab posts on teaching character: Summer Turner’s nuanced…
Read articleLiteracy Leadership
7 Misconceptions About Teaching Adolescents to Read
The scale of the problem of students leaving secondary school unable to read is an unnecessary tragedy.…
Read articleLiteracy Leadership
Can’t Read, Won’t Read: The Sequel
Learning to Fly Successful graduates may still need some structure in order to develop true independence. One of the questions…
Read articleTeaching Struggling Readers
Can’t Read, Won’t Read: Part Three
Metamorphosis Diligent attention to details can bring rapid growth and startling transformations. Expectations and tone are created instantly. What…
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Can’t Read, Won’t Read: Part Two
No Escape Our determination is the prerequisite for their success When students have a well-established history of failure,…
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Pulling The Strands Together
What help do students struggling with reading at secondary school need? Jeanne Chall, the eminent reading researcher,…
Read articleEffective Practice
Not waving, but drowning: literacy in a time of Covid
The pandemic has created massive disruption for teachers and students, and the evidence that we have is showing…
Read articleWhole School Literacy
15 Tests for Secondary School Reading Interventions
Wasting money is undesirable. Wasted time is irreplaceable. 1 Which students is the intervention intended to support? The…
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10 Point Checklist: Literacy at Secondary School
A central element of our partnership with schools is developing a coherent, comprehensive and practical literacy strategy for…
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Success, failure and self-concept
For as he thinks in his heart, so he is . . . – Proverbs 23: 7 Learning…
Read articleThe Science of Learning
Time Out
Taking time out of lessons is a high-cost investment which must yield results Time is not just precious: it is…
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You don’t need RCTs to know what works
In recent times a great deal has been made of the importance of using RCTs in education in…
Read articleEffective Practice
Headline Measures?
If some can’t read, the school is failing. In many secondary schools, the highest priorities are the headline…
Read articleLiteracy Leadership
Are all students screened for reading?
A couple of weeks ago, I watched Last Chance Academy, a Panorama documentary about an academy which has…
Read articleWhole School Literacy
Can’t Read, Won’t Read: Part One
The Matthew Effect Or, how resolving reading difficulties at secondary school is different from teaching beginning reading. Sam*…
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The Road Goes Ever On
‘You will always have students who will fail.’ This response from my tutor teacher to my concern about…
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What Does Mastery Really Look Like?
One of the problems with a conception of learning that is focused on ‘understanding’ is that it concentrates…
Read articleEffective Practice
Teaching Reading Is Rocket Science
How many phonemes are there in the English language? How many different ways are there to represent these…
Read articleEffective Practice
Code-Teaching or Code-Breaking?
Code-breaking is what you do when you don’t know the code. There are two main approaches to teaching reading,…
Read articleMyths and Misconceptions
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