Initial statement in response to the Education
and Skills Select Committee's draft terms of reference Debbie
Hepplewhite (Reading Reform Foundation) 9.11.04
Remit: To examine departmental policy and guidance
on the teaching of reading to children in schools, focusing on
foundation-level through KS 3. To consider whether any changes
are necessary to improve current guidance/policy.
1) Whether policy/guidance has a sound base in
research evidence (looking at relative weight given to synthetic/analytic
phonics, whole word/language, onset/rhyme etc.).
The Reading Reform Foundation suggests that departmental
policy and guidance on the teaching of reading to children in
schools is not based upon research evidence. The NLS reading instruction
programmes do not appear to have been objectively tested with
experimental and control groups and pre- and post-testing using
standardised tests. The RRF has asked for results from any objective
testing of NLS programmes and none has been forthcoming.
The debate about the most effective teaching of reading
has arguably been won (synthetic phonics). The RRF newsletters
contain numerous articles describing in detail the effect of synthetic
phonics teaching and the effect of other types of teaching in
comparison.
Claims were made in 2003 on behalf of the DfES that
the NLS is "a synthetic phonics programme" but
this is not the case. Synthetic phonics puts almost all the emphasis
on teaching children to work printed words out by applying letter-sound
knowledge. The NLS, by contrast, puts considerable emphasis on
teaching children to use strategies other than letter-sound knowledge
for word-identification (e.g. sight-word learning, picture and
initial letter cues and context use).
2) Putting policy into practice - how effectively
is guidance being translated into practice? What variation exists
in practice?
The NLS guidance for reading instruction is contradictory.
Various programmes in different guises have been rolled out since
the original NLS framework in 1998. This dilutes the effectiveness
with which guidance can be translated into practice and also means
that variations in practice are often the result of teachers following
different parts of the guidance. The RRF has pointed to these
contradictions through correspondence and the RRF newsletters
and website but the criticism has never been addressed by the
DfES.
There is great variation in practice in the teaching
of reading. Postings on the online TES Early Years Staffroom Forum
illustrate this well. Practitioners continue to be confused by
the increasing amount of contradictory phonics advice through
manuals and teacher-training of governmental and commercial programmes,
historic myths about the teaching of reading, inadequate training
through the Teacher Training establishments, personal preferences
and biases and pressures from advisers, a changing climate in
early years education, and through a general lack of accurate
up-to-date information and knowledge of research.
3) Which children benefit from current approaches?
Are all equally well-served by current policy guidance on reading?
All children are not equally well-served by current
policy as described in articles in the RRF newsletters. Ofsted
bases its reports on the National Literacy Strategy rather than
'national literacy' and these reports fail to explain transparently
that some schools follow a distinctly different approach from
the NLS guidance for beginning reading. The RRF has made it very
clear that the NLS reading instruction programmes are not equivalent
to synthetic phonics programmes (for example, the programme used
in the Clackmannanshire research) and other research-based programmes
(such as Solity's Early Reading Research) and that some of the
NLS guidance can be damaging to individuals and groups of children.
The RRF also believes that some children who do well when taught
by government guidance could have achieved higher standards more
easily with evidence-based programmes.
4) Introduction of early literacy strategies -
teaching children to read from a very early age.
The RRF is not a group to promote ever-earlier teaching
of reading. We do, however, point out that surprisingly young
children are perfectly able to learn to read especially when taught
through an evidence-based approach (for example, at three years
old!). We believe it is more important to use the most effective
and inclusive approach once children start being taught to read,
rather than the current NLS mix of methods which does not suit
all children and certainly does not generally suit young children.
The gender gap, for example, has been closed and reversed in synthetic
phonics longitudinal studies and this appears to be regardless
of the starting age. Boys, summer-born children and children from
disadvantaged backgrounds have fared as well as other children
from an early start to reading. This is not to say that they would
have not fared just as well, or better, with a later start to
reading instruction. The crucial thing is to teach reading in
a research-based way from the start whether this start is at the
age of 3 or at the age of 6.
5) The success or otherwise of current policies
compared to those being pursued in other countries - paying due
attention to differences dictated by different languages.
If children were first introduced to a 'transparent
alphabet' in this country through a synthetic phonics approach,
this would be equivalent to the beginning reading instruction
in some European countries with less complex writing systems.
Children provided with solid synthetic phonics foundations become
proficient decoders and do not suffer early confusion and contradictory
messages about how the code for reading and writing works. There
is research which shows that children who are good decoders are
good decoders no matter how words are spelled therefore the complexity
of the English language should not be an issue (p.90, Diane McGuinness,
Early Reading Instruction: What Science Really Tells Us about
How to Teach Reading, 2004).
6) The relative value of pre-literacy experience
- by comparison to those countries with a later age start to education.
Worries are high in some quarters that in this country
early education has become increasingly more formal and academically
driven. The trend has been for schools to provide reception classrooms
based more on an infant class model than a nursery model (and
in any event, the infant class model, arguably, has been based
on a junior class model with the demands of an extensive National
Curriculum and end of key stage 1 testing). This situation has
been addressed by recent moves to a more play-based ethos in both
reception settings and in Year 1. Comparisons of settings, ethos
and staffing have been made with some countries overseas (for
children under 7) and some people have linked the suggestion that
too early a start to the direct teaching of reading relates to
an overly formal teaching style in this country compared to our
European neighbours. It looks as if the latest NLS phonics supplement
'Playing with Sounds' has been influenced by this debate
as it emphasises play-based activities, refers to "incidental"
teaching and urges practitioners to avoid "drill".
No results have been provided to support the use
of 'Playing with Sounds'. It introduces phonics (letter/s-sound
correspondences) more slowly than genuine synthetic phonics programmes
do, but nevertheless places heavy emphasis on early spelling and
writing activities at a time when children have an incomplete
grasp of letter/s-sound correspondences. It attempts to tie in
with previous official guidance (e.g. the 'Curriculum Guidance
for the Foundation Stage' with its first, last, medial letter
emphasis instead of all-through-the-word phonics from the outset).
It does not in any obvious way contradict previous official guidance
and training including the misguided promotion of guessing words
through the multi-cueing NLS 'searchlight reading strategies'
and the previous promotion of look and say and repetitive texts
of 'Book Bands'. This leads the RRF to believe that the
resulting concoction will be a continuation of a mixed methods
approach. There is still much emphasis on language play, rhyming
and playing-at-being-literate in the pre-literacy stage, but practitioners
are not informed that research shows that such activities are
not directly or necessarily related to learning how to read.
The RRF maintains that practitioners are not sufficiently
informed of how children are most effectively taught -
and how their progress can be damaged - so that practitioners
and parents are simply not in a position to make informed choices
in their settings.
NB: The RRF newsletters, downloadable from the
RRF website, explicitly address all the issues outlined in the
Education and Skills Select Committee's terms of reference and
provide detailed critiques of various NLS reading instruction
programmes.
| 
