Literacy is an extremely important part of a pupil's education journey and one that can help them to understand and progress in all subjects. Reading is an essential skill that pupils continue to develop when they join us in Year 7 and one that can help pupils develop their understanding and inference skills, vocabulary, writing, empathy and imagination.
According to UK statistics, 'children who read books often at age 10 and more than once a week at age 16 gain higher results in maths, vocabulary and spelling tests at age 16 than those who read less regularly,' therefore, we encourage our pupils to read for pleasure with tutor time reading, within English lessons and regular literacy assemblies to promote the importance of reading.
Pupils are given opportunities for reading across our subjects and staff at Malet Lambert support pupils with subject specific vocabulary to ensure understanding, allow pupils the opportunity to use any new words and they regularly use retrieval practice of new information to enable pupils to remember what they have learnt.
When pupils join us in Year 7, they sit the NGRT (New Group Reading Test) and as of 2022, the NGST (New Group Spelling Test) as well as CATs. Alongside pupils' Key Stage Two data, all information allows us to analyse where pupils have lower reading ages and therefore, we offer tailored literacy intervention to enable pupils to continue to make progress and apply their learning in these sessions to the rest of their curriculum.
Good literacy skills are essential to enable pupils to succeed in later life, and they provide the necessary tools for pupils to expand their thinking, increase their knowledge and effectively communicate with others.