What is literacy?
Literacy is the ability to聽read,听write,听speak听补苍诲听listen聽in a way that allows us to make sense of the world around us and to be able to communicate with others effectively. It is a crucial skill for all students.
Why does literacy matter?
We know that literacy struggles are linked to life chances; literacy skills are often used to measure the population and those who read and write fluently often have better life chances. We also know that over the course of secondary school, the gap between students who read and those who don鈥檛 widens and that this impedes their progress across all their studies. Similarly, as students age the number who enjoy writing (and therefore practising key skills) declines. 聽As such, improving and promoting literacy is a vital task to ensure the best life chances, academic attainment and overall wellbeing.
This evidence is not apocryphal – the headline grabbing facts from the聽听补谤别:
- 鈥淎 boy born in Stockton Town Centre (an area with serious literacy challenges) has a life expectancy 26.1聽years shorter than a boy born in North Oxford鈥�
- 鈥�10-year-olds who enjoy reading have a reading age 1.3 years higher than their peers who do not enjoy reading, rising to 鈥� 3.3 years for 14-year-olds鈥�
- 鈥淵ounger children enjoy writing almost twice as much as their older peers (68.5% of 8 to 11-year-olds, 46.5% of 11 to 14-year-olds, 36% of 14 to 16-year-olds).鈥�
- 鈥淐hildren who enjoy reading are three times more likely to have good mental wellbeing than children who don鈥檛 enjoy it.鈥�
Literacy at CVC
At 糖心logo we believe that the development of literacy skills is an entitlement for all our pupils and providing opportunities for pupils to develop and consolidate skills in聽writing,听reading听补苍诲听communication聽is the responsibility of the whole school community.
Literacy is taught across the school curriculum. Students have lessons that focus on reading and we promote literacy throughout the school year with a number of events, such as the聽, the聽听补苍诲听听肠别濒别产谤补迟颈辞苍蝉.
We also offer extra reading support for students. This takes several different forms, from extra help in class to reading mentors who will work one to one with your child during the school day, for short, focused support.
Help for parents
Reading recommendations
Reading tastes are personal and individual to each of us and so it is usually the case that a student will profit most from a discussion with the school librarians and teachers if they want a helpful recommendation. That said, for general advice聽聽has lots of good recommendations organised by age.
Reading with your child
Help with reluctant readers
In school we do all we can to support and encourage students who do not like to read for one reason or another. Frequently, we are asked what can be done at home to support readers. Sadly, there is no magic bullet that works for every child, but聽聽has lots of helpful tips, some are directed towards younger readers but there鈥檚 a lot there that is useful for secondary school aged children too.
Writing competitions
Throughout the school year we run a number of reading and writing competitions. We find that students who normally don鈥檛 enjoy writing will often engage with the competition element of these, especially if there鈥檚 a tempting prize to be one! There are so many different competitions that can be entered, if you鈥檇 like to explore this further聽聽will help.
Spelling, Punctuation and Grammar (SPAG)
This is an area where students often feel self-conscious. These skills are taught explicitly in the English curriculum but there are also helpful resources if you would like to support these skills at home. The聽聽offers some very helpful resources.聽聽resource also has some links to some fun, but informative, word games.
Similarly, this resource (OCR SPAG Guide – please see to left of this page) produced by OCR is helpful, especially as it has good links to useful exercises.
Finally, for many of us adults, we were not necessarily taught these things ourselves in our time at school, in that case the聽聽can serve as a handy refresher.
Handwriting
Unlike at KS2, handwriting isn鈥檛 measured as a marker of a student鈥檚 progress at secondary school. Nonetheless, students can sometimes feel self-conscious about their handwriting or may have some problems with legibility. These concerns are best discussed with your child鈥檚 form tutor or teachers, but there are also resources available to help parents from the聽