Books for Struggling Readers: 3 – least confident

It can be quite difficult to find “real reading” material for those who are working hard through the Foundation Levels of TRT. They can read the decodable sentences but, if they’re not flying towards the Advanced Levels, it’s important that they have something to read that is all of: possible, challenging and age-appropriate. Here are my two favourite solutions for two very different age groups. Star Quest Several years ago, the local youth offending team asked me to work with … Read More

Books for Struggling Readers 2 – mid level strugglers

Here’s the second in a series of posts about a few books I’ve loved working with over the years – starting at those for readers with the highest ability and working down. The first post is here. Older struggling readers have very low expectations of what they can achieve and I’ve generally found those same low expectations are echoed by their teachers and support workers. When I was volunteering in a small school for boys with behavioural and emotional difficulties, … Read More

Books for Struggling Readers 1 – most able* strugglers

When I read Dr Bethan Marshall’s comment that: many teenagers will think that being made to read Dickens aged 16 is just tedious… I felt incredibly deflated by the thought that we’ve created a world where people will miss out on the colour, characters, truths and entertainment of reading Dickens. John Walker writes more about the whys of the matter on his blog and comments: Too often the velleities of secondary school expectation are to blame. After looking up “valleity” … Read More

It’s Not Magic – It’s Reading

I once had a call from a TRT trained teacher who told me it was going well, but the boys were getting through all of the TRT Levels without making much improvement in their reading. That’s not the most thrilling news I’d ever heard so thought I’d see if the problem was with TRT or with the way it was being delivered. Me: How much time are you spending reading in each session? Teacher: Oh I’m just going through the … Read More

On Being the Collateral Damage of Michael Rosen

posted in: Thoughts on Education

I suspect that, given the chance to have a chat, Michael Rosen and I would agree on a lot. I love the art, magic and power of language both written and aloud. I read to my children until they were in high school. I have no professional purpose in life other than getting young people over the humiliation of not being able to read and spell by supporting them into the world of text. I’m suspicious of commercial educational concerns. … Read More

3 Misconceptions of Struggling Readers

Lacking an MRI scanner, I have to depend on intuition (ie mind reading) when trying to figure out what’s going on inside the brain of a struggling reader. Following are a few of the more common misconceptions that struggling readers live with but never vocalise unless asked: Reading is something you ‘get’ not something you learn: When my son was four, someone asked him is he was going to go ice-skating. He replied, “First I’m going to get my balance, … Read More

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