TRT First Session Report (the stuff that keeps me going….)

posted in: Youth Work & Literacy

This was Jan’s first ever That Reading Thing session. She was meeting these lads for the first time in a small secondary school for young people with social, behavioural and educational difficulties – the exact environment which inspired the creation of That Reading Thing. I am so grateful for people like Jan (and Russell, who started yesterday) who are willing to take a risk and jump right in with young people who come in complex packages. It’s obvious from the … Read More

Bomb, Comb, Tomb – why strugglers need to know how English works

posted in: Dyslexia, Spelling

Yesterday I followed a link from Twitter to an interesting article talking about British Dyslexia Association training from the perspective of a phonics expert, Elizabeth Nonweiler. In the Spelling Course section (page 8 in the linked document) under the heading, “Why Is English So Difficult?”, is the following point: If we say they can get by with pure phonics, we are telling them a lie, because of words such as “tomb”, “comb” and “bomb”. The important truth of this sentence … Read More

If you have to sell literacy, start with Tony

posted in: Youth Work & Literacy

Today Jules tweeted this and, as teachers made sensible and completely non-ironic suggestions, I had an epiphany of the worst kind. Is it possible that some high school teachers need to be shown why literacy is important across the curriculum? How can it be possible that a maths teacher needs to be ‘sold’ literacy? How can a PE teacher not understand the social significance of struggling with reading in high school? My simple answer would be: because every single teacher … Read More

Llywio Darllen – TRT in Wales

posted in: Secondary literacy

We’ve finally finished adapting and trialling Llywio Darllen, the Welsh adaptation of ThatReadingThing. It doesn’t translate directly into English but roughly means “being steered into reading”. The Year 6 pupils in Cardiff had eight hours of LLywio Darllen over two weeks and made substantial progress in both reading and spelling. Many thanks to Eirian Lloyd Jones and the Welsh Dyslexia Project/ Prosiect Dyslecsia Cymru for all their hard work and support. If you’re interested in Llywio Darllen please get in … Read More

Evidence 4 ~ One Story

One particular line of numbers caught my attention. F 13 05:11 06:05 00:06 5 hrs continuing White British truancy It’s the “Data Story” of a thirteen year old white British girl with truancy issues who struggles with reading and agreed to start meeting with a ThatReadingThing tutor.  I’m going to call her Amber. At their first session, her reading age was 5 years and 11 months which is what we would expect of a child at some point in Year … Read More

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