Literacy Conversation – start with spelling

posted in: Phonics for older students, Resources and Lesson Ideas, Spelling |

What shared language do you use with your students to talk about a word they’re struggling to spell or read? We’re limiting this post to four terms: sound & spelling phoneme & grapheme Because of changes to the curriculum, your students might need phoneme and grapheme. However, I prefer to start with the familiar because older students who’ve struggled with reading and spelling in the past can feel anxious about learning terminology and recalling terms can waste precious memory in … Read More

Do you have ‘Literacy Conversations’?

posted in: Phonics for older students, Post-16 & Adult Literacy, Resources and Lesson Ideas, Secondary literacy |

That Reading Thing is still our gold standard one-to-one programme for older struggling readers who need a boost before they feel confident enough to engage in more formal lessons in a group or classroom. That Spelling Thing is much less prescriptive and is home almost anywhere as long as students (of any age) are beyond the emergent reader level. When you combine the two you have a whole school vision for improving literacy across the curriculum. What is a ‘literacy … Read More

Guest Blog: Post-16 Phonics Changed my Life

posted in: Secondary literacy |

This is a guest blog from Jo Byrne a member of the marvelous Claire Collins team. It’s beautiful, funny and wise in it’s own right, but maybe someone else will recognise themself and book their own appointment. Over to Jo:   Way back in July 2018 I embarked on a project with Claire Collins Consultancy Ltd and the UCL Institute of Education to design and pilot phonics approaches for post-16 learners (see Bit.ly/Post16Phonics). We had a cross team residential to … Read More

Inclusion – deep, wide and welcoming

posted in: Secondary literacy, Thoughts on Education |

This is a post about inclusion in schools, not just the inclusion of policy documents but the inclusion of real-life school, the inclusion that states explicitly, “you belong here regardless of how hard you find this”. At the start of each That Reading Thing training, participants read the following: 1. What did Cal tell that big man at the pub? He was mad! 2. Bliss is in the galaxy of Blob. When you reach Blob, you have to stop at … Read More

An alternative to scripted teaching

posted in: Secondary literacy, Spelling, Thoughts on Education |

Direct Instruction, the umbrella under which scripted teaching sits, is set up as the antidote to Discovery Learning, the Traditional answer to Progressivism. This little post seeks to clarify how we use the term, ‘script’ and assure you (at the risk of coming over all 1990s) that there is a 3rd Way when it comes to literacy lessons. I think we’ll call it Directly Indirect Scripted Discovery Learning. Suggestions for pithier titles are welcome.   Here’s what we don’t mean … Read More

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