School Reform Minister, Nick Gibb, talks about phonics and gets it wrong again

Janet Downs's picture
 74
‘…a substantial body of evidence shows that systematic synthetic phonics is the most effective way to teach all children to read.’

School Reform Minister, Nick Gibb, speech to Reading Reform Foundation, 28 March 2015

But it doesn’t. Regular readers will know (see sidebar) that Gibb’s ‘substantial body of evidence’ supports ANY method of teaching phonics as long as it’s systematic.

Even the quotation Gibb cites from the Australian National Inquiry into the Teaching of Literacy doesn’t endorse just synthetic phonics:

‘The evidence is clear […] that direct systematic instruction in phonics during the early years of schooling is an essential foundation for teaching children to read. […]’

No mention in the evidence of synthetic phonics – the method which Gibb endorses so enthusiastically.

The substantial body of evidence also says phonics is but one component, albeit a very important one, in teaching reading. This was confirmed in a report commissioned by the Department for Education (DfE) in May 2014:

‘One of the key messages to emerge from the evaluation so far is that many schools appear to believe that a phonics approach to teaching reading should be used alongside other methods.'

But Gibb ignores ‘other methods’. There is only one way of teaching reading – synthetic phonics.

Gibb appears to think it is only this Government’s relentless focus on phonics which is improving reading. But systematic phonics was embedded in primary schools before Gibb started promoting his systematic/synthetic/one-or-the-other-or-both phonics programme. When he announced his matched-funding scheme for phonics materials, take-up was slow. Gibb had to resort to naming-and-shaming local authorities where schools hadn’t rushed to buy the materials. This was because schools were already teaching phonics. The money would have been better spent in promoting comprehension. It was comprehension which needed more work, the Eurydice report into the teaching of reading in Europe found - phonics was already well-established.

The phonics screening test assesses decoding. Decoding isn’t comprehension. Teachers say fluent readers, those who read for understanding, sometimes struggle with the pseudo-words in the test because they’re looking for meaning not nonsense.

Failing to understanding the difference between ‘systematic’ and ‘synthetic’; failing to understand the two terms are not interchangeable; and failing to understand what evidence about reading methods actually says - these result in nonsense.

 

Let’s hope future school ministers can comprehend as well as decode.
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Comments

Brian's picture
Sun, 05/04/2015 - 20:07

As you say 'If a child (I refuse to use 'wee one' under any circumstances, it makes them sound incontinent) enters reception able to participate in everyday conversation ...'

Well let me take you to an infant school near where I live where last year only two children, on entry, scored anything at all on the baseline assessment, not scored at the expected level, but scored anything at all. Pile on top of the communication problems the social, emotional and, often, physical problems these children have and I think you'll see the nonsense of a test for all children at the same point and the ridiculous nature of your comments about poor teaching.

Your final point is ludicrous. You have changed the phonics check into a reading check, as if the two are the same. Presumably you think phonics is not in itself useful in isolation ... so if performance in the phonics check has been 'amazingly increased' where is the corresponding "amazing increase' in reading outcomes.

Dick Schutz's picture
Mon, 06/04/2015 - 05:25

Hey, set the "baseline assessment" aside. Reliable instruction to teach children how to handle the Alphabetic Code doesn't require any "score" on this as a prerequisite. If a child (scratch "wee one" too if it bothers you) can participate in everyday conversation, it's "good enough." The rest of the child's reading trajectory is entirely dependent on the instruction s/he receives. Sure, all the biosocial considerations are important to the child's well-being. But they are not obstacles to teaching the child how to read per the Alphabetic Code. The results of the Screening Check, which many want to abolish, show this to be so.

Re 2nd paragraph. "Phonics" is a teaching method. One of the "mistakes that were made" was to title the Screening Check a "Phonics" Screen. Actually, it's measure of expertise in handling the Alphabetic Code--the link between written and spoken English. The error in titling has given rise to much of the tis-taint debate surrounding the Check, and since the term "phonics" is deeply embedded in usage, it's an understandable error that we're stuck with for now, and it's no "big deal," unless it is unnecessarily made to be.

The "amazing advancements" have been in enabling children to handle the Alphabetic Code--the link between written and spoken language. The instructional accomplishment has been shown to positively impact on teacher's rating of children's reading performance at the end of KS 1, which is as far in schooling as Screened children have come to date.

The Screening Check does nothing other than to identify individuals at any age who need no further instruction in reading per se. That is, those who pass the Screen are "good to go" to use their reading capability as a valuable asset to cope with schooling and post-schooling matters. Views of "reading" that extend its definition beyond what written communication to incorporate a reified abstraction termed "comprehension" are inherently dooming children who enter school with the "baseline assessment" capability that you cite to be forever, "behind." The doomed fate is in the view of reading, not in the kids.

Andy V's picture
Mon, 06/04/2015 - 10:03

Janet - You appear to be confusing and conflating pedagogy and whether a school is implementing systemic phonics in accordance with the 2014 national curriculum. They are not the same. To say a school is not doing something is not the same as telling them how to do it.

Pot and kettle comes to mind regarding your comments on Stoke: the Ofsted report is exclusively about Stoke and is not a report about the national picture. A reading of the summary and recommendations indicates to me that Ofsted has identified a range of weaknesses in Stoke schools - including spelling and reading (as distinct from comprehension) - and in drilling down into reasons for those weaknesses have amongst other aspects flagged up flaws in the application and implementation of systematic phonics. This is LA specific within the maintained sector and cannot in all good conscience and honesty be interpreted as a national statement on this issue. This brings me back to my opening point that pedagogy and strategy implementation are just not the same thing.

Brian's picture
Mon, 06/04/2015 - 10:32

I'm going to have to concede on this one Dick as I haven't got the faintest idea what your last paragraph means.


Dick Schutz's picture
Mon, 06/04/2015 - 17:04

I haven’t got the faintest idea what your last paragraph means.

Rightly so. The paragraph is anything but an example clear writing. The sentences exemplify "tortured syntax, and the 4th line has a typo (delete "what") that makes for quasi-gibberish.

I could say the paragraph was deliberate-- it reflects the "author's intent" to illustrate the consequences of treating the core of reading as "comprehension." Actually, though, it's just sloppy self-editing and proof reading. I find it tedious to self-edit in the little box provided by WordPress. WordPress, incidentally, is an Internet marvel, but that's a whole nother story. It irks me to have do arithmetic to confirm to WordPress's satisfaction that I'm not a robot I know I'm not a robot, but for some reason WordPress doesn't. So all the time I'm composing a comment I'm worrying about whether I'll be able to do the instrument topass the screening check. The worry is another reason for the sloppy editing.

Anyway, I'll try again:

A "mistake was made" by tacking on "The Simple View of Reading" to the UK commitment to teach all children to read in KS 1. Had Sir Jim Rose said that children should be taught how to handle the English Alphabetic Code and that this can feasibly done in KS 1, there would have been little room for argument. As it happened though, tacking on a superficial and unnecessary "theory of reading" has proved to serve no purpose other than to refuel the long-standing "Reading Wars."

The "Simple View of Reading" is anything but a simple view of schooling. Everyone (+/-) agrees that children enter Reception with widely different backgrounds. The Simple View of Reading uses the reified abstraction "comprehension" to account for the instructional assets children bring to school, and the view tasks schooling to extend each child's "reading comprehension."

The Simple View construal of "reading" has three important undesirable consequences--
--It dooms children who start behind in "reading" to remain behind. This is blithely termed the Matthew Effect. But the effect is removed when "comprehension" is excised.
--It assigns to "reading instruction" all of the complex schooling effort necessary to extend the academic assets each child brings to Reception.
--It degrades and directs attention away from the Alphabetic Code--the link between written and spoken English.

There is a non-theoretical, simpler, more productive schooling orientation:
--All children (+/-) enter Reception with "good enough" spoken language.
--A "good enough" Screening Check is available to confirm that children have been schooled "good enough" to be able to read any text with understanding equal to that were the communication spoken.
--Children who can pass the Screen are "good to go" in schooling without further formal attention to reading instruction per se.
--Children who can't pass the Screen require further instruction in how to handle the Alphabetic Code.
--UK schools and teachers have made remarkable strides in realizing the intent to teach all children to read by the end of KS-1. The Screening Check has played an important role in this accomplishment, and teachers and schools have not received the approbation they deserve for the accomplishment--largely because teachers in the aggregate have been among the interests trying to abolish the instrument that scientifically confirm what schools and teachers have achieved.

It seems to me the alternative orientation is a better bet--but I could be a robot, cheating WordPress to think I can do single-digit arithmetic.

Janet Downs's picture
Tue, 07/04/2015 - 08:00

Dick - the screening check does not test whether children can 'read any text with understanding'. It merely tests decoding.

The screening check has played no part in 'realizing the intent to teach all children to read by the end of KS-1'. Getting children to read in the infants' class (ages 5-7) has always been present in UK schools - nothing to do with a screening check which is just three years old. In any case, there's a counter-argument that introducing children to formal teaching of reading can be counter-productive: studies in New Zealand found the 'early introduction of formal learning approaches to literacy does not improve children’s reading development, and may be damaging.'

But it is not the point of this thread to discuss the age at which formal education should start. The point of this thread was also not to discuss the relative merits of phonics. It was to point out that schools minister Nick Gibb doesn't know the research he cites does NOT say what he says its says. See my responses to the Education Select Committee which asked for a critique of the evidence used by the DfE about phonics. (Unfortunately, my bite-size responses were published out of order - the comment dated 'November 21, 2014 at 01:38 PM' should be read first.)


Janet Downs's picture
Tue, 07/04/2015 - 07:07

Andy - 'strategy implementation' encroaches on pedagogy when a Gov't mandates a particular teaching method ie synthetic (or is it systematic, Gibb doesn't appear to know the difference?) phonics.

Strategy implementation encroaches on pedagogy when Ofsted is expected to comment on how well a school teaches phonics and when Ofsted produces a report (albeit LA specific) which says mixed methods are not recommended and offers up examples of what inspectors regard weak practice (which would likely lead to a school missing a Good or better judgement for teaching).

Again, I think you're being disingenuous when you say a comment on one LA does not have implications nationally. Is Stoke being treated differently? Is it being judged in a way other schools might have reason to think doesn't apply to them? If the answer to just one of these questions is 'Yes', then it rather undermines Ofsted claims of consistency.

Andy V's picture
Tue, 07/04/2015 - 09:42

Janet - Basics should underpin this: pedagogy in focused on the teaching and how a teacher unpacks and delivers a subject whereas phonics is focused on a curricular requirement. How the latter is delivered (the pedagogic approach) is left to schools. For me then there is no overlap.

Did you perchance miss or otherwise overlook the following key findings bullet point in the Stoke report:

" Not all the schools taught early reading using phonic decoding as ‘the route to
decode words’, as required by the national curriculum 2014. Three headteachers
were unaware of this requirement in the new programme of study." This emphasises the non-overlapping difference between pedagogy and curriculum.

It is also worth highlighting that the following key findings are focused around the impact on the achievement of pupils (and their progress) arising from the quality of teaching:

" Almost all of the schools visited used a range of early reading books to teach
young children to read. Many of these books, however, were not ‘closely matched
to pupils’ developing phonics knowledge and knowledge of common exception
words’. In other words, the books used did not support young children to
practise and apply the phonics they were learning.
Four of the schools did not send home phonically decodable books so that
children could practise their new knowledge and skills at home.
The teaching of phonics was not always of good quality and pupils did not
progress quickly enough in several of the sessions observed.
In almost all of the schools visited, the teachers observed did not teach children
to form the letters correctly when they taught the sounds. In these schools,
teachers did not link the teaching of early reading with that of early writing well
enough. The interpretation is that they failed to understand the vital contribution
of phonics to spelling.

It is particularly noteworthy that the references to phonics in the inspection handbook occurs in the section, achievement of pupils, and not quality of teaching. Your postulation (belief) that "Ofsted is expected to comment on how well a school teaches phonics" is inaccurate. In relation to quality of teaching and achievement of pupils Ofsted's focus is on impact: the teacher did 'x' and the impact was 'y'. The latter being evaluated in terms of progress, understanding and knowledge (and ultimately attainment). In this regard the Stoke report reflects recommendation as to how schools can bring about improvement to the achievement of pupils.

The report never said, "mixed methods are not recommended and offers up examples of what inspectors regard weak practice". What is said, and as you quoted yourself on 5/4/15 at 7.59 am, "phonics alone should be taught initially and that teaching other strategies alongside phonics is not recommended." Teaching two approaches alongside each other (discretely and in parallel) is not the same as "mixed methods" that you assert.

I am confused by your shifting position regarding the Stoke report:

1. 5/4/15 at 7.59 am, you state, "Ofsted says:
‘The guidance to schools makes clear that phonics alone should be taught initially and that teaching other strategies alongside phonics is not recommended.’"

It is clear from this that you are portraying the quote as a national statement from Ofsted

2. 7/4/15 at 7.07 am, you state that, "[you] think [I am] being disingenuous when [I] say a comment on one LA does not have implications nationally."

What I had done was point up that a report based exclusively on evidence from 11 schools in Stoke should not be reinterpreted as a national statement (or directive). Quite evidently the report is a spotlight on 11 Stoke not all infant/primary schools across England; that is the several thousand infant/primary schools. What is recommended for Stoke is not the same as for another LA. My position is quite transparent.

Janet Downs's picture
Tue, 07/04/2015 - 07:16

Dick - if you're having trouble typing a long response into a small box (and I sympathise here - it's difficult following an argument thread when much of it has disappeared), then word process first and cut-and-paste.

The site introduced 'single-digit arithmetic' to stop the copious amount of spam which was bombarded the site. This wasted administrators' time trawling through to ensure a genuine comment hadn't got caught in the spam filter. It may 'irk' you to do the simple sum but it's a hundred times for irksome for administrators to spend time deleting hundreds of spam messages.

There is, however, a way round it - register with the site and log in.

Dick Schutz's picture
Tue, 07/04/2015 - 14:08

I was using a personal defense mechanism in joking about the difficulty of drafting a comment in a little box. It's really "no problem." I suppose I would be happier using a pencil and a yellow-lined paper pad, but "writing"today has come a long way from that--technologically, but not pedagogically, and not as far as human communication is concerned.

The bit about arithmetic and robots happens to be relevant to Gibbs' speech and to th this thread. People read the speech very differently depending on the background they bring to the communication. This is true of any text.

Anyone who has not had experience with posting on the Internet and encountering CAPTCHA would not have the foggiest "comprehension" of what I was talking about with the "arithmetic." And a few years ago, the terms "posting," "Internet," and CAPTCHA would have been incomprehensible. To regard this "meaning" as central to "reading" instruction, while ignoring/disregarding/discounting the centrality of the English Alphabetic Code in reading instruction is ________. (The reader can fill in the blank of the Cloze test. The keyed answer is any pejorative term.)

Frankly, I didn't know the meaning of CAPTCHA, although I certainly knew the concept, having experienced failure many times until I just googled for it. ("goggle" is another example of a former-nonsense word--to rub in the point)

A CAPTCHA (an acronym for "Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart") is a type of challenge-response test used in computing to determine whether or not the user is human.

That won't mean very much unless you "comprehend" a Turing Test and understand it's nothing like "reading tests" or any other schooling tests. And you won't "appreciate" the importance of CAPTCHA unless you've experienced spam. And you won't comprehend "spam" unless you have experienced it or "looked it up."

Turns out that CAPTCHA is a Screening Check with all (_/-) the same characteristics as the (Mis-labeled Phonics) Screening Check. Robots likely object to the Check vigorously. (Incidentally, robots can read, while many kids can't --but that's a whole nother story.

Barry Wise's picture
Fri, 10/04/2015 - 17:07

Hi Dick

You clearly know a lot about this. Please could you settle a few points?

1. Is there good reason to believe that synthetic phonics taught FIRST, FAST and ALONE works better than using a mixed bag of techniques? If so, where's the evidence?

2. Is there evidence to show that systematic use of synthetic phonics is better than systematic use of any other kind of phonics and better than non-phonic approaches?

3. What's your own experience of what works best?

Dick Schutz's picture
Fri, 10/04/2015 - 18:52

Nothing that I say will "settle the points," but I can give you my take. The short answer to your first 2 questions is "Yes." The evidence lies is in the history of the English language and the English Alphabetic Code--the link between spoken and written communication-- not in the Ed Research Lit. The Reading Research literature is such that you can find "citations" to support any contention you want to make. You can also find shortcomings in the studies that are cited, so the up-shot of "Research evidence to date" can't net anything other than tis-taint squabbling.

I interpret "first, fast, and alone" as "teach kids how to handle the Alphabetic Code and don't confuse them with work-arounds." Interpreted literally, the bumper sticker, "first, fast, and alone" is misleading and off-putting.

A child's "first" language experience begins at birth, if not before, so that's where "first" begins. When the has been taught/learned how to participate in everyday conversation, the child has the prerequisites that are "good enough" to begin formal instruction in how to handle the Code. The UK (Phonics--mislabeled) Screening Check is a "good enough" indicator of when the teaching job has been done.

How fast it's possible to get the job done depends on the child and on the reading instruction. And nothing is "alone" in instruction; there is always context at the time and there is always more to come in the future. Since the Screening Check evidence now in hand shows that whatever most schools and teachers are now doing is "good enough," that's cause for celebration--but not "mission accomplished. Some kids in some schools and classrooms are inadvertently getting short-changed in their reading instruction With a bit more analysis of Screening Check data (that has already been collected, just not analyzed), the short-changed glitch can be fixed.

Re "what works best", I don't rely on my personal experience. Like everyone else, I always "think I'm right," but when I "check it out" I've been "wrong" a lot of the time. (I chalk the error up to "inadvertent mis-instruction," but the "check" is always instructive, and one self-corrects and goes on).

The question "What's best" can easily be determined by putting the instruction, rather than the kids, to the test. That is, what we're after scientifically is reliable If-Then statements--IF (this is the instruction we provided), THEN (kids will reliably pass the Screening Check by the end of Yr 1). Schools and teachers know what instruction they are providing, and the Screening Check is already in place. So the ingredients for a Natural Experiment are in place. All that needs to be done to "settle the points" is to put the ingredients together, turn on the stove, and taste the proof of the pudding.

I think I know how the results of the experiment will turn out, but I've been wrong before and expect to be wrong a lot again in the future

Brian's picture
Fri, 10/04/2015 - 19:26

I'm interested in how just teaching children to handle the Alphabetic Code sorts all problems. Try decoding one, two, four, tough / through.


Barry Wise's picture
Fri, 10/04/2015 - 19:26

Thanks, Dick.

I think Janet has a suspicion of the 'alone' bit, which you rephrase as "don't confuse ...with work-arounds." I have seen how context clues screw up the process and see the wisdom in that.

Why isn't there more reliable scientifically respectable evidence?

Since we are talking about an intervention lasting around 20 weeks I cannot see why dozens of controlled trials have not been done already.

Dick Schutz's picture
Fri, 10/04/2015 - 21:51

Why isn’t there more reliable scientifically respectable evidence?
Oh, boy! That's a loaded question. It depends upon how you squint in looking at the evidence. We do have a plethora of everything from peer-reviewed journals, to handbooks and textbooks "out there." So squinting one way, "We have more than enough respectable scientific research. Schools and teachers are just failing to implement it."

The "problem with that" is that schools and teachers "try" and sincerely believe they are "following best practices." Teachers are taught to honor research, so when itheir best practices don't work out for them, they tend to attribute the failure to the kids and/or their parents rather than to the cruddy research.

So the beat goes on.

It's only been within the last 50 or so years that schooling has been considered "a problem." Prior to that time, the aim in developing countries was, "get all kids enrolled in school." Kids regularly dropped out or were counseled out of school, and in an agricultural/industrial era there were "jobs" they could go to. In that era, schools were good," reading research was "good" and there were "no problems."

When the quantitative goals were met, the qualitative cracks and broken links started to show and EndLand hasn't yet worked out the glitches.

Oversimplified, that's my short answer to the "why" question.

The more important question is "What to do to change the beat?" My answer is:
Simple. The weakness in EdLand isn't "on the ground" with schools, teachers, kids and parents. Gawd knows the OnTheGrounders have "problems and issues" but they're "good enough" The weakness is the technical support the OnTheGrounders get. The research is crappy, the instructional programmes they're sold is unreliable, and the achievement test technology imposed on them is 100 years out of date.

Trying to shift the "blame" from the bottom of a system to the top of the system is a fool's errand. There is no reason to play the blame game--the OnTheGrounders will surely lose further in that game.

Schooling can pull itself up by its own bookstraps through tried and true scientific and technical methodology. The place to test that contention is to start with "little kids" and in "reading." The Screening Check is a "good enough" weapon of mass instruction to generate "disruptive innovation " via a Natural Experiment that is already underway;

The obstacle is that the "bootstraps" are metaphorical. and the schooling players wearing the boots are headed in a completely different direction. So most likely, the beat will go on as before.

Dick Schutz's picture
Fri, 10/04/2015 - 22:41

I’m interested in how just teaching children to handle the Alphabetic Code sorts all problems. Try decoding one, two, four, tough / through.

No problem, BrIan. The 180ish grapheme-phoneme correspondences that make up the English Alphabetic Code include correspondences that account for all these words. However, you have picked words that include correspondences that occur very infrequently even though the words themselves are encountered much more frequently.

So these words wouldn't be used in early reading instruction--any more than place names that have "one-only" correspondence frequency. With words like "one," two," and "four" that are needed to teach early arithmetic, the instruction is easy: "Here the sound is-_____" Kids get enough practice with encountering the word, that their learning to read the words is "no problem."

The aim is to teach the "how to" of reading--not to throw words at kids that make the "how to" most difficult to learn.

Brian's picture
Sat, 11/04/2015 - 08:09

Of course I chose words which aren't phonically regular. It's obvious which they are, when you can read. But there's no clue in the word about that and I've seen many children trying to decode irregular words and getting very frustrated.

I know you will come back with your 'poor reading instruction' comment, it's the answer to everything. But I'm afraid someone who see the joy of learning to read as ' reading instruction' in 'Alphabetic Code' is never going to convince me.

And, to repeat, like Janet, I am not against phonics as an important part of learning to read, but only a part and children can lead to read well without phonics dominating.

Janet Downs's picture
Sat, 11/04/2015 - 09:16

Dick - you say: 'Since the Screening Check evidence now in hand shows that whatever most schools and teachers are now doing is “good enough..."'

Nick Gibb says reading has improved since the introduction of the screen check and this is down to the relentless teaching of synthetic/systematic phonics. But the DfE commissioned report found the majority of teachers, despite saying they used phonics first, fast and foremost, actually supplemented phonics with other methods. To repeat:

'One of the key messages to emerge from the evaluation so far is that many schools appear to believe that a phonics approach to teaching reading should be used alongside other methods.’

The 'natural experiment', therefore, shows teachers have been using mixed methods. They should, therefore, continue to do so and not be pressurized by a schools minister who doesn't seem to know 'synthetic' and 'systematic' are not synonyms and doesn't appear to realize the evidence he cites doesn't say what he says it says.

Janet Downs's picture
Sat, 11/04/2015 - 09:27

Barry - as Dick says, there is already a lot of research in this area. Gibb has used much of it to underpin his support of teaching synthetic phonics first, fast and foremost. But, as I've said repeatedly, the evidence he cites does NOT support the sole use of synthetic phonics (see sidebar for summary, also, if you've got plenty of time, you can read responses to the Education Select Committee's request for comments about how the Government used evidence to support phonics teaching - you'll see a contribution from Dick Schutz on page 6, my contributions are on pages 8 and 9).


Dick Schutz's picture
Sat, 11/04/2015 - 14:42

I’ve seen many children trying to decode irregular words and getting very frustrated.
The frustration arises not from the "irregular" but from the fact that they haven't learned/been taught how to use the Alphabetic Code to read the words, and the work-arounds that they been taught are of no avail. We all get somewhat frustrated when we try to read texts that have a lot of words that aren't currently in our personal lexicon, but that can't be chalked up to "reading instruction."

Incidentally, I certainly do NOT "see the joy of learning to read as ‘ reading instruction’ in ‘Alphabetic Code’" . That's an interpretation that you bring to the text because of your previous experience, not because of the "meaning of the text." The interpretation, again, supports what I've been trying to communicate about "reading."

I am not against phonics as an important part of learning to read, but only a part and children can lead to read well without phonics dominating.
The weakness in that position is that it takes us straight back to Searchlights and justifies all of the "Mixed Methods" the updating of National Curriculum intends to remove. What the position represents is a disregard for the history of the English Language and the English Alphabetic Code. I don't find that a tenable position, but possibly I'm missing something.

Dick Schutz's picture
Sat, 11/04/2015 - 15:40

The ‘natural experiment’, therefore, shows teachers have been using mixed methods. They should, therefore, continue to do so
Precisely.--pretty much. "Mixed methods" is a mixed bag. Teachers (and all adults) do whatever we can to "teach kids right." Whatever, a teacher is doing is improvisation that operates within a personal mindset.

A school or teacher where the mindset is "mixed methods" rather than "synthetic phonics" will be unlikely to fare well on the Phonics (mis-labeled) Screening Check. But that contention is just what I see in the evidence to date. It hasn't been tested because the analysis hasn't been done. "Looking at the data" would cut short all of the "tis-taint" colloquy that is currently endemic.

and not be pressurized by a schools minister
You and I read Gibbs speech differently--because of the different backgrounds we bring to the text, not because we differ in our reading capability. I can't find anything in the text that applies any pressure on schools and teachers. At the same time, it's perfectly clear that schools and teachers do feel pressure, and many people blame whoever happens to be DfE minister at the time.

I fully agree with you that one of the "mistakes made" was to prescribe an instructional method rather than to place reliance on the history of the English Language and the substance and structure of the Alphabetic Code. That error has proved to have wide negative ramifications. The good news is that the negatives have not hindered the positive advances that are evident in the Screening Check results to date.

Education Ministers come and go. Statutorily, the updated National Curriculum remains in place. I can find nothing in it that puts pressure on schools and teachers to teach "phonics" (which has morphed from a teaching method to a teachable construct in general and professional usage.)

In opposing the Screening Check, schools and teachers are fighting last years war. An altogether new batch of KS 1 and 2 tests along with an "Baseline Entry Test" that will be used to statistically "evaluate schools" in 2022 is on the way in 2016. The "new" testing orientation repeats the testing orientation in the US that is now unraveling very rapidly. The orientation is well-intentioned but is fraught with large technical potholes. The matter seems to me to warrant wider attention than it is currently getting.

Janet Downs's picture
Sun, 12/04/2015 - 09:12

Dick - The Education White Paper 2010 made it clear that systematic synthetic phonics was the 'best method for teaching reading'.

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/fil...

The Gov't couldn't have been clearer about what method of teaching reading should be used in English schools.

There is opposition to the baseline entry test but was ignored just as opposition to the diagnostic screening test has been ignored. However, I hope a new Gov't scraps the baseline test along with other unnecessary tests which make children in England among the most-tested in the world. I believe the USA is following this trend and this has lead to widespread teaching in about 40 states. We'd be interested to hear more about this and how the testing is unraveling.

Dick Schutz's picture
Sun, 12/04/2015 - 15:34

I don't see any reference to Synthetic Phonics in the 28 points of the Executive Summary of the 2010 White Paper or to any coercion of teachers. The thrust is in the opposite direction:
Raising the status of teachers and giving them renewed freedom and authority
will make a significant contribution to improving schools. However, the best
performing education systems also set clear expectations for what children must
know and be able to do at each stage in their education, and make sure that the
standards they set match the best in the world. Our system of curriculum,
assessment and qualifications gives us the ability to do that in this country,
but at present the National Curriculum includes too much that is not essential
knowledge, and there is too much prescription about how to teach.


Yes, there is a paragraph in the report referencing SP, but it's backed up by a footnote listing of research reviews in the US and UK as "evidence." UK governmental "promotion" of SP began with Sir Jim Rose's 2006 response to the Select Committee of Parliament.

The future is always anyone's best guess. I don't know what Labour's current position is, but given their past involvement and support of SP, the updated National Curriculum, and the coming wave of 1916 testing, I don't see a "turn-around in my crystal ball. Time will tell.

But meanwhile, the US is on the cusp of a testing tsunami. Between now and the end of the school year in June all (+/- students in the US in Grades/Yrs 3-8 and 11 will be taking tests in "reading and math" requiring a total of 8-11 hours of instructional time. The tests will be administered on "computers." If you've ever worked on a computer for 8-11 hours and you've heard of Murphy's Law, you'll have some understanding of the situation.

The "whole thing" is going on under the banner of "Common Core." You can get a sense of the imbroglio by googling Common Core. Here's the first thing that came up for me:
http://haltcommoncore.com/2015/03/03/in-protest-of-common-core-parents-and-kids-opting-out-of-state-testing/

"Common Core" is a breaking story that has been picked up by the national media and ha become an "issue" in the 016 Presidential campaign--which is has already under way. So there will be a lot more Common Core news coming. How the story will turn out is anybody's best guess, but right now the UK education scene looks very good in comparison.

Dick Schutz's picture
Sun, 12/04/2015 - 17:11

Here's another angle on "high stakes testing" in the US in today's (April 12) newspaper:
http://www.pressreader.com/usa/los-angeles-times/20150412/281655368597460/TextView

If in the US, the YR 1 teachers in England who consciously or unconsciously nudged up a few kid's scores on the Screening Check to "pass" could be criminally charged as Racketeers and face a minimum prison sentence of 5-years.

It happens that all of the 11 school personnel convicted after a 6-week trial are Black, adding additional complexity to the matter.

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