Sound Reading System and Literacy — House of Commons, 2018-06-14
Topic: Education
Anne Frances Milton (Conservative, Centre-right): There are a number of imaginative ways of promoting the success of not-for-profit systems, and in holding this debate the hon. Lady has taken one of the first steps. There are 650 Members in the House, and as I always say when talking about apprenticeships and skills, those 650 people can spread good practice and good work. Members of Parliament have good access to their local schools—we all enjoy going into our primary schools—so that is an opportunity to promote the sort of products the hon. Lady is talking about As I was saying, there is wide range of commercial products, but I know that my right hon. Friend the Minister for School Standards is very happy to meet the hon. Lady’s constituent to discuss her phonics programme. I am sure he will be extremely interested to do that. The Government have to be careful not to endorse specific publishers or products, but as long as this programme meets the core criteria, there will be plenty of opportunities for the hon. Lady to promote its benefits I mentioned earlier that we initially turbo-charged phonics with over £23 million of funding between 2011 and 2013, but let me add a word about resources. This tends to be rather sterile ground, but it is important to say that a number of initiatives are going on. We provide funding to make sure that schools across England are supported to teach phonics. In response to the 2015 screening check results, the Government have since funded Ruth Miskin Training and the University of Reading to deliver 36 events to share best practice in the teaching of phonics The most recent roadshows—late last year and early this year—were held in areas where the results in the phonics screening check were low and in the 12 opportunity areas. The roadshows incorporated practical observations of phonics lessons, and the provision of theory and advice about how best to organise, structure and approach teaching systematic synthetic phonics most effectively. This is very important in areas—the opportunity areas—where there are more children from disadvantaged backgrounds, because if we do not get this right at an early age, all we will do is embed the inequalities we are seeing not only in schools, but in communities, and which children take with them throughout the rest of their lives In 2017, we funded nine phonics partnerships, where schools excelling in systematic phonics teaching work with partner schools to spread good practice. These funded partnerships showed an improvement in nearly 80% of the schools that were supported. We are currently inviting applications from eligible schools for them to apply to lead phonics partnerships for this financial year to support effective phonics teaching in schools. We also plan to fund another 20 partnerships during this financial year In addition, funding for improving the teaching of phonics has been made available through the teaching and leadership innovation fund and the strategic school improvement fund. Ruth Miskin Training, through a project worth £1 million, is delivering a whole-school literacy professional development programme to support systemic synthetic phonics teaching in priority schools over the next three financial years To date, we have also funded a total of 17 strategic school improvement fund projects that include phonics. These projects have been awarded nearly £6 million in grant funding. For example, since December 2017, the Excalibur Teaching Schools Alliance has upskilled 22 teachers to become specialist leaders of education in phonics who have been matched to support 104 phonics champions in 52 schools. As a result, it is expected that, by June 2019, 85% of reception and year 1 children in the supported schools will achieve the expected standard in phonics As I say, the Government do not endorse specific products. My main responsibilities are apprenticeships and skills, and I am also involved in the introduction of the T-levels. I have seen a lot of young people who need to be given a second, a third, sometimes a fourth, sometimes a fifth chance, and it is not just young people; it is young and older adults for whom school simply passed them by, in large part, in my view, because they missed out on those critical early phases in their education. It did not matter what history, geography or science they were taught—if they could not understand, if they did not have those basic literacy skills, everything someone attempted to teach them thereafter was completely lost For me, this is definitely about social mobility. Learning to read and write is probably the best springboard from which to launch a successful career and open up opportunities that perhaps a person’s family and those living around them did not have. My right hon. Friend the Minister for School Standards is doing his bit at his end to make sure that in 16 years the Apprenticeships and Skills Minister—it is unlikely I will still be in that position, but you never know—will have a much easier job and will be able simply to pick up these excellent young people who have achieved at school and understand the world around them. I was previously public health Minister, and I remember negotiating at the Health Council of the European Union on front-of-pack food labelling. We have an obesity problem in this country, and all that information is utterly lost to far more adults than it should be simply because they cannot read the information on the pack in front of them In conclusion, our support for the effective teaching of phonics in early-years settings and schools is based on a firm body of evidence, and it is working, as is shown by the phonics screening check and the PIRLS results, but there is more work to be done. That is why we are setting up a national network of English hubs supported by a new centre of excellence. This will enable schools that need support to get it in a way that works for them, complementing the national funding I have described. Schools can work collaboratively, sharing experience, knowledge and expertise with the support of high-quality, evidence-based resources. That is key to improving pupils’ literacy and enjoyment of reading across the whole of their school careers, from early years into adulthood Finally, I congratulate the hon. Lady on raising an issue that possibly does not get as much attention as it should in the House. The impact of being unable to read and write is perhaps lost on many Members as we talk about the sort of subjects we have discussed at length this week, but it is critical if we want to make sure that, whoever you are, whatever your background, wherever you come from, wherever you were born, whoever you know, you have the same opportunities in life as those of us who have possibly been more privileged Question put and agreed to.