The document discusses the importance of literacy across the curriculum and how it impacts teaching and learning quality. It highlights the barriers poor literacy presents, statistics indicating literacy challenges in the UK, and the role of teachers in promoting literacy. Strategies for enhancing literacy in various subjects are outlined, including oral communication techniques, writing frameworks, and supporting reading in the classroom.

1. Literacy across the
curriculum
Lindsay Maughan
Intervention Lead and Specialist
Leader of Education (SLE)
@UKLiteracy

2. Aim:
To explore how and why supporting literacy
improves the quality of teaching and learning
Understand
how poor
literacy can be
a barrier to
learning
Know the
three literacy
strands
Explore some
strategies that
can ‘scaffold’
learning

3. Rising standards at KS2
 79% achieved at least level 4 in reading,
writing and arithmetic
 76% reached at least level 4 in the new
spelling, punctuation and grammar test
 86% reached at least level 4 in maths

4. The context
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drNv48RLg78

5. Literacy: a few facts
 1 in 6 people in the UK struggle with literacy. This means their
literacy is below the level of an 11 year old.
 92% of the British public say literacy is vital to the economy, and
essential for getting a good job.
 14% of children and young people from lower income homes rarely
or never read books for pleasure.
 Parents are the most important reading role models for their
children.
 Children and young people who engage in technology based
texts, such as blogs, enjoy writing more and have more positive
attitudes towards writing.
Source: Geoff Barton, ‘Don’t Call it Literacy!”

6. 1. The bandage was wound around the wound.
2. The farm was used to produce produce.
3. The dump was so full that it had to refuse more
refuse.
4. We must polish the Polish furniture.
5. He could lead if he would get the lead out.
6. The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the
desert.
7. Since there is no time like the present, he
thought it was time to present the present.

7. The Matthew Effect
“While good readers gain new skills very rapidly, and quickly move from
learning to read to reading to learn, poor readers become increasingly
frustrated with the act of reading, and try to avoid reading where
possible.”
“Students who begin with high verbal aptitudes find themselves in
verbally enriched social environments and have a double advantage”
“Good readers may choose friends who also read avidly while poor
readers seek friends with whom they share other enjoyments”
The Matthew Effect
Daniel Rigney

8. Age 7
 John (top quartile)
 7100 words
 Jennifer (lowest quartile)
 3000 words!
Age 16: 1 in 12 have a working vocabulary of 800 words!

9. ?
Unconfident Confident
Repetition
Reinforcement
Rigour

11. Who is most responsible for supporting
students in their development of literacy?
Teaching Standards:
“demonstrate an understanding of and take responsibility for
promoting high standards of literacy, articulacy and the correct use
of standard English, whatever the teacher’s specialist subject”
Ofsted:
“When evaluating the achievement of pupils, inspectors consider
how well...pupils develop a range of skills, including reading,
writing, communication and mathematical skills, and how well they
apply these across the curriculum”

12. Case study: class context
Y10 class
 20 students
 16 F/ 4 M
 10 Ever 6
 7 SEN
 6 students with literacy difficulties – ranging from mild to
severe incl. 1 with dyslexia
 1 student with an eyesight impairment
 76% have an average KS2 point score of 21 or below. This
means they were working at an average ks2 level 3 at age 11

13. Some issues that may arise in the
classroom
Students may be:
 Unable to read information you
give them
 Unable to independently
research
 Unable to access the curriculum
 Unable to articulate themselves
 Unable to sustain attention and
focus in the lesson
Poor behaviour
Lack of motivation
Lack of drive and
ambition
Poor attainment – low
levels of progress

14. Literacy: what’s in it for
departments?
Reasons why
departments should
support literacy
Most
important
Least
important

15. Speaking and listening
 Teacher talk/ student
talk
 Often assumed to be
‘natural’, but is not for
many
 Oral frameworks
needed

16. Different types of talk
 Explaining
 Instructing
 Questioning
 Describing
 Analysing
 Evaluating
 Speculating
and
hypothesising

18. Why talk?
Summarising
ideas
Asking
questions
Justifying
responses
Challenging
responses
Analysing
Building on,
clarifying,
modifying
others’ ideas
and
evaluating
ideas

19. Questioning
Bad questions
 Lots of closed question
 A ‘scattergun’ approach
 Don’t involve the whole
class
 First answer will be
accepted
Good questions
 May be pre-planned
 Will focus on the why and
how not the what
 Will build in ‘thinking time’
and ‘oral rehearsal’

20. Idea from @TeacherToolkit

23. How do geographers talk?
 Think about people who represent the public
face of geography.
– programmes about the natural world
– weather forecasters
– geography teachers
– documentaries about geographical issues
– serious travel programmes
 How do geographers talk?

24. How do geographers talk?
 specialist vocabulary
 semi-formal
 factual, explanatory
 enthusiasm, passion and respect for other
places and perspectives

25. Oral frames
Develop sentence
openers that are
specific to your
subject/topic.
Embed in talk first

27. 10 tips to develop talk in the classroom
1. Never accept the 1st answer
2. Never accept a 1 word answer
3. Encourage students to respond by saying, “I agree/disagree
because... “
4. Develop their use of sophisticated sentence openers
5. Encourage students to use connectives in talk
6. Encourage students to question/challenge the talk of others
7. Encourage your students to provide more than 1 reason to support
their views
8. Persistently ask them to develop/ tell me more/ explain/
9. Encourage them to sum up their ideas into a formalised statement
10. Encourage formal talk where possible- avoid contractions “I’d”  “I
would”

28. Writing

29. Writing
 What is the purpose? audience? format?
(PAF)
 Style - formal or informal?
 Layout and presentation?
 Tone
 Conventions?

30. What to explore
 Generating ideas + effective planning
 Connectives
 Sentence discourse markers
 Spelling, punctuation and grammar (SPG)

31. Purposes
 Inform
 Explain
 Persuade
 Evaluate
 Review
 Argue
 Advise

32. Writing Provide
model
Deconstr
-uct
model
Analyse
effective-ness
Provide
scaffold
Evaluate
Construct
collabor-atively
and
review
Create
indepen-dently

34. Make writing real
“Write a letter advising another scientist
about DNA.”
Why?
What’s the point?
Avoid meaningless writing tasks.

35. Better...
format audience
Write an online article aimed at teenagers
to be published on Science Today’s
website explaining recent research on
DNA.
purpose
theme

36. teacher
Model expectations of writing
checklists exemplars
peer

37. Tense
• Past
– I walked
• Present
– I am walking
• Future
– I am going to walk
Voice
• First person
– I, we, my, our, us
• Second person
– You
• Third person
– He, she, they, it

38. Sentence types
• Short
Sentence types Openings
– Used to emphasise a point
– Create tension
– To give clarity (good when
used before or after longer,
more detailed sentences or
at the beginning or end of
writing)
• Long
– To develop a point
– To show extending thinking
Vary Openings
• Adverbs
– “Interestingly, ...”
Shows personal opinion first
• Connectives
– Introduce ideas and other
lines of thinking
– However, ...
– Consequently, ...
– Although...
– Despite...
– Since...

39. “The limits of my language are
the limits of my world”
Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951)

40. Vocab matrix
Adjectives
Words that describe
Verbs (-ing -ed)
Words that are actions
Adverbs
Words that describe an action
Connectives
Words that link ideas
Prepositions
Words that show the
relationship between words
e.g. distraught e.g. thinking e.g. furiously e.g. Despite that.... e.g. Yesterday...
troubled
discussing Even though...
annoyingly
after

41. Developing students’ vocabulary
 Read challenging texts
(suited to ability)
 Provide glossaries
 Dictionaries /
thesaurus
 Word of the week
 Key quotes board
 ‘Up-cycling’ words

42. Reading

46. Ways of reading
 Continuous reading
 Close reading
 Skimming
 Scanning

47. Supporting reading in the
classroom
 Enlarge the font size for your weakest students
 Print on yellow paper for students with dyslexia
 Think about the vocabulary you use in the classroom –
challenge your more able students!
 Point out tricky words and explain what they mean when
reading – give glossaries for those students who may need
them

48. Supporting reading in the
classroom
 Ask students to read in pairs, as a group, whole class, or
individually. Ask them to read in chunks – a sentence or
paragraph for weaker students/ half-page or page for more-able
 Check understanding – older students can sometimes read
aloud quite competently but gain only a partial understanding
of what has been read.
 Provide accessible texts: short sentences, pictorial support
and clear signposting all help!

49. Word Clouds (Tagxedo.com)

51. Describe your educational philosophy in 25 words.
1 All children deserve the right
to a quality education . No
matter what their social background
is or what their learning
needs are . Education for all . 25

52. Spelling strategies

53. QR codes
 Literacy in PE blog @davidfawcett27

54. Outstanding support of literacy?
 Literacy embedded in every lesson
 Classrooms rich with quality dialogue about literacy
 Established classroom routines display high quality
provision for literacy
 All teachers in school actively promoting literacy – driven
by SLT/ senior leader and English department
 Enrichment activities in subjects other than English that
promote literacy – e.g. ‘Geography in the news’ club
 Engagement with new technologies to support the
acquisition of good literacy skills

55. Questions Ofsted may use when
observing ‘literacy’ in any subject:
 Are key terms and vocabulary clear and explored with pupils to ensure
that they recognise and understand them? Are they related to similar
words or the root from which they are derived?
 Do teachers identify any particular features of key terms and help
pupils with strategies for remembering how to spell them or why they
might be capitalised (e.g. ‘Parliament’ in history or citizenship)?
 Do teachers remind pupils of important core skills – for example how to
skim a text to extract the main elements of its content quickly or to scan
a text for information about a key word or topic?

56.  Do teachers make expectations clear before pupils begin a task – for
example on the conventions of layout in a formal letter or on the main
features of writing persuasively?
 Do teachers reinforce the importance of accuracy in spoken or written
language – for example, emphasising the need for correct sentence
punctuation in one-sentence answers or correcting ‘we was…’ in
pupils’ speech?
 Do teachers identify when it is important to use standard English and
when other registers or dialects may be used – for example, in a
formal examination answer and when recreating dialogue as part of
narrative writing?

57.  Do teachers help pupils with key elements of literacy as they support
them in lessons? Do they point out spelling, grammar or punctuation
issues as they look at work around the class?
 Does teachers’ marking support key literacy points? For example,
are key subject terms always checked for correct spelling? Is
sentence punctuation always corrected?

58. Further reading
http://www.scoop.it/t/literacy-in-secondary-education

59. #LiteracyDropbox
 Literacy in…geography/history/RE/maths/
science/PE