The Secretary of State for Education on her new literacy campaign aiming to make children in England the best in Europe at reading.
... Before children even arrive in schools, our reforms to early years are helping them to acquire the language, skills and vocabulary they need to learn to read.
Our reformed national curriculum and more demanding qualifications and accountability system will set higher standards for literacy at every age.
More 6-year-olds are already on track to becoming strong readers through phonics.
And as the results published today have shown, that adds up to 120,000 more 6-year-olds on track to becoming strong readers in just 4 years.
We’ve invested in helping more schools to improve their phonics teaching because international evidence shows that systematic phonics is the most effective way to teach all children to read.
Phonics involves teaching pupils the basic letter sounds of the English language, and how they blend together to form words in a structured and systematic fashion - just like you do here at Charles Dickens Primary School. And I’d particularly like to recognise the work of the Minister of State for Schools Nick Gibb, who is championing this work.
We know that 99% of pupils who met the expected standard in the phonics check in 2014 went on to achieve or exceed the expected level in reading at the end of key stage 1 this year, helping drive up the overall number achieving or exceeding that level from 85% to 90% in just 5 years.
At the end of primary school, we’ve seen the number of pupils meeting the expected standard in reading rise, which translates to over 33,000 children in the last 5 years alone....
