Teachers - Read, Write, Inc

[ConfusedGovernor]

I observed a RWI lesson yesterday and was very surprised by what I saw.

The school are thrilled with RWI and keep telling us governors how wonderful it is.

The statistics say otherwise, which is why I asked to observe a lesson.

(In particular, while adequate progress is made in reading, no progress is made in writing)

It is a junior school and I observed an hour lesson of 6 Y3 students all currently working at NC L1. All who have been in this RWI group for 2 terms now.

What I saw was:

• The children made no progress - they were taught nothing new in the hour.

• They read about 20 words, which they could already read before the lesson started.

(They read these words over and over, off the IWB and from their books - but it was still only about 20 different words)

• They wrote about 3 sentances, again with no new words or punctuation in them.

• The students weren't challenged. There was no opportunity for kids to read or write harder words. There was no differentiation at all.

Can any teacher tell me what's going on?

Why does schoool think it's brilliant?
Do you think it's brilliant?
What do you do teach reading / writing to kids in Y3 who can't read or write?

Do you teach writing in RWI, or do you teach it separately?
Do you spend a whole hour on RWI?

I'm well aware that as a governor I'm not allowed to have any opinion on teaching.

But I have a meeting after Easter to discuss why the kids aren't progressing and just want to know more about how the whole thing works, or should work.

All staff have been trained at our school (TAs and teachers). It is a big responsibility for TAs to take on, but teachers mark books (and therefore keep up with what children in their classes are doing). TAs have also been on visits to 'model schools'.
We've got files with plans for books and ready-made words for each level to reduce planning time.

In the very first stages, YR are supposed to spend 20 mins a day on a sound. This incorporates writing and sounding.
In later groups, a range of sounds are reinforced and reinforced over and over, day by day - orally, written, spelt as sounds orally, written in words - all kinds of ways. This takes up about 10-15mins of the hour's lesson. The other part is spent reading and writing using the Get Writing books. There is a lot of exploration of character (feelings, thoughts, etc) and emphasis on punctuation. Not really a whole lot different from a normal literacy lesson!

After 18 months of running it, we've found a couple of problems:

1. The children who respond fantastically to the phonics teaching but have little comprehension
2. The group of very slow movers, who are having to be targeted with intervention programmes.

But.....on the whole, it's very successful. It is also very useful to have the prescribed assessment process as we have children arriving at strange times throughout the year and can slip them easily into an appropriate phonics group.

I must say I am fairly amazed that you, in your role as a governor has been asked to observe a lesson and make a judgement on a scheme of work. That is not my understanding of a governor's role whatsoever. Where did that remit come from?

Of course it is the role of the governors to ensure the school standards are met and SEN governors often work closely with SENCOs

Responsibilities

The governing body has a range of duties and powers and a general responsibility for the conduct of the school with a view to promoting high standards of educational achievement. Its responsibilities include but are not limited to:

setting targets for pupil achievement
managing the school's finances
making sure the curriculum is balanced and broadly based
appointing staff
reviewing staff performance and pay.

The governing body has considerable discretion as to how to discharge its responsibilities but is required to constitute itself in line with the regulations and to appoint a chair and vice chair. The governing body may delegate certain of its responsibilities to certain governors or committees of governors, although in general, it is not compelled to do so.

I have never, in any school, encountered governors observing lessons and making independent judgments.

How on earth would they be qualified to do that?

Then your governors aren't fulfilling their statutory responsibilities

Observing lessons
The advantages of engaging with governors, for teachers and curriculum leaders, at curriculum meetings is arguably less challenging than having them in the classroom as observers. If the governing body has decided that part of their monitoring is to attend school and observe lessons, it is important that clear guidance for such visits be agreed in advance. Governors should be clear that they are there to learn, and teachers should be clear that governors are not there to judge the quality of teaching.

The governors? role is to learn about curriculum content and learners? responses to it. It is useful to have a few minutes to chat with the governor before and after the teaching session to explain what is going to happen and then to discuss what did happen. The governor involved should then provide a written report of their findings to the teacher visited and to the governing body at its next meeting.

and all school governors attend training

I can?t stand the RWI scheme, I?m sure it?s some kind of scam the same as the IB to make money from schools.
In my very humble opinion the only way to get children reading is to learn the alphabet, learn the basic sounds like oo and ar etc then learn the first 100 sight words by using flash cards and then get them to sound out as much as possible using a wide range of reading books. My 8 year old has just finished lord of the flies; I took him off the RWI scheme and taught him myself at home.

I told the teacher to remove him from the RWI lessons as his reading had not improved in 6 months on the RWI scheme. I taught him myself at home and after 1 month he was reading levels higher than the top group of RWI.

I absolutely do not believe in these new fangled reading schemes, the old way is best.

and did the teacher remove him from the lesson?

Yes, I should add that it was a private school in a different country.

I assumed it must be private

It is a junior school and I observed an hour lesson of 6 Y3 students all currently working at NC L1. All who have been in this RWI group for 2 terms now.

Reading at level one in year 3, I?m sorry but that is just appalling

They are not qualified to judge the success of the lesson/scheme without being accompanied by a trained teacher. The evidence of this is in the OP. They are asking on an parents' forum whether something is successful in order to presumably report back to the rest of the GB. Their own judgement is clearly insufficient. This is absolutely the problem with such undertakings.

I think you have misunderstood the OP
and I believe the OP is more than qualified to judge but is shocked by what they saw....

Bamboostalks - as literacy governor it is entirely appropriate for me to observe a RWI session.

I am not allowed to make a judgement on the quality of teaching - and I said that in my opening post.

What I'm trying to do is get more knowledge, so that when the HT explains to me how they are raising standards in writing, I can evaluate whether or not her plan is likely to work.

I was fobbed off last year, and I don't want the same thing to happen this year.

The more knowledge I have the better I can fulfill my role.

On this thread I have not been discussing the quality of the teaching. I've been finding out more about the RWI scheme. This is key to my job. I have to understand whether using it the way we do is likely to teach the kids to write.

The point of my observation was not to report back to the GB, but to be more informed before my meeting with the HT about why our children in RWI are doing so badly in writing.

It's the statistics on pupils progress which has raised serious concerns. It's my role to check the HT has a realistic plan to turn things around. I would not be a good governor if I just took the HTs word for it like I did last year

In the meeting I can't suggest what school should do differently - all I can do is ask questions. It requires a lot of knowledge to ask the right questions.

If kids were making expected progress, I wouldn't be questioning RWI.