How could kids' reading be better supported?

[KidsReading]

Hi. Any advice or thoughts would be really appreciated...

I've done some voluntary reading help at the local primary school. I love it. I love seeing them build in confidence, and enjoy reading with an adult. I work in publishing and it's got me thinking, what support do teachers and schools need/want to strengthen the reading skills of the students?

• from what I can see, TAs don't have time to read with kids much because they're supporting kids on EHCPs.
• the class teachers have a lot to teach, many children per class, so their time is also limited.
• volunteers are few and far between, and just for the odd hour.
• national reading charities just send in books and idea leaflets for reading. Wonderful for those with no books at home, but parents aren't not reading with them because they don't have 'ideas' (no criticism here; parents have many time pressures, I realise).

So what's the answer, do you think? Reading charities that support giving books and people to go in and read with each struggling child for 20 minutes a couple of times a week (so you're tackling availability of reading material at home/reading for pleasure and practice)? Would teachers and schools welcome such support? Does anyone's school do this or something different?

Or am I missing something completely? Any thoughts greatly appreciated. Thanks so much!

Reading support for weaker pupils is most effective on a daily basis. This requires a trained person to deliver it. At my school we would be very receptive to a charity offering this level of support. In the current climate we would be grateful for any support at all!

@luter Thanks so much for the reply. Are you a teacher or TA (before I bombard you with questions!)?

I agree-daily support is key. Distributed practice is well evidenced but it’s difficult to find that number of people who want to, or are able to, volunteer so frequently.

I have listened to children read at my daughter's school. They said they have far less parent volunteers since COVID. I went weekly and generally read with the same children, mainly the ones that didn't read at home. They were generally being heard read 2 or 3 times a week (me, teacher, TA). Sadly that probably dropped to 1-2 times when I had to stop.

A volunteer to read daily would be amazing. I'm not sure it needs to be as long as 20 mins. That's a long time for a struggling reader, although I am thinking of younger children.

Our school has plenty of books. Reading books, library books, books in the playground. I know that having up to date phonics books can be expensive, but I think the bigger issue is often adult time/motivation. If you want to read with a child, you can usually get hold of books to read. Although reluctant readers may be more engaged by specific books that interest them.

I think parents have a huge part in the most part, or I would have thought, but then we once had a child over one evening and they were all getting their homework done and I was no help to him, I couldn’t explain why the sounds weren’t fitting the writing so I think sometimes it comes down to extra help in school by someone experienced for those who need it. In general it’s about trying in any way you can to keep them interested. A lot of people say they’re fed up of the biff, chip and floppy books but they always did the job here, we’d find loads of them in the library and the kids would actively go for them (sorry if I’m mansplaining here!!)

Thanks everyone for your replies. Really helpful :)

Ring-fenced funding for a school library would help a lot.

The best books for my reluctant reader where ones that had a page for the adult to read, then a page with a sentence for the kid. That way there could be enough plot to keep them interested, with their bit still being manageable.

Unfortunately they where at quite a low level, and I haven't seen anything similar for slightly older kids. I would kill for a series of chapter books, that have easily identified sentence/paragraphs of easy to read text embedded in the main story.

In my local private school they use reading volunteers. 10 volunteers in a primary school of retired people to listen to reading everyday. Repeat practice

almost all support needs to come from parents, not school - it is a very important part of parenting

Daily practise of 10mins for struggling readers. No more. There's not enough warm bodies in a classroom to achieve that though so if there's no volunteers and parents aren't doing it, the ones struggling will continue to struggle regardless of the number of free books and leaflets given to them.

Libraries need to be resourced to support too. Welcoming in schools and nurseries for story times, opening at hours when parents can take their children, having a good selection of children's books.

So much of children's reading ability is set very early on with reading at home before they get near schools, so if they don't have books at home we need to figure out how to support parents at all income levels to get hold of them.

And a tiny thing - always always have the subtitles on whatever children are watching.

I think, certainly in my area, that the relationship between schools and public libraries could be much better. The public library system could play a much greater role in supporting schools

Our school is fortunate to have a lot of volunteers who attended a short course on how to support reading. I'm in Ireland and our local Further Education college arranged and delivered the short 3 week course post covid to fill a gap that was identified.

Bring the children regularly to a large city library - so they link books / reading to treat. Exposure to the absolute vast array of subjects also helps - as it helps form that link - reading unlocks access to favourite topic/interest.

Hi OP, I'm really interested in this - I've been volunteering with year 3s for the academic year and it's been so interesting. I'm also a school governor (elsewhere) and parent.

I think a huge part of the issues for children I read to is a lack of 1:1 time with any adult, at home or school. Ideally yes absolutely they would have more time with their parents, or a volunteer sit with them for 20 mins a day and I'm sure that would massively increase their confidence and skills, not just in the actual reading but comprehension and talking about the story, what's going to happen next, how do the pictures tell us what's going on. But in school it ideally needs to be the same adult to develop a relationship, and grow the children's confidence. It's not just about "can they read" but listening and them having time with someone.

So how do we help more children? I do think more parents should be encouraged to help but yes ideally we'd have paid staff in school as dedicated resources. Sadly I can't see that happening. But for anyone reading this, honestly the 1.5 hrs I spend in school on a Monday morning is having a hugely positive impact, not just on the children but on me, being able to see a difference. Fortunately my boss also reads in a school and is very supportive of me starting late l, i make up the hours.

I've worked in a school that advertised for reading volunteers and got about thirty. Mostly retired people. As they were recruited all at once the school was able to give them some training.

My dc went to primary in Australia and there was an expectation there that you would go in for two mornings a week per child per family.

I've also been to a Catholic primary where nuns came every day and listened to readers.

Another issue is that half the time you have someone who can listen to children read is wasted with faffing around. Getting their book out, not having a book, not knowing what the book they had was called or what level it is, the next child not coming straight away, writing in the diary. The person listening to the readers needs a TA of their own!

I am a retired librarian and volunteered with Beanstalk for years. I strongly agree with Neighneigh that it is not just ‘can they read’ but building up confidence, being listened to, having fun. Over the school year I saw the same three children twice a week, half an hour each (year 6) so time for a game, changeover etc. Children enjoyed it and grew in ability and confidence, teachers saw this, and I loved it!!

What I found most useful to further my children's ability is a information sheet which detailed what questions I need to be asking at the end of the book to progress comprehension and information on how to progress reading style i.e. reading grammar (questions marks) using expressions etc. Obviously the above needs to be age specific

Parents should support their own children's reading by listening to them read daily and enthusing a love of reading into them. Why is it only the responsibility of schools to improve reading?

@twistyizzy it's not solely schools responsibility, but schools are the ones who notice the impact of a lack of reading. Some parents simply don't take time to read, for a billion different reasons, and the benefits of school picking up that role are huge.

We had a governor meeting last night which was actually genuinely depressing when we got to budgets. We desperately need the government to step up and fund more staff in schools, there's no other answer.

@Neighneigh I know nothing about school budgets. Are you able to share any general information so I can understand how it works/why it’s so bad? Thanks

TAs that support children with EHCPs would not otherwise be hearing other children read. They would be unemployed as there would be no money/role for them.

One if my schools trains volunteers who hear readers for just 10 minutes either at the start of end if the day. They get one child who they build a rapport with. Its meant to make it easier to volunteer as its a short burst when you would be dropping iff or pickung up.

One big issue is someine with poo reading skills really lacks confudence or ability to hear there child so it needs real outreach to give them those skills in a way that doesnt make them feel crap about themselves.

Other parent just need to know what questions to ask.

I used to volunteer to listen to children read at a local school pre covid.
Not having had a child in the KS1 age group I was working with for a very long time, I found that I often didn't understand a lot of the terminology that the children were being taught. It's all very different from when I was at school. Don't get me started on whether i think they actually need to know this terminology at the age of 6 - that's a whole other discussion.

So I would say that volunteers need to be up to speed with what is being taught and how, in order to help the children. Same goes for parents really too.
Someone at the school also needs to be responsible for coordinating the volunteers too. At the school I was at it was not uncommon for parents to want to volunteer in their own child's class and then move themselves to volunteer in the next class when their child moved up. I don't think that volunteers should have been allowed to work in their own child's class - they should be allocated elsewhere. Also I lost count of the number of times I arrived on my set morning/afternoon to find that the children weren't available to read that session as some other activity was on but noone had thought to tell me thus wasting my time.