Transforming Reading Skills in the Secondary School

Simple strategies for improving literacy

Pat Guy

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9781317442905
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Transforming Reading Skills in the Secondary School is a commonsense text designed to help practitioners working in a mainstream context. The book suggests ways to develop the underlying skills necessary for good reading through multiple pathways such as mainstream subject lessons, individual and small group support sessions, whole school initiatives, the use of reading mentors and home-school liaison opportunities. Brimming with ideas and activities, Pat Guy explores a variety of different aspects of reading, including:

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• how reading is taught and why it is such an important skill for the individual

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• how to motivate the reluctant reader

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• the role played by the mainstream & specialist teacher

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• underlying problems pupils may face

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• how to increase parental involvement

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• reasons why a pupil's comprehension might be limited

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• the role of the School Librarian

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• the relevance to reading of vocabulary and general knowledge.

Anyone wanting to develop the reading skills of secondary pupils who struggle will find this a resource they return to time and time again.

Part I
Promoting reading in the secondary school

Introduction

I have been involved in the teaching of reading for over thirty years, initially as a primary school teacher, then as an LEA (Local Education Authority) Advisory Teacher working with pupils with literacy difficulties and, for the last fifteen years, as a SENCo (Special Education Needs Co-ordinator) in secondary schools. Over this period of time I have become aware of the performance of a large group of pupils who chose not to read and of the implications that this has for their final level of academic achievement. These students are able to decode adequately, but find comprehension increasingly difficult as they move through secondary school. Their problems remain unidentified as an individual’s reading comprehension is assumed to be at the level of their decoding ability.

Many books explore the support needed by pupils with specific reading weaknesses, but few investigate the difficulties faced by these students whose reading skills stall at secondary school. Transforming Reading Skills in Secondary Schools identifies some of the less obvious, but common, barriers to achievement: limitations of general knowledge, a restricted vocabulary, low motivation, a weak memory and narrow reading experience, all of which limit pupil performance and, unbeknown to the adults working with them, create obstacles to their achievement. Support may be targeted erroneously towards the end result of the knowledge gap and resources and effort wasted: putting strategies into place to help a student with concentration problems will not be effective when the student lacks concentration because of poor comprehension.

Transforming Reading Skills in Secondary Schools is a commonsense publication designed to help the practitioner working in the mainstream context. The book suggests ways to develop the underlying skills necessary for good reading through multiple pathways: mainstream subject lessons, individual and small group support sessions, whole school initiatives, PHSE (Personal Health and Social Education) lessons, library events, the use of reading mentors and home–school liaison opportunities.

All support strategies and advice sheets are clearly presented and can be easily incorporated into lessons without the need for major adjustments to planning. Input of a steady ‘little and often’ nature from all adults involved with the students will have a positive effect on pupils’ reading, improving their performance across the curriculum.

There is a clear and established correlation between poor literacy, low pay, poor qualifications and unemployment and reading is an easy, cost-effective way to improve the life chances of those students who do not have opportunities for real-life experiences such as travel, cultural visits and events, or regular exposure to formal language. If we are able to persuade pupils to read, help to raise their level of skill to make reading as easy as possible and provide entertaining and purposeful reading activities, we will be able to improve their overall performance and remove this invisible barrier to their learning.

Chapter 1
Overcoming barriers to reading development

How to help students who have:

• undiagnosed medical problems: hearing loss; visual difficulties
• limited language
• a restricted vocabulary
• a poor general knowledge
• issues with attention
• assumed developmental delay
• a specific learning style
• limitations of memory: visual memory; auditory memory difficulties.

Undiagnosed medical problems

As a first step, it is important to rule out the possibility of any underlying physical problems. It is easy to assume a student has some sort of specific reading difficulty, when they are actually experiencing a medical difficulty.

A degree of hearing loss

Might the student have an undetected hearing problem? Some students will have an intermittent hearing loss, the most common of these being glue ear. Glue ear occurs when the individual has frequent colds or a runny nose, the middle ear fills with fluid and the student’s hearing is limited. Any sort of deficiency in hearing will affect reading ability. In the early stages of reading, it would be easy to think a child with an undiagnosed hearing problem had a specific learning difficulty, for example, when they are unable to hear the difference between the letters ‘b’, ‘d’, and ‘p’ because the letters sound the same when you have the equivalent of a permanent heavy cold. When an older student does not quite hear the correct pronunciation of words, they will have little idea of how to say the words when reading aloud.

Students may be unaware of their problem and, as the hearing loss is intermittent, it might not be picked up by the usual screening checks.

Typical behaviour of an individual with a hearing difficulty would include: straining forward to hear what is being said, watching the speaker’s lips closely, regularly asking for information to be repeated, an apparent lack of attention, ear-ache, tiredness, indistinct speech, poor pronunciation or monotonous speech patterns. The reading comprehension of students with hearing problems is likely to be patchy because of the unreliability of information input; some explanations will be heard and others will not.

Support strategies for students with hearing loss

• Send the child for an ENT (ear, nose and throat) assessment to gauge the severity and/or regularity of the loss.
• Take extra time to ensure the student has understood what has been read. The student with a hearing problem is certain to have fragmentary general knowledge and understanding.
• Spend some time directly clarifying the correct pronunciation of subject vocabulary, adding visual clues whenever possible.
• When reading from a textbook, stand close to the student, read as clearly as possible with hands and book away from the mouth to enable the student to support their hearing by lip reading.
• Try to reduce the amount of background noise when reading aloud. It can be difficult for students with a hearing problem to ignore some sounds and focus on others, as all sounds will be heard at the same level.

Undiagnosed visual problems

Could the reader have some sort of undiagnosed visual difficulty? When reading, these individuals may tilt their head, rub their eyes, shut one eye, frown, squint, blink, rest their head on their arms to look at the page sideways or hold the book too close or too far from their face. They may have problems identifying the correct order of letters within words, reading words in the correct order across the page, or omit words and omit or re-read lines.

The students may not be aware that others do not see print as they do. If every image they see is blurred or moving, they may assume this to be normal.

To read successfully, students need a range of visual skills in addition to adequate sight.

Students must be able to coordinate their eye movements and focus both eyes on the same part of a word, follow a line of print without losing their place, maintain clear focus whilst reading, make quick focusing changes when reading from a book or board and then back to their notes, in addition to being able to process what they are seeing. If children have problems with any of these aspects of vision, they will experience difficulty with reading.

Support strategies for students with visual problems

If the student exhibits any of the signs of visual problems as described above, ask them about any difficulties they may experience. Is their vision sometimes clear and sometimes blurred? Do letters appear to be doubled or lines of words overlapping? If so, when does it happen and what do they do? Do they ever get dizzy or feel sick when they are reading? Do they get headaches when reading for long periods?

• The more severe cases will need an assessment from an optometrist. An optometrist will diagnose less obvious visual problems such as tracking or accommodation weaknesses. Students may be prescribed corrective lenses or given eye exercise programmes.
• Some students might find the glare of black print on white paper hard to tolerate or complain that the print moves on the page. Sometimes mild problems can be alleviated by using coloured A4 plastic sheets as overlays. Worksheets copied onto pastel coloured paper rather than white also seem helpful, with dark grey rather than black print helping to reduce contrast.
• Older copies of books with faded or creamy coloured paper are easier for some students to read because the contrast between print and paper is reduced.
• When students are reading from the computer screen or whiteboard, the colour of the background can be changed and font size enlarged.
• Position students who you suspect experience visual problems close to the board, under adequate lighting and away from reflective surfaces to ensure reading is as easy as possible.
• Ruler-sized strips cut from coloured A4 plastic sheets can be used as a combined reading guide and overlay. This will make it easier for students to keep their place on the page in addition to reducing glare.
• Keep sets of A4 magnifying sheets for students to borrow.
• Coloured rather than black pens for whiteboards can help to minimise visual stress.

Worksheets will require similar consideration:

• A plain font is preferable; students can have additional difficulties with the recognition of words printed in an ornate style.
• Print needs to be of an adequate size and at least a 12 point.
• Do not use capitals for whole words as the words will all appear to be of the same size and shape. This will make it more difficult for the reader to recognise words quickly; telephone being a more recognisable shaped word than TELEPHONE.
• Unjustified text will help the reader to keep their place and read fluently. When the beginning of a word is on one line and the end of the word on another, it will be hard for some readers to read without stumbling.

Limited language skills

Any students experiencing underlying language problems will have difficulties with decoding. These will exist alongside the less obvious weaknesses in comprehension, vocabulary, the processing of text at speed and interpretation of formal text structure.

At the age of 16 years, 49% of students who have a history of Speech, Language and Communication needs would be expected to experience problems with the accuracy of reading (decoding). However, 74% will experience difficulties with the comprehension of a text and this may be less immediately obvious than the difficulties associated with decoding.

(Conti-Ramsden and Botting, 1999)

A survey of two hundred young people in an inner city secondary school found that 75% of them had speech, language and communication problems that hampered their learning.

(Sage, 1998)

The importance of the part played by spoken language in reading development cannot be underestimated. Spoken language precedes reading and a child must be orally competent before developing reading skills. All individuals’ language will develop at different rates and when a student’s language is immature or underdeveloped, the effect this will have on their reading will need to be considered. Any student with limited language skills will be at an immediate disadvantage when reading secondary texts.

Problems that will affect a student’s decoding will include:

• A limited appreciation of sounds and speech patterns. If individual words are pronounced sloppily – ‘fing’ for ‘thing’, ‘free’ for ’three’ – letter/sound links will appear inconsistent and confusing. If words are run together in speech, for example, ‘innit, wotsama’er, a pupil may be unaware of their separate nature in text.
• The student’s auditory discrimination may not be refined enough to distinguish between sounds that differ in small ways such as ‘though’ and ‘foe’.
• Some individuals find it difficult to recognise rhyme. Whilst not a major concern in itself, the ability to recognise rhyme forms part of the underlying set of skills that support reading. The ability to hear rhyme helps with decoding, for example, ‘The word you are looking for begins with an “n” and sounds like: sight, fight and right’. If the reader knows the word ‘down’, then by association, they will be able to read the words: frowned, town, brown, gowns and drowning. Working on rhyme encourages the student to look at words analytically and to recognise groupings of letters within words: f/ield, sh/ield, y/ield and w/ield. This will help the weaker reader more than knowledge of letter sounds as it enables them to decode longer words.
• When words are misheard or misinterpreted, they may not be recognised in print: Les Stir for Leicester, SA for essay or Jim for Gym. Newspapers print student ‘howlers’ every year during the exam season and often, although the errors appear humorous, it is easy to understand the logical process the student has followed.

Speech and Language therapy services can appear to hold an ambivalent attitude towards older students, targeting their limited resources towards th...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title page
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Part I Promoting reading in the secondary school
• Introduction
• Chapter 1 Overcoming barriers to reading development
• Chapter 2 Effective support in withdrawal lessons
• Chapter 3 Improving reading through mainstream lessons
• Chapter 4 Whole school reading events
• Chapter 5 Stand alone reading lessons
• Part II Practical exercises, advice sheets and hand-outs to support staff, parents, carers and students
• Chapter 6 Advice Sheets
• Glossary
• References and resources
• Index