Reading 

Our goal is for every child to be able to read at an age-appropriate level, with fluency and without barriers, to ensure that they can access the full curriculum and experience the joy of being able to read for pleasure. This strategy is designed to support and challenge students of all reading abilities, with a particular focus on closing gaps in chronological reading age. On average, 70% of students join Havelock Academy with a reading age deficit, so it is imperative we act to support students to become fluent and confident readers.

This is a school-specific appendix to the DRET Literacy Policy.  It will evidence the strategies in place for pupils to help them read under the three main categories below:

• Reading Culture
• Reading in Subject
• Reading Intervention

Reading Culture

As with all secondary schools in DRET, we use DRET Reads at Havelock Academy as a daily tutor read aloud programme for pupils to access a canon of high quality, highly challenging texts which are read to them daily. 

The profile of our cohort at Havelock Academy means some of our children are unlikely to be able to access some of the texts that we might consider important cultural capital for our children. For example, Great Expectations or I am Malala (both have a reading age of 13). Nationally 25% of 15 year olds have a reading age of below 12, so many of our pupils couldn’t easily access these books independently.

Dickens wrote Great Expectations and other novels as an important comment on society: the books were not meant to be exclusive. By reading these books aloud we model reading fluency from staff of all subjects disciplines and uphold a prominent reading culture. 

Our book list for DRETreads is as follows:

As well as DRETreads, at Havelock Academy we make extensive use of the student learning centre (library) which is open during break and lunchtimes. Book selections and displays are regularly updated by the dedicated academy reading lead.  The space affords various opportunities for our students, whether that be joining the librarian team, attending book club or simply using the space to research and revise for upcoming A Level exams. Many of our students will consider and pursue higher education when they leave Havelock’s doors. Therefore, it is critical that these opportunities are available to students as they will be relied upon in later life.

Promoting the importance of reading is also built into the wider fabric of school life. At Havelock Academy, age-appropriate table-top articles are updated by staff and placed around the communal areas for students to engage with at break and lunchtimes. This is further supported by our annual prize giving in which students are awarded a book chosen and donated by key stakeholders. These strategies ensure our whole school community are sharing the same messages regarding the importance of reading for pleasure.

Reading in Subject

Disciplinary literacy underpins all aspects of the curriculum at Havelock, with dedicated CPD built in each year focused around the EEF literacy strands, including reading fluency. All staff understand the importance of pre-teaching tier 2 and tier 3 vocabulary to aid reading fluency, and this is embedded by heads of subjects in both their long- and short-term planning and can be seen in displays in each classroom across the academy. Staff also consider how explicit vocabulary instruction can be taught explicitly, incidentally and consciously (Quigley) and ensure that these approaches are set at the heart of their practice. These strategies are regularly quality assured by the school literacy lead and Vice Principal both of whom conduct regular learning walks.

As a whole-school expectation, staff are instructed to read all texts to students to model reading fluency. Students follow the text with their rulers and are frequently asked about the content they are reading to assess comprehension and any gaps in vocabulary knowledge or cultural capital.

Here, our Trust Wide Subject Leads and Departmental Heads outline how they approach reading texts within their subjects:

English:

Knowledge in English is cumulative, and in literature draws on many domains of knowledge such as biblical allusions, art, Greek myths, rhetoric, geography, politics, and history. It is through a broad programme of study at KS3 that teachers can make explicit links between this knowledge and literary concepts, metaphors, and conventions, and to develop students’ critical analysis of these ideas.

Success in reading is complex, as not only do students need to be able to decode words to comprehend meaning, but they must also read with fluency to ensure comprehension, and background knowledge is key to the comprehension of vocabulary; thus a broad and balanced curriculum is essential to reading success.

In classrooms, it is primarily teachers who read aloud, in order that fluency and pace is maintained to allow for comprehension and enjoyment of the text being read; teachers modelling the reading also allows students access to texts with reading ages above their own, which if tackled independently might not be understood.  Strategies such as echo reading are utilised in classrooms and recently, we have introduced a prosody lesson into Y7 so that we can begin to embed a further strategy to support reading fluency. Teachers ensure students understand through quizzing and questioning, summarising, annotating and note-taking, and repetition or elaboration of the reading as necessary.

Prior to the analysis of texts in English, comprehension of plot, character, and ideas is supported through ‘cold reads’ or ‘cold watches’ of complete texts; this allows students to experience the whole of a text in its original form, and enjoy the rise and fall of narrative, exposition, and to lose themselves in a story, before deconstructing its component parts. The texts are read aloud by the teachers to imbue expression and meaning and to demonstrate a love of the text, as well as to support comprehension; where the text is in the form of a play, the stage production is shown, in order to closely replicate the experience of the theatre audience.

Reciprocal reading is utilised to support students’ reading of more complex texts by harnessing metacognitive strategies, and teachers teach this consistent approach which mimics the automatic practices of expert readers:

1. Predict – what are we going to read about in the next section of text? Explicitly demonstrate how expert readers use cues in the text.
2. Clarify – which words & phrases do we need to establish the meaning of?
3. Question – use questions to develop understanding and inference
4. Summarise – what are the main ideas? Reviewing, consolidating the content of the text and ensuring comprehension.

This approach combines metacognitive strategies, modelling, and procedural knowledge, to give a supportive framework for accessing challenging reading material.

Geography:

Although the canon of the subject lies in the representation of Earth through maps, i.e. the ability to communicate with others the spatial distribution of places and features, alongside the manipulation of other geographical data, literacy forms a fundamental part of the discipline. The word geography derives from geo, meaning the Earth, and graphos, meaning to write about. So the purpose of geography is underpinned by the importance of literacy.

Although many before Eratosthenes (born ~245 BCE) wrote about their travels (such as Homer and Herodotus), Eratosthenes is arguably the father of geography and is best known for calculating the circumference of the Earth and creating one of the first world maps (missing out of course the Americas, China, and the majority of the southern hemisphere!). Eratosthenes also created a comprehensive treatise about the world including references to climate zones. Many years later in the turn of the millennium, Strabo took ‘writing about the earth’ to a new level with his collection of 17 books called ‘Geographica’. Within these books, Strabo gave the reader an insight into different geographical regions including descriptions of climate, people, and wildlife. The ability to give detailed and accurate written descriptions of the world formed a substantial role in the birth and development of the subject.
Literacy in geography tale many forms including:

1. Concise annotations using geographical terminology (to support readers in understanding visual representations such as diagrams, photos, maps, and other geographical data)
2. Detailed descriptions and explanations of geographical phenomena that use geographical terminology (to support readers in gaining insight into what is represented in diagrams, maps, photos, and other geographical data)
3. Extended pieces of writing that takes the reader on a journey across a geographical space, using a range of geographical terminology, alongside other literary techniques to move the reader from the everyday to the geography and back again (be that characteristics of human environments, physical environments, changes over time, personal stories of experience etc.)

History:

The Education Endowment Fund Report on Improving Literacy in Secondary Schools makes 7 recommendations, and the first of these is to prioritise disciplinary literacy across the curriculum. This is fundamental to the teaching of History for two key reasons:

1. History is fundamentally a discipline: a form of knowledge as opposed to an uncontested canonical body of knowledge. The essence of history is enquiry. Indeed the Greek writer Herodotus, generally credited as the first historian, coined the term ‘Historia’ meaning investigation, not narrative. History is thus concerned with investigating the meaning of events through disciplinary knowledge – concepts such as cause; consequence; significance; connections; similarity / difference. In short, History is a series of claims which historians make about the past, which they attempt to make convincing through the effective and judicious use of facts deployed as supporting evidence.
2. Public perceptions (and by implication those of pupils) of History are very different from the accepted (by historians) definition in Point 1 above. As the US historian Ted McCormick points out in a Twitter thread from July 2021:

In popular science books, scientists are usually centre-stage; in popular histories, historians are usually invisible.Nobody doubts that scientific discovery takes intellectual labour; indeed, that intellectual labour is often the story people most want to hear. On the other hand, there seems to be a sense that history is just there for the telling; that "the facts" are given rather than made.

This reality presents teachers of History with particular challenges. Ass educators, it is of course beholden upon them to correct misconceptions of any kind. It is especially important to correct this misconception because if it is not corrected in Y7 then the History teacher is in danger of reinforcing it by omission. At GCSE and A Level the most common reflection of examiners is that pupils struggle with the very notion that a given question might be answered validly in several different ways in History. In other words, History is about argument, and knowledge in History is dynamic and contested.

The DRET History curriculum endeavours to engage pupils with this from the very first lessons, encouraging pupils to think of History less as ‘events’ and more as a study, similar to English Literature or Science, of what great figures in the field have written about History. Not surprisingly, an approach such as this gives primacy to reading, and in the case of the DRET History curriculum, reading the work of experts in the field and also reading about the work of experts in the field (ie the methodologies they have employed).

Mathematics:

Learning mathematics requires students to learn the language of mathematics (Hager, 2018). If we want our students to be proficient in operations and procedures and confident in transferring knowledge to different and novel situations, then we need to ensure that they are mathematically literate.T

The OECD define mathematical literacy as:“…an individual's capacity to formulate, employ and interpret mathematics in a variety of contexts. It includes reasoning mathematically and using mathematical concepts, procedures, facts and tools to describe, explain and predict phenomena. It assists individuals to recognise the role that mathematics plays in the world and to make the well-founded judgements and decisions needed by constructive, engaged and reflective citizens." (OECD, 2021).

One of the key underlying principles of the Trust’s mathematics curriculum, in line with National Curriculum expectations is students should conceptually understand the mathematics they are learning, communicate and reason accurately and apply knowledge to novel real-life as well as mathematically abstract problems. For our students to succeed in these goals it will require an explicit focus on literacy, in order to help students build connections between terminology, concepts, skills and representations and support then to master the knowledge within the domain.

Science:

Reading is not only a crucial way for students to learn science content, but also an important part of what professional scientists actually do. Science has a very specific language which must be used accurately. These words are often used in everyday life incorrectly - e.g. we do not weigh ourselves when we step on the scales we measure our mass. To support students in correctly using scientific vocabulary we implement a number of strategies:

1. Key vocabulary - Each lesson has the key vocabulary indicated and defined for the students. These are also included on the knowledge organisers for each unit. We also explicitly teach root words, prefixes and suffixes in year 7. We recognise that students will need this knowledge to decipher language moving through the course - so we frequently refer to this when introducing new vocabulary. This includes the key vocabulary of practical work - accuracy, reliability etc. 
2. Retrieval - Students are frequently quizzed on key vocabulary in the retrieval tasks at the beginning of lessons. This includes both identification of key terms and their definitions.
3. Right is right - We support students to use precise technical vocabulary and we show them the difference between the facile and the scholarly. We set and defend a high standard of correctness in our classrooms in both verbal and written responses. 
4. Linking learning - Staff are explicit with students about the links between the units and the different sciences. Students are encouraged to identify commonalities in language and where concepts and prior knowledge is being applied in a different context. 
5. Annotating - The resourcing of the TWC has been reformatted to 1.5 point to allow greater space for the annotation of the text to support student retention and understanding of key vocabulary and this should be regularly modelled by teachers in lessons. 
6. Call and response - Repeat - When introducing new vocabulary students are expected to repeat the word that the teacher has introduced. Reinforce - We reinforce new information or a strong answer by asking the class to repeat it. 
7. Ruler reading - The resources which accompany the TWC have line numbers to support students in reading along when staff are reading from the booklets. The expectation is that the students will use a ruler to support them in following the text. This mirrors the expectation of DRET reads. 
8. Interpreting data - Students are explicitly taught how to interpret and describe trends and patterns in data. There are frequent opportunities for staff to model responses and support students when inferring conclusions from the data. 
9. Command words - The modelling of extended response is embedded in the trust wide curriculum. This is to ensure that students can correctly use their knowledge by identifying how that knowledge needs to be applied in the question from the command word. 
10. Further reading - At the end of each unit there is an article linked to that unit's study. This hinterland knowledge is included to engage the students in the contemporary applications of science. 

French:

In our MFL classrooms, before becoming silent and interiorised, reading is first an oral activity.  Reading aims to be a joyous collective endeavour where the foreign sounds are noticed, practised, celebrated through choral vocalisation, and where the meaning is brought to the fore through both clear dual-coding and the modelling of prosodic reading.

One of the ultimate functions of our MFL KS3 curriculum, is to grow learners who can decode and articulate new words in the foreign language with a degree of competence and confidence, as well as demonstrate phonological awareness when listening to the foreign language.  Another function is to help all learners automatize a core of foundational linguistic structures. Finally, our inclusive curriculum also aims to build all learners’ confidence and resilience when dealing with long foreign texts. 

With these aims in mind, our approach to reading is informed by recent research in both SLA and cognitive science.  Therefore, our curriculum and pedagogy predominantly feature:

1. Comprehensible input (Krashen, 1982) always precedes output in our learning sequences and so reading will precede and model writing
2. The phoneme-grapheme correspondence is taught systematically in Years 7-8 and revisited in Years 9-11 – this is to secure confidence and high success rates when decoding new words independently, as well as resilience when hearing a string of spoken words.  (Coates et al., 2017)
3. The discovery of new words, phrases and texts in the foreign language is conducted with the close translation in English and/or unambiguous imagery – this dual-coding helps ensure all students are included and initiates the semantic encoding which promotes deeper levels of processing than would pure visual or acoustic encoding alone (Craik and Tulving, 1975).
4. Reading aloud collectively as a class after teacher’s modelling, and before being asked to read to peers – choral reading provides safe, inclusive initial practice (McCauley, 1992) , while reading out loud to peers facilitates memorisation, that is semantic and acoustic encoding, through vocalising and self-reference effect (Rogers, Kuiper & Kirker, 1977 and Boucher & Lafleur, 2015)
5. Longer texts are introduced from the onset in Y7 but our core texts support all students with clear literal translation and line numbering – the latter to mitigate any split-attention effect (Chandler and Sweller, 1992) and facilitate further instruction, questioning and language processing activities which will all strengthen the semantic encoding.
6. In and out of lessons, independent reading comprehension from KS3 onwards is supported with access to a range of texts from Active Learn, teachers’ selection, local library’s selection of graded readers. 

Religious Education:

Following the conception of RE as a composite subject composed of four subdisciplines of Theology, Philosophy, History and Human Sciences disciplinary literacy in RE means students become conversant with the rules and tools of thinking in each of these disciplines either singularly or, more likely, in combination with each other. 

The importance of academic rigour and knowledge in disciplinary literacy in RE is a major aim of our trust-wide curriculum. The legacy reputation of RE as about something other than knowledge has led RE to lose status as a subject vis a vis other subjects but also crucially in the minds of student it has often become a place where opinion is more important than knowledge. The titles (and, of course content) of two recent articles from education scholars bear out this popular misconception about RE:
 

 ‘“Science is purely about the truth so I don’t think you could compare it to non-truth versus the truth.” Students’ perceptions of religion and science, and the relationship(s) between them: religious education and the need for epistemic literacy’

 (J Pearce, A Stones, M Reiss and T Mujtaba, 2019)

Some pupils should know better (because there is better knowledge than opinion). Interim findings from an empirical study of pupils’ and teachers’ understandings of knowledge and big questions in Religious Education (J Pearce and A Stones, 2021) 

Both the titles and the thrust of the concerns represented in the articles show how RE needs to recover from being primarily about opinions and how it might maintain its curricular importance along side other subjects. The need for epistemic literacy is highlighted in the first article whilst the second article regretfully outlines the applicability of the term epistemic injustice to RE. If we do not attend to epistemic literacy, we give undue weight to pupils’ experience and opinion and we create a climate of epistemic disadvantage a corollary of epistemic injustice. Students are wronged in their knowing if we do not prioritise epistemic literacy in our curriculum and in our classroom. Substantive and disciplinary knowledge combine with personal knowledge to form a fully orbed picture of knowing in RE. Traditionally in a learning from / learning about dichotomy RE has often been conflated with personal development or reduced to personal knowledge alone.

The Ofsted research review makes clear that where learning about religion and non-religious worldviews happens best then personal reflection happens best. 

This focus on the disciplines of Theology, Philosophy, History and Human Sciences as ways of knowing ensures disciplinary literacy which is often the one lacking component of RE. The great need in RE today is for epistemic literacy and the imperative to avoid its converse epistemic injustice. Our view of RE aims to find the best balance between the powerful knowledge of RE in its social and intellectual dimension.

The disciplinary literacy threads in RE mean that students can have nuanced answers which understand that different thinkers from different disciplines as well as religious and non-religious worldviews may respond to a question differently. Deep disciplinary thinking means that students will have knowledge that they think differently and knowledge why they do so both based on religious and non-religious tradition and the disciplinary lenses which are used to address the question. This kind of real thinking is the best preparation both for the world out there, personal reflection and importantly the GCSE and A Level courses and exams for those who continue with the subject beyond ks3. ​​​​​​​

Reading Interventions

Every child is assessed with NGRT (GL assessment) termly. This data is analysed and some pupils will have follow up assessments to determine/diagnose barriers to their reading to inform interventions.

Generally, students will be categorised as follows:

Wave 1: Standardised score 115+ = These students will enjoy universal approaches to reading support through our reading culture strategy and our reading in subject strategy.  They are unlikely to need further intervention but will continue to be tested termly.

Wave 2: Standardised score 85-115 = These students have historically received tutoring intervention provided by Reed on a weekly basis after school and have been invited to our literacy book club. This is supervised by our PP lead staff member and is delivered by external tutors.

Wave 3:  Standardised score below 85 = These students will be tested with a further diagnostic test to determine more accurately the barrier to learning.  The student will then be benefit from Read, Write, Inc Fresh according to the needs. This intervention is delivered by two primary specialists who lead the academy’s WAVE provision:

*The bottom 10% of each year 7 cohort also benefit from being in small nurture class called the WAVE. They still follow the full national curriculum, but this is scaffolded, and their reading intervention is supported by specialist primary trained staff. Once students achieve a score above 85 on the NGRT testing and/or staff feel they are ready, they are integrated back into mainstream classes. They are heavily supported with this transition by the wider WAVE team and heads of subjects.

Reading Impact 2023/2024

Our reading assessment data for 2023/2024 demonstrates significant gains across key stage three because of our reading strategy. We are particularly pleased with the progress our strategies are having on our disadvantaged students. The data is as follows:

Year 7 (October 2023 to July 2024)

Year 8 (June 2023 to June 2024)

Year 9 (June 2023 to June 2024)

• Havelock Reading Appendix 2024-2025 download_for_offline
  download_for_offlineHavelock Reading Appendix 2024-2025