1. Leading Reading Programme – Day 2
Andrew Crosby
Becky Mitchell

2. Reading sessions should also:
Provide opportunities for formative assessment.
Provide information that can be used to assess and accelerate pupil progress.
Would this work best through guided reading groups or whole class teaching?

3. What would an effective reading session include?

4. What is an effective structure for a lesson/series of lessons?
How much should we cover each lesson? How much time do we have in a lesson? How can we keep the level of engagement up while allowing opportunities for AfL and independent working?

5. Elements that need to be included across a series of lessons:
Clear focus on the principle aim/objectives of the lesson/unit
High quality texts pitched appropriately
Clear purpose
Engaging activities that allow pupils to practice, discuss and possibly perform
Some form of independent practice/application
Some form of assessment to gauge progress
Choice?

6. The importance of dialogue
Teaching through dialogue enables teachers and pupils to share and build on ideas in sustained talk. When teaching through dialogue, teachers encourage children to listen to each other, share ideas and consider alternatives; build on their own and others’ ideas to develop coherent thinking; express their views fully and help each other to reach common understandings. Teaching through dialogue can take place when a teacher talks with an individual pupil, or two pupils are talking together, or when the whole class is joining in discussion. (DfES/QCA 2003)
Dialogic talk – nothing new!

7. What is the teacher to pupil talk ratio?
Teacher: Now I want you all to think about the story we were reading yesterday. Can anyone remember what it was called? Sit down, please, Sam. No, we don’t call out. I am looking for someone who is sitting quietly with their hand up. Yes, Alison, can you tell us the title?
Alison: The Iron Man?
Teacher: Good girl, that’s right, it was called The Iron Man, wasn’t it? Can anyone remember what happened to the iron man? Where did he come from? Where did he go? Yes, Danny, can you tell us?
Danny: Fell off the cliff.
Teacher: That is right, he walked up to the edge of the cliff and he fell off, well done!

8. Consider the quality of dialogue in reading lessons in your school.
Teacher: Jack, please tell us which story you preferred and why.
Jack: I preferred ‘At the Zoo’ because it was very mysterious and you didn’t find out what was looking at what until the very end because when I first heard the story I thought there were some new arriving animals and the children were looking for them for a school project but at the end I found that these aliens were actually looking at humans at the zoo and the humans were the new arrivals.
Teacher: That story sounds very confusing. When did you realise that the children were in the cages?
Jack: Oh not until the very end. In fact, the first time I read it I didn’t get it at all. It took two readings and then I thought ‘Now I know what’s going on!’
Teacher: But on our list of ‘what makes a book worth reading’, we put ‘Easy to read’. ‘At the Zoo’ doesn’t sound like it was an easy story if you had to read it twice to understand it.
Jack: Yes, but the words were easy. The story wasn’t. The story, was a mystery, and I like mysteries so that is why I like ‘At the Zoo’ better.
Teacher: So Jack prefers ‘At the Zoo’. What about you Karen?
Consider the quality of dialogue in reading lessons in your school.
What kind of questions are teachers asking? What does the teacher pupil conversation look like?

9. How often do you see these things happen in your school?
* Cutaways
* Split inputs
* Differentiated questioning
* Independent learning journeys
* Challenge activities for higher ability children
* Lessons with no/limited input at the start
* Children being asked to prove their answers
* Children working through tasks at their own pace
* Paired work
* Group discussions and activities
* Differentiated task activities
* Adult guided groups
* Children being asked to make comparisons and links
Do they happen in reading lessons?
Does every reading lesson begin in the same way? Do they all follow the same structure?

10. Promoting quality dialogue and children making links
Scene 1
Teacher: Our first word is covet. Sam, do you know what covet means?
Sam: It’s like not out there, like secret something.
Amber: Oh! Yeah like covet operations on NCIS!
Aaron: Like covet it up?
Scene 2
Teacher: Our first word is covet. Sam, please read the dictionary definition.
Sam: (reading) ‘To wish for greatly or with envy’
Teacher: Ok, so what’s something you might covet?
Maria: I covet an iPhone – that’s what I want for my birthday.
Scene 3
Teacher: Our first word is covet. Here’s our friendly definition: ‘If you covet something that someone else has, you want it and wish it belonged to you.’ Have you ever coveted something?
Eli: Ooh – my cousin got this cool new bike! When I saw it, I wanted it so bad!

11. Let’s give it a go! 3/4 lessons
* What is the progression through the unit?
* What is the core focus/objective in each
lesson/across the unit?
* How would pupils explore the text?
* How can the focus be given purpose?
* What needs to be modelled/practiced/
experienced? How?
* What is the fun factor?
* What opportunities are there for
purposeful dialogue between children and
with adults?
* What purposeful independent tasks
could be designed?
* What AfL would need to be built in?
3/4 lessons