Learning support assistants and effective reading interventions for 'at-risk' children

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What are the implications?

In completing this digest, the authors began to ask the following questions about implications for teachers and learning support assistants:

This study found in favour of a phoneme-based approach over a programme aimed at raising awareness of rhyming patterns. How much emphasis do you place on training children to distinguish the individual sounds of words? Do you think more time spent on this would improve pupils’ ability to read?
The authors of this study experimented with literacy teaching by devising 9-week programmes with biases towards different aspects of learning to read. In what ways have you been able to ask questions of and evaluate specific elements of the National Literacy Strategy? Could an experiment-evaluation approach be incorporated into your curriculum planning?
How confident are you that LSAs are used to best advantage in literacy sessions in your school? What sort of staff development could you suggest which would make their deployment more effective?

In addition school leaders may wish to consider the following points:

How familiar are LSAs in your school with the differences between rhyme- and phoneme-based approaches to literacy? Would it be feasible to replicate the experiment in this study in your school to inform the discussion on how best to teach literacy?
The authors suggested that training LSAs to take a more active role could improve the literacy skills of ‘at risk’ pupils. What are the advantages of LSAs main deployment being with ‘at risk’ pupils? Does this approach raise any questions about the role of teachers and LSAs, or the way their deployment is perceived by pupils?

The digest authors also began to ask the following question about implications for school governors and parents:

The study focused on ‘at risk’ children who had poor literacy skills. If parents have children in this category, how are they informed of their child’s progress, of what the school is doing for their child, and of ways they can help improve their child’s literacy skills?

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Research Home Themes \| Find digests \| About the digests resources glossary researchers contact TRIPS Introduction Does Learning Support Assistant training improve literacy? Were there any differences in the effectiveness between phoneme-based, rhyme-based, and mixed programmes? What were the aims of the study? How were the children selected to take part in the study? How did the authors set up lessons to identify the best literacy strategy? What are the implications? Where can I find out more? Send us your feedback Collated digests To view/remove/add notes and save your collated digests click here Get Word Reader Learning support assistants and effective reading interventions for 'at-risk' children This digest found in Teaching Assistants English Send to a friend Word doc 90KB Printer friendly Collate for later What are the implications? In completing this digest, the authors began to ask the following questions about implications for teachers and learning support assistants: This study found in favour of a phoneme-based approach over a programme aimed at raising awareness of rhyming patterns. How much emphasis do you place on training children to distinguish the individual sounds of words? Do you think more time spent on this would improve pupils’ ability to read? The authors of this study experimented with literacy teaching by devising 9-week programmes with biases towards different aspects of learning to read. In what ways have you been able to ask questions of and evaluate specific elements of the National Literacy Strategy? Could an experiment-evaluation approach be incorporated into your curriculum planning? How confident are you that LSAs are used to best advantage in literacy sessions in your school? What sort of staff development could you suggest which would make their deployment more effective? In addition school leaders may wish to consider the following points: How familiar are LSAs in your school with the differences between rhyme- and phoneme-based approaches to literacy? Would it be feasible to replicate the experiment in this study in your school to inform the discussion on how best to teach literacy? The authors suggested that training LSAs to take a more active role could improve the literacy skills of ‘at risk’ pupils. What are the advantages of LSAs main deployment being with ‘at risk’ pupils? Does this approach raise any questions about the role of teachers and LSAs, or the way their deployment is perceived by pupils? The digest authors also began to ask the following question about implications for school governors and parents: The study focused on ‘at risk’ children who had poor literacy skills. If parents have children in this category, how are they informed of their child’s progress, of what the school is doing for their child, and of ways they can help improve their child’s literacy skills?