Primary school pupils show improvement in their reading ability
as attainment in this year’s reading assessment increases since
last year.
Education standards continue to improve as new statistics on the
phonics
screening check published today (12 October) show 79% of
five- and six-year-olds met the expected standard, up from 75%
last year.
Phonics is a body of knowledge that is necessary for pupils to
learn to read and spell, at whatever age. Young children learning
to read are taught how to recognise the sounds that each
individual letter makes, as well as the skill of blending the
individual sounds together to read.
Improvements in children’s reading ability in English primary
schools builds on the international success earlier this year,
when England came fourth for primary reading proficiency, out of
43 countries that tested children of the same age in the highly
anticipated Progress in International
Reading Literacy Study.
Schools Minister said:
Teaching children to read using phonics has been a key part of
this government’s focus on driving up school standards over the
past 13 years, and our children are now the best readers in the
west.
Today’s results reflect the hard work of our teachers and show
strong progress as pupils continue to recover from the impact of
the pandemic.
The phonics screening check was first introduced in 2012 when
only 58% met the expected standard. Since 2012, there has been a
21% point increase in attainment in the check, highlighting the
government’s commitment to raising standards across the board.
Literacy and numeracy are the cornerstones of a world-class
education. Last week, the Prime Minister announced plans to build
on this at post-16 through the new advanced British
standard, which will bring together the best of A Levels and
T Levels into a single new qualification and make maths and
English mandatory.
Raising standards in primary schools is a key priority for this
government to set children up with the best start in life. The
government established the network of English hubs to support
schools to ensure all children are given a strong start in
reading. It also introduced a validated list of phonics
programmes to ensure schools have access to high-quality
programmes.
The £60 million English hubs programme was rolled out in 2018 and
is designed to develop expertise in teaching reading in schools.
The lead schools work with partner schools by modelling best
practice and providing expert teachers to help them raise
standards through phonics.
Our network of 40 maths
hubs is supporting schools across the country to improve
maths teaching based on mastery teaching approaches used by some
of the highest performing parts of the world.
The key stage 1 attainment statistics were also published today,
showing the number of pupils meeting the expected standards in
reading, writing, maths and science increasing from 2022.
This year:
- 70% of pupils met the expected standards in maths, up from
68% in 2022
- 68% of pupils met the expected standard in reading up from
67% in 2022
- 60% of pupils met the expected standard in writing, up from
58% in 2022
- 79% of pupils met the expected standard in science, up from
77% in 2022.
Since 2010, the proportion of schools rated good or outstanding
by Ofsted has increased from 68% in 2010 to 88% based on latest
data.
