It is a winter lunchtime in the most deprived ward in Hackney, east London. The windows of the surrounding tower blocks are shut firmly against the cold and litter blows in the wind. However, this doesn't stop the excited shouts or wipe the smiles off pupils' faces at Thomas Fairchild Community School as they run out to meet their "Linklater" - a reading buddy from the City law firm Linklaters, which is based a mile down the road.
The pupils beam with pride as they give up a break, playing with friends, in favour of 30 minutes' one-to-one reading with their mentor. "It has a very high status among pupils and a very low drop-out rate," reveals the primary school's head teacher Alasdair Friend.
The need for the scheme is clear. Children come to the school with very low levels of literacy: "So low that it's often off the bottom of the scale," admits Friend. What's more, 60 per cent of children at the school speak another language when they go home and 70 per cent have free school meals.
As a result, around 40 children, aged between nine and 10, are currently paired with a reading mentor for the academic year. "The aim is to raise the profile of reading," he explains, "and support children who perhaps have nobody at home to read with."
Pairing children with adults who are not their parent or teacher also develops their confidence and social skills. "It's about widening the experience of the children and raising their expectations by providing them with positive role models," adds Friend.
Ofsted approval
The strategy seems to be working well. While key stage results at the school remain low, Ofsted has described Thomas Fairchild as excellent because of the progress made with children. "They start very low and we move them on, the majority pretty dramatically," explains Friend.
But this literacy success among some of the most deprived children in the UK is not taking place in isolation. There is now a plethora of government initiatives designed to improve literacy levels in the UK. The flagship policy is the National Literacy Strategy, which was introduced in 1998 and is designed to raise educational standards for all primary-aged pupils.
Key elements include a daily literacy hour and training programmes for teachers. Furthermore, most schools have a literacy co-ordinator, who is responsible for spreading examples of best practice throughout the school.
It seems that these policies, aimed at building a nation of bookworms, are beginning to bear fruit. For instance, the National Needs and Impact Survey of Literacy, Numeracy and ICT Skills, conducted as part of the Government's Skills for Life programme, shows that while 5.2 million adults aged 16 to 65 in the UK have literacy skills below those needed to achieve a D to G grade at GCSE, this represents a fall from an estimated seven million in 1997.
In addition, 75 per cent of 11-year-olds in 2003 hit Level Four in English, which is the standard of achievement expected of them. For 2004, the Government has raised this target from 80 to 85 per cent.
This has led to dramatic improvements in schools. Ten-year-olds in England are now the third most able readers in the world, according to a March 2003 Progress in International Reading Literacy Study, conducted by the independent charity National Foundation for Educational Research. The study also showed that there had been a marked increase in our international performance since the mid-1990s.
Getting started
One key to success is starting young. Under the Bookstart programme, all new parents now receive a free book for their baby, along with a pack containing tips for developing their child's literacy skills. Health visitors and librarians distribute the packs, and this financial year the Sure Start Unit is funding the programme.
However, it is not all plain sailing as there is one potential problem with the National Literacy Strategy. According to Julia Strong, deputy director of the National Literacy Trust: "While the strategy is fundamentally excellent, if you're not careful it can cause children to lose the idea that reading is also for pleasure and is fun."
Leicester's Book of the Year award scheme is one project where young people use their enthusiasm for books to promote reading among their peers.
Now in its third year, the scheme is run like a mini Booker Prize. Teenagers from 16 schools across Leicester start reading 40 contemporary fiction books in September, and the aim is to select a shortlist of five.
"Discussions happen after school and the young people take it very seriously," explains Jan Geere, an English teacher at the City of Leicester School.
"They chat away, discussing things like plot, theme and the impact on the reader." Geere adds that the enthusiasm generated by the Book of the Year scheme is impressive. "It creates a real buzz," she says, "with children asking each other: 'Have you read this?' and 'What did you think about that?'."
After the short-listing, the aim is to get as many teenagers as possible to read the selected books between February and May. Staff from Leicester's libraries service meet the young people responsible for short-listing the books to give advice on marketing the titles in schools. "The young people go back really enthused and work hard to promote the books in their schools, for example, by making presentations in assemblies and classes," says Geere.
Students across the city then vote for their favourite book and the winner is announced in June. Last year, three out of the five short-listed authors attended the awards ceremony, including the winner Alan Gibbons who wrote The Edge, a book about a boy Danny and his mum, who go on the run to escape domestic violence. The winner for 2004 has yet to be decided but, as Geere explains, "the scheme just keeps on growing".
This concept of using enthusiastic readers to promote books is not unique to Leicester. Reading Champions is a project co-ordinated by the National Reading Campaign, which uses positive role models to combat the reading gender gap. For instance, in 2003, only 70 per cent of 11-year-old boys achieved Level Four in English, compared with 81 per cent of girls.
Role model network
As a result, the National Reading Campaign has built up a network of male role models, which includes Premiership footballers, national DJs and authors, plus school caretakers, dads and volunteers from the local community. These champions aim to combat negative assumptions boys might have about reading by talking about their experiences, and providing one-to-one reading support to boys in schools.
Again, the idea is to ensure that reading is seen as fun. This is particularly crucial as research published by the National Foundation for Educational Research in December last year shows that the number of children who enjoy reading has declined over the past five years. Among 11-year-olds, only 65 per cent said they liked reading compared with 77 per cent in 1998.
But, in Hackney, it is clear that the kids are enjoying their reading and take it very seriously. "You get to pick any book you like or a magazine," says Muhaimen, aged 10 and originally from Bangladesh. "I like the Simpsons because it's about a family who go on holiday and always get kicked out of every country they go to. I never used to read much, but now I read at home."
His friend Yasin, nine, from Turkey, agrees. "Yes, I read a lot more now too. Sometimes, when I get stuck on a word, my reading partner helps me. At the moment, I'm reading Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator and before that I was reading the Hunchback of Notre Dame."
All the Linklaters' volunteers are impressed with the children's reading progress and all comment on how much their confidence improves throughout the year. One tells how the nine-year-old girl she reads with has progressed from reading picture books to something "with lots of words and fewer pictures". The girl beams with pride and continues reading, happy in her sense of achievement. P
TELL ME MORE
- DfES 0845 850 1444 www.standards.dfes.gov.uk/literacy
- National Reading Campaign 020 7828 2435 www.readon.org.uk
- National Literacy Trust 020 7828 2435 www.literarytrust.org.uk
- Bookstart 020 8516 2977 www.booktrust.org.uk
- Arts Council 020 7973 6564 www.artscouncil.org.uk.
CASE STUDY - Read It helps children to discover that reading can be fun
"It has made me enjoy reading a lot," says Elizabeth, aged eight.
"I like the fun games, especially the miming ones." Elizabeth is one of more than 1,000 children in some of the most deprived areas of Leeds to benefit from a scheme to make reading enjoyable.
Read It is a community-based literacy project run by Learning Partnerships, a charity committed to making an explicit link between community regeneration and learning. The scheme is run in 13 schools, eight of which have after-school literacy clubs for children aged seven to nine. Four Read It clubs for children aged seven to 13 also operate in community venues in Leeds.
Schools pay a membership fee to be part of the scheme, which receives single regeneration budget funding, and literacy is made fun through sharing books, word games and prizes.
Business involvement
More than 200 volunteers, many from local businesses, are also involved.
For instance, Annie Smith is an analyst at British Gas and for the past year has been a volunteer at the after-school Read It club at Bracken Edge Primary School in Leeds. "Quite a few of the children's parents don't read to them," she says. "The project's success can be seen by how much the children enjoy it."
According to eight-year-old Ashley: "Before I came to the club I read just a bit at home, now I read at home a lot." Harry, eight, agrees: "I read a lot more now. I read Roald Dahl the most." Francesca, nine, says: "My favourite parts are the quizzes and games." Eight-year-old Megan agrees: "I like all the prizes. I haven't won any yet, but I'm aiming to get a few."
