Charity founder fears a waste of teaching effort

Education, Sport & Culture president Matt Fallaize said during a States meeting that Guernsey was already starting to see a decline in literacy standards across Key Stages 1 and 2.

ESC published the statistics for these following calls to do so and has also commissioned a review.

The charity, Every Child Our Future, helped pay for the training of specialist teachers, who taught children reading recovery.

This ended three years ago, once around six to eight teachers were trained in this intervention. Now there are concerns that hard work and funding has been wasted.

Guernsey ECOF chairman Huw Evans was disappointed to hear about the decline.

‘It is of great concern for the whole island and worrying that students’ performances have lowered,’ he said.

‘It’d be interesting to see how much money is still spent on these interventions.

‘Overall though we’re very supportive of Matt Fallaize and applaud him for his transparency in providing the statistics that show the decline in standards and the increase in students needing additional literacy support.’

ECOF’s aims, while working in collaboration with the States and local businesses, were to improve literacy and numeracy standards for local children, with at least 85% of children attaining level 4 at Key Stage 2, as well as through encouraging community responsibility and participation in children’s education.

Through this a three-year business plan was developed with the States and local businesses to facilitate specialised training of teachers and teaching assistants to provide additional support for struggling children.

Although they no longer provide teacher training, ECOF still provides volunteers to read with pupils, an initiative that Mr Evans said continues to be successful.

Deputy Fallaize said a number of literacy interventions, such as ECOF’s reading recovery programme, which is now funded by the Education Office, have provided support for a large number of students working towards age-related expectations.

‘This may have contributed to gains in literacy seen since 2011, but cannot provide a full explanation of the trend as an improvement,’ he said. ‘Then a decline is also evident in the proportion of students achieving the higher levels, who would not have received any such interventions.

‘Until further investigation has taken place it will not be possible for definitive conclusions to be drawn.’

However, ECOF founder Denise Fallaize, who has now stepped down from her role, was frustrated and disappointed over the revelations.

‘I sincerely hope that all the effort and financial support provided by the community through local charities hasn’t been wasted,’ she said.

‘ECOF especially, with the strong support of teachers, showed that it is possible for 90% of children to attain expected standards in literacy and numeracy at Key Stage 2.’

In 2011 in Guernsey she noted only 67% of children attained this level and said this improved through their funding of specialist teacher training, but now, amid reports that standards have dropped since the introduction of the new curriculum in 2017, this funding is said to have been squandered.

‘I really hope all that effort and progress wasn’t wasted,’ she added.

‘The improvement was amazing for all the children involved, especially those from more-disadvantaged backgrounds.’

ESC’s information is based on data provided by schools about pupils’ performance at the end of Year 2 and the end of Year 6.

It has said it is working with the head of curriculum and standards, Clare Sealy, and other professionals and is considering amending the curriculum to ensure that teachers are supported by the most recent evidence and guidance about how best to teach early reading.

The findings of the literacy review, and any significant findings across other subject areas including maths and science, will be shared publicly in due course.