Don’t Call it Literacy!

​No matter what specialist subject you teach, there is no getting around the fact that literacy is the main gateway through which your students must access the curriculum, making it the clear responsibility of every educator to ensure it’s properly addressed at every stage. A report recently released by Renaissance Learning UK reveals a worrying 5-year gap between the respective reading ages of Y10/11 pupils and GCSE exam materials – and this is just one way in which a lack of understanding of the whole-school importance of strong speaking, listening, reading and writing skills can negatively manifest itself. Here, Geoff Barton draws together years of teaching and leadership experience; a passion for grammar, literacy and all the various modes of human expression; and plenty of relevant research, to produce a beautifully concise, immensely enjoyable and highly practical guide that could, quite simply, transform teaching and learning in any classroom.