Basic Skills Family Programmes in Newport LEA

The pupil, Kayleigh, chooses a book she has already read from a selection in front of her and reads it through. She is occasionally encouraged to say a whole phrase, rather than reading each word separately, e.g. ‘I… love… it’ becomes ‘I love it!’, but otherwise, Gaynor, the Reading Recovery tutor doesn’t interrupt her. Kayleigh completes the book and Gaynor picks out just two things she got wrong or stumbled over, and they practice them. This pattern is repeated with two more books and then a new book, that Kayleigh has never read before is selected. They go through it together, just looking at the pictures and discussing what seems to be happening. Gaynor points out one or two new or difficult words, so that Kayleigh is prepared for them before she reads the book aloud.

After only a few weeks on the scheme Kayleigh has progressed from the simplest of stories, to books with lots more words and content. Like all the children who get this daily one-to-one half an hour, Kayleigh’s reading will be assessed at the end of the year, and the progress from her first assessment will be remarkable.

The parents watching the session have seen the growth in their own children’s confidence and self-esteem because of their reading progress, and are interested to see how Gaynor works. In the discussion that follows, they explain how they are now more able to support their children’s learning. One parent recounts how her son ‘now WANTS to do his homework, because he CAN do it’. The PALS course has engaged them all in learning, and they cannot speak highly enough of it. One insists it should be available to all parents: ‘It’s made me more confident with making reading fun, not correcting every mistake in a negative way, breaking words up into sounds’.

Also in Newport, Pillgwenlly Primary School is near the docks and has a mixed catchment area, with 65% of pupils having English as an additional language.  Headteacher, Jill Richards, is very clear about why it is important for the school to offer Family Programmes: ‘the parent is the first educator. Unless parents are supporting us in understanding parenting, as well as literacy and numeracy, children will be at a disadvantage’.

Rachel Edwards oversees the Family Programmes across the school. She runs an impressive timetable of activities, with workshops and courses for parents of children in each year group. Some 100 parents now come into the school to get involved in various learning opportunities. In the spring term there is LAP for parents of the nursery school children, with Number and Play and parenting classes in the summer term. Reception class parents have language, maths and parenting classes, while year 1 parents are offered Reading Recovery workshops and maths. Parents of children in Years 3, 4 and 5 have English and maths Catch Up workshops.

Year 6 is a challenging time for children preparing for entry to secondary school and it can be difficult for parents too. Jill and her colleagues at Dyffryn Secondary School were keen to find ways around potential difficulties, especially for children who might find the transition particularly hard, so when the chance arose to take part in a pilot in ‘Family Learning and Transition from Key Stage 2 to Key Stage 3’ they leapt at it.

‘Food for Thought’ was a great experience for six lucky children and their parents. Each week, for three weeks, pupils and parents cooked a dish and then in the fourth week, they cooked and served an entire meal for the group. The first two sessions were at Pillgwenlly, the last two at Dyffryn, so parents and pupils had a creative and enjoyable first experience of the new school. With lots of communication, weighing, measuring, recipe reading and making menus and invitations there were plenty of skills practiced too. Jill is so pleased with the initiative that it is likely to become a regular feature.

Family Programmes are important because there are big gaps in parents’ education levels and this can cause anger and frustration. Some parents may lack the confidence to get involved in their children’s school life and to support their children’s learning, so they need a lot of support and encouragement. After all, very few adults are trained in how to support reading or maths. The Family Programmes approach delivers learning on ‘safe ground’ with care and empathy. The results can be remarkable.

At Pillgwenlly, end of Key Stage assessments and truancy levels show steady improvement, and the overall profile of school achievement is rising and attendance at parental consultations has gone up. Jill is convinced that the involvement of parents in Family Programmes is a factor. ‘If the parents are engaged, the child is a better attender’. She feels these programmes are part of the school, embedded in everyday school life, yet they can only be offered if the funding is there. ‘It’s very important to maintain these programmes, as without the additional funding we wouldn’t have the trained staff to offer the intervention needed. For example, Catch Up was offered to children who had achieved level 2c at the end of Year 2. Normally 2c children are unlikely to achieve level 4 by the age of 11. Yet 100% of our pupils who received Catch Up achieved level 4 – or even level 5.’

All of the Family Programmes are funded by the Welsh Assembly Government as part of the Words Talk, Numbers Count Strategy, which is managed by Basic Skills Cymru.