Decline in literacy blamed on island's own curriculum

Tuesday 08 October 2019

Methods of teaching young children how to read may be behind the falling standards of literacy being identified in Guernsey's schools.

A 'multi-cueing' approach is being used in States schools, and that has been identified by the Committee for Education, Sport and Culture as a risk factor in bringing up literacy standards overall.

Multi-cueing involves a combination of phonics (the sounds the letters make) and encouraging children to make guesses based on pictures and what might make sense to them. 

The Bailiwick Curriculum states that multi-cueing should be used to teach early reading - rather than just focusing on the use of phonics as is popular among some teachers. However, in a statement released last week, focusing on the current decline in literacy standards, ESC said; "this ‘multi-cueing’ approach to early reading is now known to be much less effective than using phonics alone. Three major international reviews of evidence recommend that schools should move away from multi-cueing and adopt a phonics-based approach for early reading."

Pictured: Deputy Matt Fallaize, President of ESC and Clare Sealy, the Head of Curriculum and Standards. 

ESC says all schools do use phonics in their teaching of reading, but the Bailiwick Curriculum currently tells them to use this as just one strategy among several. The Committee said it is working with the Head of Curriculum and Standards, Clare Sealy (pictured above) 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".

Guernsey's curriculum was only introduced in 2016, by a previous Education Department, but the current ESC Committee said it has been "clear about the need to strengthen the content in the Bailiwick Curriculum, which has been largely skills based".

ESC has cited evidence from a number of other jurisdictions which have introduced similar skills-based curriculum models, and which show a decline in standards and an increase in inequality.

For example, ESC says PISA scores for Scotland have slumped since it adopted its skills-based curriculum in 2010, as have results in Finland since it underwent a similar change. Portugal’s results, on the other hand, have risen significantly since they moved away from a skills-based curriculum and added greater content.

In the 2018-19 academic year, ESC put a number of measures in place to work towards strengthening content in the curriculum, including investing in a teacher-led group to develop key content in core subjects. ESC says; "This year’s performance data reinforces the need for the curriculum to continue to evolve in the light of evidence and best practice locally and internationally."