It’s not unusual for a student to start secondary school struggling to read and write at the expected level. English teachers, of course, know the importance of closing that gap, and work extremely hard to put interventions in place for any child who needs them. If they don’t, students will struggle to access the secondary curriculum, and, ultimately, be disadvantaged when sitting their GCSEs.

In the past six months, that literacy gap has also caught the eye of the education secretary, Nadhim Zahawi, who has pledged to “tackle illiteracy” across the country.

In this week’s Schools White Paper, Zahawi repeats this commitment, and says that any child who falls behind in English will get the support they need to get back on track. The White Paper also sets an ambitious target: that by 2030 the national average GCSE grade in English language needs to have increased to 5 (from 4.5 in 2019).

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How secondary teachers work to engage reluctant learners with literacy is bound to be in the spotlight, then. So, at a classroom level, what steps can they take to get every pupil interested in reading and writing?

One place to turn for support is a group of educators who have extensive experience when it comes to engaging some of the most reluctant learners: those working in alternative provision (AP) and pupil referral units (PRUs).

What alternative provision can teach us about engaging reluctant readers in literacy

Georgina Gallagher is the head of English at Bromley Trust Academy Hayes, a secondary alternative provision in south-east London, and she regularly sees students who are completely disenfranchised with education and, in particular, literacy. This she puts down to a fear and mistrust of staff. 

In order to build engagement, then, relationships have to come first. 

When a child first arrives at BTA Hayes, they spend three to five days in the Assessment and Transition Centre (ATC). While the ATC is run by staff who are skilled at engaging unmotivated, anxious students, classroom teachers also spend time in the centre, getting to know their new students. 

Here, keeping the conversation light is key: it’s about building trust and showing that you’re interested, says Gallagher. 

In the ATC, students also undertake a range of baseline assessments, including three in literacy. These outcomes are then fed into an individual exit report, which informs the rest of their education at the school.

In the classroom, Gallagher tailors her teaching to those reports, and uses a range of techniques to engage students. The “challenge board” is particularly useful for reluctant learners who don’t want to draw attention to themselves, she says. This is a display board with a number of plastic wallets stapled on, full of different resources, from sentence starters to grammar rules and vocabulary lists. Gallagher allows students to get up at any point during the lesson, collect these resources and use them for further support: it’s been a huge success. 

To encourage engagement, she also uses a game called “Popcorn” during whole-class reading: this involves getting students to read sections of a text - it could be as little as three sentences - before saying “Popcorn: Sarah”, for example, which means it’s Sarah’s turn to start reading. This ensures that students are all paying attention: when their name is called, they need to know where the class is up to in the text. 

When reading a text that is particularly atmospheric - for example, if rain or wind is mentioned - she also encourages students to do sound effects: whoever does the best one gets a small reward. “It’s all about tricking them into listening with little activities. Don’t be afraid to go off piste, and have fun with them,” she says.

‘It’s all about tricking them into listening with little activities’

All of this, Gallagher stresses, is about breathing a bit of life into the GCSE course. “Lots of the GCSE material is very dry and we are upfront with students about the texts and resources in the exam,” she says. “But to foster an improved appreciation for reading, we use resources that are relevant to them and affect their life.” 

Using personal interests to engage students in learning is a technique frequently utilised by Christopher*, who has perhaps the hardest group of all to engage. He is a prison officer at HM Prison Swaleside, in Kent, with responsibility for education. Getting prisoners interested in learning, particularly literacy, is so important, he stresses: a large majority have very limited or no reading skills at all.  

In order to do this, Christopher focuses on informal learning outside of the classroom to help them realise the power of education. One of the most popular offerings has been group learning on philosophy, funded by the Royal Institute of Philosophy. This requires no reading or writing skills at all and, therefore, is accessible to everyone. The course is delivered through discussion, and the learners explore themes around reality and identity. From this, some prisoners have been encouraged to take on further learning. 

Christopher is also compiling an anthology of poems written by the prisoners. Again, these activities take place out of formal learning time but spark interest in, and place value on, education. And there is evidence that approaches are working: prior to the pandemic, around 15 per cent of the prison population was considered to be “engaged” in education; that is now at 25 per cent, and is expected to rise. 

“We’re reaching men who have never engaged with education before. With the learning-by-stealth initiatives and wider informal learning initiatives taking place on the wings, that’s only going to increase,” he says.  

Of course, working with adult learners is not the same as trying to engage children and young people in learning. But, at the City of Birmingham School, an all-through PRU with multiple sites in the West Midlands, providing engagement opportunities outside of English is also key to driving up interest. 

Kiri O’Flynn is the deputy headteacher. She explains that there is a wealth of strategies in place to encourage reluctant learners, one of which is that every site has a fully stocked library area, in which students are encouraged to spend their free time. Each week, every student takes a book home, and they also have access to an e-library. 

Students read a book as a whole class each term, often linked to a trip. For example, after reading David Walliams’ Gangsta Granny, students were taken to the theatre to see the show. Reading is celebrated throughout the school: and a reader of the week is selected each week, with special events linked to reading also organised.

“One of our secondary centres had a CSI day, based on a crime book, and all the subject areas got involved and it was really positive. Every student took part and got a copy of the book to take home,” O’Flynn explains. “We’re big on every subject being involved in literacy, and we encourage students to read aloud in every subject, just to normalise all of these skills.”

Re-engaging reluctant learners: what can work in the mainstream?

Clearly, there is much going on in these settings around re-engaging the most reluctant learners. So, what are the main lessons for mainstream teachers to take away from this work?

For O’Flynn, the focus should be on investing in reading materials tailored to student interest - even if they are not on the curriculum. Crucially, students should be allowed to take these home. 

“At the beginning of a child’s journey, put reading to one side, and spend time having conversations about their interests. Once you know what they care about, you can select materials, whether it’s books, comics, magazines that will capture their attention,” she says. 

“Then it’s about incidental conversations in the corridor, saying to a child, ‘Ooh, I’ve got a book I think you’d be really interested in,’ or you can draw in another teacher and say things like, ‘I was telling Mr Peters about that book you loved about cars, and he’s interested in cars, too. Why don’t you go and talk to him about it?’” 

Fostering those relationships, she says, is absolutely essential, as is having high expectations. 

“Every single student is entered for the GCSE. We do have high expectations for them, and we let them know that,” she says. “We want them to get good outcomes, and to see the value in doing so. Spending money on things like personalised reading materials shows that you’re investing in them and their education.”

Showing that you care and building relationships is the biggest thing Gallagher says she’d recommend to mainstream teachers, too. 

“Building that rapport with them, being honest and showing that you really care about their learning is, second to none, the most important thing we do here,” she says. “That is a great foundation to build an interest in your subject and what you’re teaching them.”

‘Being honest and showing that you really care about their learning is, second to none, the most important thing that we do here’

However, she also warns against treating reading or writing as a punishment. Instead, she advocates for creating positive associations: through games like Articulate, as well as initiatives such as DEAR (drop everything and read) time.

“In some schools, if the class isn’t behaving, they are made to sit and read in silence, or write an essay. Staff are inadvertently making reading and writing a punishment,” she explains. “If our students are seen reading for enjoyment, we give them a raffle ticket. At the end of every term, whoever has the most tickets wins a £75 voucher for JD Sports: it’s all about making reading a treat rather than a punishment.”

Crucially, none of these recommendations is a million miles away from what mainstream teachers do in their own classrooms every day. 

But, as the interest in tackling low-level literacy increases from the government, there are still useful lessons here: the importance of positive associations, using relationships as the first building blocks to engagement and investing in the resources that interest students the most.

*Surname redacted for privacy reasons.