Pupils at Bishopbriggs Academy are involved in initiatives to hone their literacy skills before they even start at the school. Since staff formed a cross-curricular literacy committee three years ago, the academy has run innovative projects involving pupils at its associated primaries.

Last month, the school’s work was recognised when it won the Literacy Across Learning prize at the Scottish Education Awards.

Matthew Pearce, the depute head who nominated it, said the school was grateful to the Scottish Book Trust, which had visited and delivered workshops. Bishopbriggs had used a number of SBT initiatives as inspiration for further projects.

Following an SBT Family Legends project, for example, Bishopbriggs Academy launched “My Community”, its own literacy initiative in co-operation with its primary cluster schools. This was one of the keys to innovative literacy teaching at the school. Children from the cluster primaries and S1 worked on talking and listening activities around their local community to create a My Community journal.[QQ#] Technical accuracy of pupils’ writing has also been identified as an area for development by the staff.

To embed the cross-curricular approach to literacy, staff received training in reciprocal reading. About 80 per cent of them have also been trained in co-operative learning methodologies. This had had an impact on pupils’ experiences in the classroom and the development of their skills, Mr Pearce said.