* Find out who the weaker pupils are and how weak their reading is. If reading age levels don’t mean that much to you, ask the special needs co-ordinator to give you a piece of writing that your pupil has managed to read comfortably.

* Help slow readers to penetrate text by explaining in advance the key points they will meet, and by putting important vocabulary on the board.

* Get them to focus on short parts of the regular text, using cloze and truefalse exercises. These can be written on the spot and don’t need lots of preparation.