10 minute plan to prevent Year 3 Literacy Crisis

Following the daily Systematic Synthetic Phonics lesson in Reception and Year 1 a guided teaching session with BRI decodable stories offers multiple benefits. By incorporating a short BRI story reading 3 times all children, including both precocious learners and struggling readers, practice their decoding, fluency and communication skills.

 ‘Bolt-On’ takes only a few minutes using:

 ‘I do’

 ‘we do’

 ‘you do’

^{*A universal model created by the distinguished American educator, Anita Archer}

Advantages of establishing BRI practice:

1. Provides a routine to embed rigorous decoding and additional blending practice

2. Offers the opportunity to encompass prosody and oracy

3. Provides an opening for the introduction of grammatical conventions including capital letters, full-stops, question marks, exclamation marks

4. Offers the opportunity for more precocious readers to connect deeply with the stories’ characters and their foibles

5. Provides the essential focus on those children who still struggle to ‘lift the words from the page’ and rapidly to identify those requiring Tier 2 and/or Tier 3 instruction.

Materials: Teacher requires a copy, initially, of BRI Level 1A (6 stories). The class overhead projector with ie a blunt pencil to act as a ‘pointer’.

Children require their white board, pen and eraser at the ready.

A TA or volunteer observer (the ‘extra pair of eyes’) requires a note-book for recording any children who may be struggling and who lack confidence. She/he should stand in the optimal place for observing both front and back rows.

Children engaged in Tier 1 or Tier 2 sessions will also need their own copies of BRI and copies of SPELLING WITH BRI. For Teachers, notebooks are essential for noting each child’s specific difficulties and progress, including all specific areas of difficulty and any error corrections.

Whole Class Practice:

1^st reading:

Teacher models the first ‘I See Sam’ story emphasising both expression and ‘all-through-the word’ reading while sliding ie a blunt pencil precisely under each letter(s)/sound.

(The first six stories of ‘I see Sam’ contain only 5 sounds and 3 words).

2^nd reading:

Teacher provides a reading scaffold by reading the story aloud, with the class simultaneously echo or whisper-reading, directing them to imitate the teacher’s intonation. This will encourage children to develop both fluency and expression.

Before embarking on echo reading, the teacher needs to explain what pupils should be listening for ie intonation.

TA or volunteer (‘a second pair of eyes’) needs to carefully monitor children who may be struggling.

3^rd reading: Teacher ‘cold calls’ children to read a sentence each, supporting any child who is still unable to decode/read the sentence alone. It is important to proceed gently with struggling and shy children. Teachers should initially choose a simple l or 2 GPC word for the pupil.

When time permits, use the questions accompanying each story to probe the characters, their personalities, actions, motivations etc.

Alternatively, delay all introduction of Cold Calling until Year 1, and instead invite a discussion exploring the BRI characters, their personalities, actions, motivations. Oracy, with the optional choice to include the questions accompanying each story, can then be prioritised.

Recommended:

Christopher Such, Primary Reading Simplified. A succinct examination of why significant problems can arise when children reach Yr 3.

Reading Myths, Mastery & Motivation, Getting Fluent with Christopher Such Mind the Gap. Hosted by Emma Turner & Jon Hutchinson (available on YouTube).

For additional information see https://www.piperbooks.co.uk including 30 Reasons to Teach Children to Read Using BRI Decodable Readers (Blog Section).

For class discount see https://www.piperbooks.co.uk/buy-bri-books. e-mail for details

For more information, visit Piper Books online to explore the BRI phonics reading program and other resources.

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