Report of the Literacy Taskforce
As a key input into the development of the Literacy and Numeracy Strategy, in 1999 the Government established the Literacy Taskforce to provide advice on how the goal should be defined, how progress towards it should be measured, and the ways in which literacy learning could best be supported. The taskforce was asked to make specific recommendations to improve teaching and learning for children in their first four years at school, to identify those aspects of current practice that need affirming or reinforcing, and to indicate programmes or practices that need reviewing. This Literacy and Numeracy Strategy is no longer an active strategy.
Reading, Writing, and Mathematics Proposals Pool
The Government asked the Literacy Taskforce to recommend criteria for the distribution of funds available to schools from the Reading, Writing, and Mathematics Proposals Pool. The funds are to assist schools to meet the set-up costs of programmes that they are sure will meet the particular needs of children identified as making limited progress. Furthermore, it is the Government’s wish that such programmes involve parents and the community.
The Literacy Taskforce was concerned that schools do not add more literacy programmes without being very clear about the way in which they will make a difference to the progress and achievement of their students. There is evidence now that some schools are using programmes without adequately evaluating their effectiveness. The taskforce considered that this not only wastes the school’s resources but, in particular, is also not a good use of children’s time, especially when they need to make rapid progress to close the gaps in achievement.
The taskforce would prefer that Government funds to support literacy learning be used to develop teachers’ expertise, for example, through the development of literacy leaders or a self-directed professional development package, or be used to expand the specialist resource available to work intensively with children, especially for decile 1 and decile 2 schools.
Because decisions about appropriate programmes are best made at the school level, the taskforce did not accept the task of determining a list of programmes that are deemed to be suitable. However, members were concerned about aspects of the approach and quality of some of the programmes and materials currently being marketed to schools. This concern reinforces their earlier recommendation that schools be provided with statements of best practice to guide them in their decision making.
The taskforce was also concerned that decile 1 and decile 2 schools currently face such pressures that the system for submitting proposals must be as straightforward as possible.
The Literacy Taskforce recommends that the Reading, Writing, and Mathematics Proposals Pool be limited to decile 1 and decile 2 schools in this financial year, opening out to other schools in the following years but with priority being given to lower decile schools. The criteria for funding are listed below.
Criteria to be met for funds from the Reading, Writing, and Mathematics Pool
The Reading, Writing, and Mathematics Proposals Pool is for programmes to be used with students in years 1 to 6 in primary schools. Proposals must:
- provide evidence that the needs of the target group have been clearly identified;
- provide a rationale for how the programme will meet the needs that have been identified;
- describe how the programme reflects best practice;
- describe how the programme will further develop teacher expertise;
- describe how the programme will be sustained (bearing in mind that schools will be eligible for funding for a maximum of two years);
- provide evidence of the commitment and involvement of parents and the community.
Schools that have received extra Crown funding for similar purposes, for example, through the School Support Project or the Innovations Pool, will not be eligible.