Phonics schemes instead of new books: teacher writes

Hi Michael,

I have read this blog posting with great interest, as a classroom teacher of 16 years with a TLR of literacy I have seen many bandwagons being jumped upon by those in government. SSP is simply one of those. I find it amazingly insulting that the questioning of "basic phonic" teaching has been seen as something that schools have up until this point not been teaching correctly and furthermore that we would struggle to bring a book or story to life in the classroom! Michael Rosen's response to Rose echoes that of the majority if not all teaching staff I have come across. To further rub salt into my already raw wounds I have recently been informed that my budget for book-buying in our amazingly under-stocked library, has been held over in order to ensure that teaching of SS phonics is implemented throughout all ages in my primary school. (4-11 year olds!) This means that for the next 12 months at least, my children get a grand total of zero new reading materials, none - all for the sake of an unproven strategy. So my point to Mr Rose is to stop bandwagon jumping and actually prove to us the value of SSP. As I for one can see none. It is just another benchmark or position-league-table stick with which to beat already weighed-down teachers.


Best wishes
Russ