Leading partners

Secondary

Whole-school literacy in Secondary Education: Implications for training partners in school

A Leading Partners in Literacy project, through the TDA

Background

In the autumn of 2010, Exeter University, sponsored by the TDA and the Literacy Strategy set up a cross curricular project between student-teachers of English and of Science.
Student-teachers worked in cross-curricular pairs to consider whole-school approaches to literacy.
Science and English student-teachers taught in joint literacy projects, involving their placement schools, their PSTs and a range of other teachers.
The results of this project were extremely encouraging, proving beneficial for the student teachers, their pupils and the placement schools.
Lecturers at the Graduate School of Education wished to make the benefits of this project available to all student teachers in future placements. We developed research and training materials so that student teachers might, via cross curricular initiatives, enhance reflection through agendas, particularly in the enrichment phase.

Resources

Training materials arising out of the project are now available. All our partner schools may encourage their student teachers to become involved in cross-curricular literacy. These materials are available in two forms:

Teachers and students may access a narrative summary of the project. This summary contains hyperlinks to all materials so that readers of the summary may consider particular training materials in the specific context in which they were used (click on summary to access materials in this way).
Teachers and students may click on any of the links below to go directly to any of the materials. There are two main types of materials, training materials, used to support the project, and outcomes, different types of evidence demonstrating what student teachers actually did, felt and thought

Training Materials:

In the order in which they were used for the initial project

Questionnaire: asking student-teachers what they already know about literacy
Literature review: a guide to recent research into literacy in Science
Literature review 2: a guide to the implications of recent research summary:
Rose Review: a guide into the implications of the Rose Review into reading
Student guidance: advice to student teachers about setting up a literacy project
Coordinator interview: a framework for student teachers to use when interviewing the literacy coordinator
Text usage schedule: a framework for observing teaching of texts in the classroom
Science texts: analysis of a page from a Science text book
Phase two advice: guidance for making cross-curricular literacy the focus of themed agendas
Semi-structured interview: questions student-teachers were asked about their involvement in the project

Outcomes:

In the order in which they were produced for the initial project

Questionnaire data: what student-teachers say they know about literacy
Text observation: one student-teacher’s detailed observation about the Science: teaching of texts in Science in her school
Literacy overview: a summary of the whole-school literacy approach of one placement school
Science observation: one student teacher’s detailed observation of literacy in a Science lesson
Discussion transcript: transcript of a group of student teachers talking about their involvement in cross-curricular projects
Presentation one: PowerPoint from one student teacher describing what she has learned about whole-school literacy
Presentation two: PowerPoint from one student teacher describing what she has learned about whole school literacy
Analogies: a Science-student teacher’s study into the use of analogy in Science explanations
Micro-teaching evaluation: example of a themed agenda plus evaluation based on a literacy teaching episode
Interview one: transcript of an interview with an English student teacher about what she gained from the project
Interview two: transcript of an interview with a Science student teacher about what she gained from the project