Transcript
KAREN FOLEY:
A knowledge of children's literature is really important in effective teaching. And I'm joined by Teresa Cremin from the Open University, and Claire Williams, teacher at St Andrew's C of E School in Essex. I understand that the teachers as readers research suggested that teachers don't necessarily know enough about children's literature to teach Reading for Pleasure effectively, is this right, Teresa?
TERESA CREMIN:
Yes. Well, it's certainly the case sadly that in our early study survey of 1,200 teachers nationally in 11 different local authorities, we found that there was relatively scant knowledge of children's literature and indeed teachers were rather dependent on celebrity authors. For example, in relation to authors only 46% of that sample were able to name six children's authors. And even worse, 22% didn't name a single poet, nil. And 24% of the sample didn't name a single picture fiction creator.
Now, they finished the whole survey or we'd have discounted them. So it wasn't lack of energy, it was lack of knowledge. And with that lack of subject knowledge, they're not really, one would argue, in a position to teach reading effectively. They're not able to recommend texts, not able to select texts, and indeed to teach or to enable Reading for Pleasure to foster reader development.
KAREN FOLEY:
I mean, I guess, getting a sense of the emerging literature around that must be quite a challenge for teachers on top of everything else. Claire, is this something you've experienced, needing to get up to date with what's happening in children's literature?
CLAIRE WILLIAMS:
It definitely resonates with my experience. When I started my teacher training, we had to do an audit similar to the review practice on the Reading for Pleasure website. And it made me reflect on how narrow my knowledge of children's literature was, and how I didn't have enough to draw on to be able to make recommendations. So professionally, it was my responsibility to update my knowledge and make sure I'd got a much broader repertoire to be able to draw and to make recommendations tailored to specific children.
KAREN FOLEY:
So how did you go about doing that?
CLAIRE WILLIAMS:
My starting point was the United Kingdom Literacy Association Book Award. So every year since I trained, I've made sure I've kept up to date. That's unique in that it's the only book award that's judged by teachers. So they're judging and choosing the books that are selected based on which books are going to be rich and exciting to use in the classroom. Quite often that introduces me to new authors and illustrators that I've not come across before. And then when their books excite and inspire children I teach, then you can follow them on Twitter, there are lots of ways now of keeping engaged with work that they're publishing.
TERESA CREMIN:
I mean, that's not dissimilar to in the project. Lots of teachers set themselves targets. So they said, I'm going to get to know more world literature, I'm going to get to know more contemporary poets as it were. They also collectively set themselves targets within groups. So, for example, in Medway, the team of teachers there-- 15 teachers said, we're going to develop our knowledge of poetry and of poets.
And so I think it's that kind of business of saying, where are the gaps in my knowledge and how can I extend those gaps? So that when you're actually not just recommending whether that's an absolutely key reader to reader recommendation piece, but also when you're selecting books to read aloud, when you're selecting books to develop literacy around, you're able to find the very best that are going to suit that child. Or indeed recommend three books to the child so he has some volition or she has some volition in making their own selection from within the range. We can never know enough. It's a real challenge for the profession.