Ever since the general election loomed on the horizon, Labour has made a big play around wanting to do more to bring oracy into the curriculum and classrooms across England.

For example, in its 5 Missions for a Better Britain, oracy is given a specific focus as an important life skill for children: “Speaking skills - known as oracy - can deepen children’s understanding, analytical skills and engagement leading to better classroom outcomes.”

However, it warns that, currently, oracy is “not always taught in schools” despite the benefits it can bring - something former Labour press secretary Alastair Campbell has lamented, too, when he told Tes last year: “It’s kind of weird we haven’t taken [oracy] more seriously.”

Sir Keir Starmer clearly agreed with the Better Britain document promising to address this directly: “Labour will conduct a curriculum and assessment review to explore how to weave oracy into lessons throughout school” - something he said would be a benefit to thousands of pupils.

Barrier to opportunity

“In every class, there are kids who have so much ability and talent, but who struggle to find within themselves the confidence to express it, the belief that their ideas matter, the voice to speak up,” he said in a speech in Gillingham last July.

“This is a subtle and significant layer of the class ceiling - don’t doubt that. The inability to speak fluently is one of the biggest barriers to opportunity.”

At the time, the Conservatives appeared unimpressed, with education secretary Gillian Keegan saying on social media platform X (formerly Twitter) that Starmer’s idea that “the education system’s number one priority should be speaking lessons” was “borderline insulting”.

Given this stance, then, it was interesting to note that as part of the Department for Education’s announcement this week of the merged Initial Teacher Training and Early Career Framework (ITTECF), there was a more overt focus on oracy.

“The changes [to the ITTECF] include updates and enhancements regarding supporting pupils with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), high-quality oral language (sometimes known as oracy) [our emphasis], and early cognitive development,” the new framework states.

Actions speak louder than words

What do those “updates and enhancements” for oracy actually look like though? Well, in a way, not a lot as there are just two changes.

The first comes in Standard 3 of the framework, which sets out how teachers should be able to “Demonstrate good subject and curriculum knowledge”. The original framework stated:

Modelling and requiring high-quality oral language, recognising that spoken language underpins the development of reading and writing (eg, requiring pupils to respond to questions in full sentences, making use of relevant technical vocabulary).

The new framework has been updated to read:

Teaching, modelling, and requiring high-quality oral language, sometimes known as oracy [our emphasis], recognising that spoken language underpins the development of reading and writing (eg, where appropriate, develop pupils’ responses to questions into full sentences).

The other change is in Standard 4, “Plan and teach well-structured lessons”. The original framework stated:

High-quality classroom talk can support pupils to articulate key ideas, consolidate understanding and extend their vocabulary.

In the new framework this has been updated to read as follows:

High-quality classroom talk (sometimes referred to as oracy) [our emphasis] can support pupils to articulate key ideas, consolidate understanding and extend their vocabulary.

Reading between the lines

So, really, all that has changed is the overt use of the word oracy to show that trainee teachers have in effect always been learning how to bring it into their classroom practice - a shift that could be seen as an attempt to counter Labour’s claim oracy has been overlooked in classroom practice.

Whether that will be enough to rebuff any future attempts by Labour to use oracy as a policy differentiator remains to be seen.

However, it seems likely that as the election inches ever closer, we might hear a lot more debate about oracy.

Dan Worth is senior editor at Tes

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