Another week, another report outlining the impact of the pandemic on children. 

This time it comes from the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF), describing a longitudinal study of children’s outcomes in reading, maths and personal and social wellbeing in key stage 1, conducted by the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER). 

In many ways, the findings of this report are the least surprising yet. 

The 2022 KS1 Sats outcomes highlighted a 20 per cent gap between those who passed the phonics screening check by Year 2 (87 per cent pass rate) and those who reached age-related expectations in reading (67 per cent). 

Now we have a report suggesting that the number of the lowest-attaining readers in Year 2 (when taking the NFER reading assessments) has tripled. The study, conducted across a sample of 168 primary schools in England, suggests that the most vulnerable low-attaining learners have not fared well as we have moved out of the pandemic. 

I wonder if I am the only one to find this a little frustrating. 

This report is helpful; it illuminates the problem clearly for those not working at the chalk face by giving stark numbers. But that’s it. There is no insight into why this might have occurred, or what we might be able to do. 

So, why has the number of low-attaining readers tripled? The simple answer is, of course, “the pandemic”. But there’s more to it. There are myriad reasons why children may find it difficult to learn to read - and school closures will have had an impact on all of these. 

Let’s think about a few. 

At a child level, we have low levels of language development. Speech, language and communication difficulties can affect the way a child learns to comprehend, how a child learns to decode, how they can learn in the classroom, how they develop the knowledge and experiences of the world that help them interpret text and answer questions (Castles et al, 2018; Catts et al, 2006; Catts, 2021; Komesidou et al, 2022). We have evidence that children’s language development has been affected by the pandemic (Tracey et al, 2022) and it is increasingly hard to secure therapy for children.

Raising reading standards

There’s also the issue of physical development, in particular for eyes and ears. Glue ear, unidentified hearing difficulties and poor vision are all aspects of physical development that teachers tend to be acutely tuned into. It’s hard to notice these things through a video screen and there will be plenty of children who have fallen through the screening services.

The impact of living in poverty also deserves a mention. Poor physical, emotional and mental health all affect a child’s ability to thrive (Marmot et al, 2010). Many of the low-attaining children represented in the NFER statistics are among the most vulnerable in our communities. 

Anecdotally, teachers have shared that many children have fallen through the early screening net provided by health visitors and social workers, leading to them starting school with unidentified and unsupported cognitive, social, emotional and behavioural needs. 

In school, it does not get any simpler. Interventions such as the Nuffield Early Language Intervention are not designed to support the children with the greatest difficulties. Neither were the approaches implemented by the National Tutoring Programme. 

At the same time, primary schools were charged with the ongoing implementation of newly approved phonics schemes, meaning teachers and leaders were likely more focused on learning about and delivering new practices and organisational structures than they might otherwise have been. Research has shown this can be detrimental to children’s learning (James-Burdumy et al, 2012). These new practices may be necessary - indeed, they may be helpful - but the most vulnerable have been left behind. 

We know that the most vulnerable learners respond best to one-to-one tutoring. They benefit from carefully designed, responsive teaching that builds on their strengths and helps them succeed. They often have a complex range of challenges and barriers to becoming a reader that are best served by complex approaches to intervention and support. 

So, sadly, these latest findings about the impact of the pandemic were utterly predictable.

The question, now, is: how do we move forwards? There’s certainly no simple answer, but thinking carefully about the underlying causes, beyond just the pandemic, might be the place to start.

Megan Dixon is a doctoral student and associate lecturer at Sheffield Hallam University