“I wish this had been around when I was teaching Year 1,” says teacher Hannah Abu-Ghaida.

She’s talking about the English Hubs - but there’s a good chance you may not have heard of them. Despite being around for almost two years there is, in some parts of the country at least, a disparity between schools that use them and those that seem unaware of their existence.

What is an English Hub?

In total, there are 34 English Hubs around the UK, based in schools chosen by the Department for Education (DfE) due to the quality of their teaching in areas around phonics and engagement in reading in Reception and Year 1 teaching.

Read more: The problem with phonics in EYFS - and how to solve it

From the magazine: The reading project that helps both adults and students

Listen: Why we’re doing too much, too young in education

Abu-Ghaida is the English Hub Lead for the Knowledge Schools Trust, which is one of  34 hubs across the country. 

Their remit is to act as central hubs to pass on best practice in these areas by engaging with schools - either on site or at their location - and even offer funding to schools to do this, such as to buy new books or paying for them to visit for a half-day best practice training course.

“That’s what’s important about English Hubs - it’s very much a two-pronged approach,” explains Abu-Ghaida.

“There’s the financial injection that schools need at the moment to boost early reading and phonics - and phonics is the starting point. But there is also the advice [delivered] in that school-to-school support way so rather than it be from an inspector, it’s more like it’s coming from a colleague.”

How do they work?

In the first year they launched (2018), English Hub schools provided showcases to schools who would travel in (covered by funding from the Hub school) to learn more about best practice for teaching phonics and general reading and writing engagement.

Since then, their remit has expanded to be able to visit schools to help “audit” their provision in these areas and offer advice based on lesson observations.

“This is a collaborative process carried out by a member of our English Hub team (a current leader within our school) with a senior leader, English/Literacy or reading leader,” explains Abu-Ghaida.

“The process takes a day and is an opportunity to reflect on strengths and areas for development based on DfE guidelines.”

Perhaps most notable, though, is the offer of funding direct to schools with up to £6,000 available as a full funding grant or £3,000 as matched funding - to help them improve their offering in these areas, such as for new books or decodable readers that pupils can take home.

The schools involved are regularly assessed by the DfE and a training provider that sits between the DfE and the English Hubs, to ensure they are adhering to the requirements of their role as a hub and all delivering the same consistent message.

“All of my team, we go on 10 training days throughout the year. [This] ensures we are providing the same message. We also all have the same requirements on financial reporting and performance reporting, and follow the same targets so that we can all support schools equally,” adds Abu-Ghaida.

How can you get involved?

Schools can self-refer to engage with an English Hub school, or be referred by an NLE [national leader of education] or local authority that should have links to a hub within its district. The English Hub website allows schools to see where their nearest hub location is and make contact.

Why is uptake low?

Given all this, it would seem schools would be keen to get involved. Yet Abu-Ghaida says that they often struggle to get the uptake they want. “We’re meant to get 80 schools in to look at us, with two people per school, but present we’ve only engaged with 12 [schools].”

This isn’t for want of trying. “We’ve done flyers and leaflet drops and sent staff to as many meetings as we can to get people aware of what’s on offer.”

One of the issues, Abu-Ghaida believes, is that many schools that are doing well in areas around phonics, reading and writing have an “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” mindset.

She says this is understandable, but warns that with new changes in Ofsted ratings around phonics coming in, many schools may be affected by this and potentially see their rating changed as a result.

As such she says schools should start to engage with the English Hubs sooner rather than later to try to ensure they are not taken by surprise by any new Ofsted rating when new criteria around phonics are taken into consideration.

The benefits

However, for schools that have struggled in this area - as defined by Ofsted criteria - engaging with the hub schools has proven beneficial, as Abu-Ghaida outlines.

“Feedback from schools who engage with us is very favourable. Colleagues tell us that it is so reassuring to be given advice and support from fellow (non-judgemental) teachers who have expertise in the current understanding of what makes for excellent provision.”

One such teacher that has been through this process is Louise Singleton, headteacher of Hambrough Primary School in Middlesex.

“The work of the English Hub has been invaluable to Hambrough,” she explains. “It has supported the school in establishing a more consistent approach to the delivery of our systematic synthetic phonics programme, Letters and Sounds, across EYFS and key stage 1.

“Advice and guidance has been practical and easy to implement within our context and the professional dialogues during the on-site visit days have led to real professional development opportunities for all staff involved.”

The school has also received funding that it used to replenish and build on its existing book stock, which has been another major benefit.