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Dept for Education and Skills

Answer

Mr. Gibb: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills how many cues to word recognition are recommended in the Searchlight approach within the National Literacy Strategy; and if she will describe each of these cues. [224329] Derek Twigg: The National Literacy Strategy is based on the best international research available and supports the statutory requirements of the National Curriculum. It advocates a model of teaching reading which has come to be known by the "Searchlights" metaphor. The model characterises reading as the ability to coordinate and orchestrate four basic cues. These are: Fast automatic phonic decoding The recognition of word and word parts Predictions from knowledge of syntax to make sense of strings of words Predictions from context to aid comprehension. The Searchlight model is designed to enable the reader to cross-refer between cues, which support each other. The ability to use this range of cues together makes it less critical if one of them fails on any given occasion. However, we promote phonics as the first and foremost strategy that children employ as they encounter new words. Phonic decoding and instant recognition of high frequency irregular words are the cues employed at the level of word recognition; grammatical knowledge and understanding of context operate at the level of phrases, sentences and text as a whole. Therefore both aspects of the reading process, decoding and comprehension, are represented in the approach and complement each other.

Secondary information

Type

Written question

Reference

432 c1343-4W;432 c1339-40W; 224329

Session

2004-05

Subjects

Reading Literacy Teaching methods

Link

View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk