Brilliant piece in tes by @bobeaglestone.bsky.social arguing that a simple tweak to GCSE English Lit could dramatically improve things. Really pleased to see our work with @mariakna.bsky.social on the difficult vocabulary in the spec cited. 👏 www.tes.com/magazine/tea...
I just looked through the list of articles in this resource, and it looks like a great resource! It consists of short articles on a variety of topics, with more to come.
**New** validated Title Recognition and Author Recognition Tests to measure text experience in primary school children, with Holly Cooper, @mariakna.bsky.social, and Marc Brysbaert. #OA @qjep.bsky.social journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
Who is thinking of going to the joint ESCOP-China meeting?
**New** chapter on “Literacy” just published in the Open Encyclopaedia of Cognitive Science. The whole series is super, accessible chapters and no paywalls, a great resource for teaching. oecs.mit.edu/pub/epclh9no...
There is so much to know and do when it comes to literacy, but my new book offers every teacher strong foundations.
It addresses reading, writing, talk, vocabulary, literacy assessment, and literacy & SEND.
'Literacy Essentials for Every Teacher'
Pre-order here: www.amazon.co.uk/Literacy-Ess...
What advice would you give to someone putting together a funding proposal?
Tune into this funding-focused episode of #ConfessionsOfAnECR where Professor @annavignoles.bsky.social demystifies the steps to an effective proposal and what funders are really looking for.
🎬 youtu.be/AjyHKRjC-v4?...
Saw the Kerry James Marshall exhibition at the RA for the second time today. Do go if you get the chance (only one week left). Beautiful, uplifting, thought provoking, challenging, shocking at the same time. www.theguardian.com/artanddesign...
Delighted to announce that I’ll be joining Royal Holloway as the ESRC-funded Postdoctoral Research Fellow on the skilled Arabic reading project, working with Professor @kathyrastle.bsky.social , Professor @denisdrieghe.bsky.social and Dr Sami Boudelaa. A 3-year position starting February 2026. 😀
Do subtitles help children learn to read? Read our blog for the Children's Media Foundation to find out! www.thechildrensmediafoundation.org/archives/170...
Heard the myths about phonics? It’s time to bust them with the evidence to back it up!
📅 Join award-winning Prof @kathyrastle.bsky.social on 26 Nov for a live 45-minute webinar, open to all Little Wandle members.
💬 Stay on for a Q&A with Kathy herself!
🎟️ Book your place via the Ongoing CPD calendar.
Exclusive: A member of the Welsh Government’s expert literacy panel has resigned, warning the new £8.2m national programme to improve reading is “flawed” and “not fit for purpose”.
Full story below
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Special event for all the Little Wandlers out there!
Enjoyed writing this new manuscript with @dkcayado.bsky.social. We describe morphological systems that differ substantially from English, and show why these pose interesting questions for theories of reading. We argue that it's time to cast a wider net in this field.
I am guest editing a special issue—"New Perspectives on the Mental Lexicon" in @qjep.bsky.social with @kathyrastle.bsky.social and Jo Taylor. Expression of interest until 20th Dec. Get in touch!
Looking forward to this session with Little Wandle colleagues!!
** New ** Seeking Postdoctoral Research Fellow (3 yrs) for ESRC project on skilled reading in Arabic. Based in my lab at @rhulpsychology.bsky.social and collaborating with @denisdrieghe.bsky.social (Soton) and Sami Boudelaa (UAE). Please share! jobs.royalholloway.ac.uk/vacancy.aspx...
Academic papers ask "Does X improve learning?" but schools need to know "Does X improve learning enough to justify its implementation costs compared to alternative Y?"
I just paid £9 for each pair of branded socks (for a state school).
🎯
🥳 The ‘holy grail’ of reading inventions that was birthed in NZ & exported to the world has finally been dumped. Now the way is clear for children to receive scientifically-based instruction & stop being instructional casualties. H/T @kathyrastle.bsky.social
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
Did you read the blog and the Times article it was responding to?
I’m starting to get threatening emails from predatory journals. They are accusing me of deliberately not responding to their requests to publish a two-page paper in a journal from a different discipline and saying that I need to respond with 24 hr to “end it smoothly”. 🤣
"Systematic phonics... is affordable, replicable and deliverable across thousands of state schools.... That matters. In education, if it doesn’t scale, it doesn’t work."
Thrilled to announce that my book MORE THAN WORDS (Avery/Penguin Random House) is out! It explains why language production has huge positive effects on talkers: attention, emotion regulation, exec function & more. Accessible science for general audiences! www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/724046...
I had to read this several times as “prioritise growth” and “hit universities over the head” are so mutually contradictory
Thanks Megan!
Great blog about how children learn about morphology- @dccolen.bsky.social has been looking at this too and has some interesting ideas about how to structure the teaching in schools…
Couldn’t agree more… spelling teaching is patchy! And driven by an exam in Yr6.
bsky.app/profile/kath...
Updated our lab's psycholinguistic database page to include Kathy Rastle et al's new web interface for the Children and Young Peoples Books Lexicon (CYP-LEX). Check it out! Give me a holler if you want us to link to your dataset or know of others I've missed. www.reilly-coglab.com/data
What can children learn about morphology when they read for pleasure? We analysed the words in 1200 books suitable for children and young people to find out! Read the blog post here: www.rastlelab.com/post/what-ca...
