Reading reform in the time of launch, mandate, deliver.
- Emina McLean
- Sep 12
- 12 min read
Updated: Sep 29
What I perpetually wrestle with, whether it has been implementation in my own school, the schools I partner with, or the systems I advise, is how do we get this right, and how will we know?
This blogpost is going to be about the reform situation we find ourselves in, but I’m going to start by talking about my Flourishing Learners Conference keynote, as writing that is what got me thinking about these things even more than usual. This built on the thinking from my recent Research Invested Schools National Gathering keynote.
My arguments
We must stop the pendulum swings and build systems that are sustainable for schools, and the system itself. I see the pendulum swings as being between total Art dogma and total Science dogma, illustrated below. Neither are sustainable, reasonable approaches to policy or practice.
To prevent pendulum swings, a range of conditions are required:
Understand what causes panic and rigidity in schools and systems.
Rigidity: Unreasonably change resistant (dogmatic views) or reasonably change sceptical (have experienced too many changes, want stability, the change proposed is not a good fit or not grounded in evidence)
Panic: Unreasonably susceptible to influence (due to lack of knowledge, impulsive, attracted to shiny things like a bowerbird) or reasonably amenable to change (due to identification of a priority that warrants it)
Build system/process/structure dependent ways of working (people come and go and systems and approaches remain) rather than person dependent ways of working (the systems/processes come and go with people).
Build institutional memory (enduring knowledge, processes, and practices, shared thinking, and expertise) in schools and systems.
Avoid novelty for novelty’s sake.
Attention to literacy leadership development in schools and systems (instructional, transformational, and distributed approaches).
Avoid dogmatism (both Art and Science dogma) in policy and practice.
Embrace pragmatism (evidence informed, contextually appropriate, responsive, sustainable, implementable policy and practice).
Focus on a few of the most changeable and most impactful levers and let the rest go.
Schools need choice.
Less done well is more.
Just because an approach has research evidence support doesn’t mean we should implement it.
Research rarely holds space for the fragile equilibria and challenging milieu of individual schools. Research to practices is not a linear proposition.
Implementation science is as useful as the science itself. How much are we informed by it? Do we observe the stages of implementation?
There are key barriers to and facilitators of effective and lasting change in schools. Do we know what they are?
Schools must perceive changes to be acceptable, adoptable, appropriate, and feasible to attempt, to stick with them.
Systems and schools must be sure changes are able to be done well/consistently and that reaching a point of implementation sustainability is possible.
Change cost/outlay must be reasonable and sustainable within a system (don’t buy expensive things that require expensive training year on year, in perpetuity).
Schools should have support and permission to stop doing things to make way for better or more impactful approaches (knowing our priorities and what makes the most and least impact, stages of de-implementation).
Current Science of Learning and Science of Reading oriented discourse and policies in Australia are susceptible to failure unless we pay attention to all of the above.
Understand the key differences between research and reality (evidence-based practice has three core considerations, not one).
The science (research findings – read the papers, don’t rely on third hand interpretations or tall tales)
The practice (system, leader and teacher knowledge and expertise)
The context (what’s best based on where we are and who we serve)
My position
I welcome disagreement, but after several years spent working across hundreds of schools, I have settled on this position. Give schools high autonomy (run your school your way) with high accountability (demonstrate the impact of what you do, demonstrate you are teaching the most important elements of reading well). I first came across the marriage of these two (often seen as competing) concepts a few years ago, listening to Luke Sparkes (Trust Leader at Dixons Academies) speak. After reading 'Reforming Lessons', discussed below, I realise this was likely first the language of Nick Gibb and Michael Gove. In terms of high accountability, do I agree with mandates? It depends on what they are.
I agree with mandating assessment tools that allow for the early identification of reading difficulties as decoding and automatic word recognition allow students to participate in the reading world.
I agree with mandating the teaching of phonics because it’s essential to building higher level reading abilities. It’s kind of pointless mandating the assessment without mandating the curriculum, and vice versa. Do we measure what we teach? Do we teach what we measure?
What I disagree with is mandating specific curriculum programs or resources. For example, some reformers are mandating Program X for phonics/early literacy. I am almost certain approaches like this won’t work in the long-term because programs come and go, the programs they’re often choosing schools have a history of moving away from very quickly and/or modifying beyond recognition within the first three years, and when we are program/resource driven, we often fail to build collective knowledge and skill beyond the program itself.
I also disagree with mandating pedagogy. I think one of the funniest things that’s happened in Education in a while is the NSW Department of Education saying it will mandate explicit instruction, but then it was an optional online PD, but then perhaps it wasn’t. What was it? I’m still not sure. Systems can’t mandate pedagogy (read, they absolutely should not attempt to). Neither can schools. This is a fundamental misunderstanding of the roles of systems versus schools, but also of the diversity of subject areas and the teaching they require. Christine Counsell is excellent on this: We cannot apply narrow instructional approaches across domains. Even in my area of English and literacy, different elements require different approaches, from explicit instruction in spelling to dialogic pedagogy in a novel study. Schools can and should decide how they want to go about teaching domains and sub-domains, guided by evidence and context.
Mandated [required] assessment, curriculum and instruction in public systems in Australia
So, let’s talk about what’s happening now in Australia. Every state and territory (apart from Western Australia) has now adopted the Year 1 Phonics Check. Most systems are taking a position on the teaching of reading. Systems like Tasmania and Victoria have additional mandates. I’ve summarised the various positions below, but welcome additions or corrections if I have missed anything.
Some systems have developed and provided scope and sequences (of variable quality), lesson plans, recommendations for curriculum programs and resources, and recommendations for assessment/screening tools, but to my knowledge, Tasmania and Victoria are the only two states with assessment and curriculum content mandates beyond the Year 1 Phonics Check. This is important to note, because in 10-15 years, we should consider these effects if there are sigificant differences in the Year 1 Phonics Check data (both in progress and sustained shifts).
Note, Western Australia since 2023, as part of their Phonics Initiative, have 'mandated' phonics screening i.e. they state students should be identified by the middle of Year 1 if they need additional support, but there is no consistency when it comes to the tools used or the data collected, which really defeats the point. They have endorsed a range of commercial phonics programs.
The Year 1 Phonics Check: Purpose and function
There have been issues with previous methods of assessment. We have been trying to assess everything at once, and consequently, we have been missing depth and breadth of code-knowledge data. We need to assess at the word-level (and sub-word level) to ascertain phonic knowledge and blending ability and we need assessment, curriculum, instruction alignment (more closely aligned assessment of what we are teaching). Word-level instruction is best measured by word-level tools, fluency instruction is best measured by fluency tools, and comprehension instruction (on a solid foundation of word-level and fluency instruction) is best measured by comprehension tools.
The Year 1 Phonics Check acts as a screening tool telling us who is at risk/are they at risk. It also acts as a diagnostic tool, telling us what they are struggling with or why are they struggling.
It is a measure of code knowledge and word-level reading ability (their access to literacy). Students read 20 real words and 20 nonwords. Students need to score 28/40 to be at the expected level/not at risk. What we assess:
• Blending ability (phonemic awareness)
• Code knowledge (what has or hasn’t been learned – we cross check this with our phonics scope and sequence)
• While automaticity or fluency isn’t a focus, we can pay attention to decoding or word reading speed.
Decoding (word reading) problems typically become reading fluency problems, which can look like or become comprehension problems. We want to lay the optimal foundations for reading for meaning.
Where are we at?
* Note, this is state (public school) data as they are state mandates with publicly available datasets.
England has achieved an impressive growth trend across several years, showing English speaking countries what is possible with our weird and wonderful writing system. This success comes from what Nick Gibb calls “phonics first, fast and only”, but there’s a bit more to it than that. I’m not going to pretend to be an expert in what they have achieved in England, so I recommend you read Nick Gibb and Robert Peal’s new book (regardless of your stance on the English reforms), called ‘Reforming Lessons: Why English Schools Have Improved Since 2010 and How This Was Achieved’. If you want to listen to Nick Gibb having policies and approaches examined and critiqued, listen to this podcast episode, 'Did Nick Gibb get it right?'. It’s important to note England has required re-assessment of students who do not “pass” the phonics check by the end of Grade 2, and that pass rate now sits at 89%, showing catch up interventions are working for many students.
South Australia has shown what is possible, even with Covid, when it comes to improving phonic knowledge and word reading skills. They should be commended for their bravery and focus. They now need to show they can keep this focus, stay the course, and move the needle for vulnerable groups. The word on the street is that South Australia has taken their foot off the pedal in several aspects of literacy reform (my sources may be wrong or delirious and I sincerely hope their reports aren't the case). The risk is that this policy initiative in any state is a flash in the pan, and if results don’t progress the way we would like, the focus will shift. Can the results in SA improve further, perhaps to 80% like in England? Can they be maintained over time? I hope so. Let’s see.
New South Wales needs to move a lot and quickly to show they are doing anything beyond bureaucratic pontification and document publication (in my view, they are the state best known for this). It should be noted Covid and other factors interfered with a set testing window, so let’s watch the next five years for trends in the data now that is sorted.
Tasmania needs to show significant increase over the next five years, given the rollout of a phonics curriculum across the state this year. The 2026 data set will be the first cohort in the state that has had phonics instruction from the start of Prep, so this will be an important baseline to measure and build their impact from. While we would expect an increase in 2025 given the policy and practice focus, many of these Year 1 students have had only phonics instruction for the first time this year, so we are only measuring 2-3 terms of curriculum delivery and instruction rather than 6-7.
Victoria, Queensland, the Australian Capital Territory, and the Northern Territory need to establish baselines and show progress within 5 years then maintenance over the next 5-10 years. I suspect Victoria may be susprised by baseline data, given the NAPLAN gloating that goes on (in my view, we are the state best known for this). I work with a lot of rural and regional schools that have primary and secondary students really struggling with basic word reading and oral reading fluency. Our state data is inflated by the number of advantaged students we have living in cities, and this hides the inequities and struggle within our system.
How should we approach Year 1 Phonics Check data?
As much as this is what it will become in bureaucratic circles, we shouldn’t compare states or territories, as they have slightly different testing windows (time point and duration), different term lengths, different phonic code sequences, and some have state created assessments while some use the national test. We should focus on improvement within state or territory data sets over time, rather than competition across borders.
We should pay attention to the disaggregated data that will become available (SA and NSW already have this and you will be shocked to know achievement gaps look similar to NAPLAN) and support our most vulnerable students to improve.
We should not try to connect this dataset to NAPLAN. We should not use NAPLAN data to judge the impact of phonics assessment and curriculum reform. We should use Phonics Check data to judge the impact of phonics assessment and curriculum reform. We are giving students access to literacy through phonics instruction. That alone doesn't guarantee reading comprehension growth or achievement.
Before we judge schools, judge systems, and ask, did systems create the conditions for schools to succeed?
Systems should use this data to provide targeted support to individual schools and groups of schools.
Schools should use this data to plan additional supports for individuals and classes, and to monitor the overall effect of their phonics instruction over time.
We should pay attention to participation rates and think about who is NOT reflected in the data.
We should link attendance data and achievement data, given how many schools and systems are struggling to recover attendance data to pre-Covid levels. How many students have been at school most days of the week in the two years leading up to the assessment? I think we should do this for NAPLAN too, otherwise, are we assessing access or are we assessing learning?
In conclusion
All policy reforms come with merits and risks.
Does systematic phonics instruction paired with the Year 1 Phonics Check seem to increase the teaching focus and improve phonic knowledge and word reading ability for students in the early years? Yes.
It is a useful policy lever? Yes, in theory.
Will systems and schools need to maintain their focus on this forever? Yes, it will never be ‘done’.
Has any system in Australia got implementation right? Have they sustained impact? Not yet.
I do worry (a bit) that we will over-emphasise phonics. I always talk about phonics as being the most important least important thing, and I hope we can get the balance right.
What is success? What are we aiming for? We will never reach 100%, so where will systems and schools draw the line? I think for many states and territories 80% is an ambitious, but reasonable, aim, but it is important to note the enormous and sustained effort that has been required to achieve that in England. People may critique 80%, and say it should be higher, and I will say, have you consistently achieved above this in a school that you have led across many years? And of course, they will say, no, I have never done this myself. It's even harder across hundreds of schools. Case closed. Would I like to see it reach 90% in many schools? Yes. Is it feasible in a time of poorer attendance and schools being bombarded with and discombobulated by too many changes? Probably not. Victoria and Tasmania need to pay particular attention to this, to ensuring that after years of inaction they don’t self-sabotage by introducing too many policies and priorities while literacy is the apparent focus.
Reform isn’t a race. Be more tortoise and less hare.
Thought-provoking piece on reading reform and the balance between launch, mandate and deliver thanks for sharing. Also, random fashion side note The Voice S28 Reba McEntire Black Embroidered Floral Sweater would be a bold and fitting statement for anyone navigating reform and style in equal measure!
I’m honestly trying to wrap my head around what “reading reform” really means in this context. Is it about curriculum changes or more about delivery methods? Some of these programs sound ambitious but not always practical. Kinda like when you buy dedicated server space before fully planning the system — it’s all about execution, not just intent.