Oral question asked in the House of Commons, by Michael Tomlinson (Conservative). It was answered on Monday, 29 January 2018 on behalf of the Department for Education.

Literacy and Numeracy

Question: I am grateful for that answer. Thanks to some tough decisions by the Minister and sheer hard work by our teachers, reading standards are the highest for a generation. Sadly, disadvantaged children still lag behind, so what are he and the Department doing to address that issue?

Answer: The PIRLS survey links strong performance in the phonics check with high scores in the PIRLS text . Particularly pleasing is the fact that our rise in the global rankings has been driven by improved performance by low-ability pupils. We are now focusing on strengthening the maths, reading and writing elements of the early years foundation stage to help prepare children for year 1 of primary school. The attainment gap has closed by 10.5% at key stage 2, but we want to go further and close the gap altogether.

Secondary information