The statistics show that 30 per cent of the pupils who did not meet the expected standard in phonics by the end of Year 2 in 2014 went on to reach the expected standard in reading at the end of Year 6 this year, with 4 per cent achieving a high score.
But of the children who reached the phonics standard at the end of Year 1 in 2014, 88 per cent went on to reach the expected standard in reading by the end of Year 6 in 2018, with 37 per cent getting a high score, while 11 per cent failed to reach the Year 6 standard. (Percentages are rounded and do not always add up to 100.)
Of those children who failed the phonics test in Year 1, but went on to pass the resit in Year 2, 62 per cent reached the reading standard at the end of Year 6 and 36 per cent failed to do so; 1 per cent were also working below the standard of the test – meaning they did not have to take it.
And of those children who did not reach the phonics standard by the end of Year 2, 30 per cent did go on to pass the reading test at age 11, but half failed to do so; 19 per cent were deemed to be working below the standard of the test.
The statistics also reveal that in 2017, 88 per cent of pupils who reached the phonics standard at the end of Year 1 reached the expected standard in reading at the end of Year 6.
Slightly more of pupils who failed the phonics check at the end of Year 1 or 2 went on to reach the reading standard in 2017 than did so in 2018 – with 64 per cent of pupils who failed the phonics test in Year 1, but passed in Year 2, going on to get the reading test in 2017 and 31 per cent of pupils who failed the phonics standard at the end of Year 2 doing so.
Main Findings:
- In 2018, 64% of pupils reached the expected standard in all of reading, writing and maths. Attainment in reading, writing and maths (combined) is not directly comparable to previous years because of changes to writing teacher assessment (TA) frameworks. In 2017, 61% of pupils reached the expected standard compared to 53% in 2016.
- The gap between disadvantaged pupils and others, measured using the disadvantage gap index, has decreased in each of the last seven years, narrowing by 3% in the latest year and 13.2% since 2011.
- 88% of pupils who met the phonics standard in year 1 attained the expected standard in reading at the end key stage 2. Of pupils who met the expected standard in phonics by the end of year 2 (but not in year 1), 62% went on to meet the expected standard. Of those pupils who did not reach the expected standard by the end of year 2, 30% met the expected standard.
- At key stage 2 in MATs, progress was higher in writing and maths than in reading. In 2018, 25% of MATs had progress scores above or well above the national average in reading, compared with 32% in writing and 30% in maths.
- There were 25% of MATs with progress scores below or well below average in reading, compared with 18% in writing and 24% in maths.
- Pupils in MATs make most progress in writing and least progress in reading. This was also the case in 2017.