About Us

Our mission is to ensure that all pupils leave secondary school reading well. We support schools with training, resources and lesson design, so that pupils who were struggling with their reading catch up quickly and completely.

Thinking Reading is a whole-school strategy with an intensive, one-to-one intervention at its heart. Our practice is built upon the synthesis of well-evidenced teaching methods with decades of research evidence to support them. In addition to consulting with school leaders and training to build teachers’ knowledge, we publish the resources needed for this intensive teaching, along with a 10-part lesson plan that ensures individualisation of each precise step in a clear, easy-to-use format.

We use our extensive experience in literacy, teacher development and leadership to help schools develop coherent literacy strategies with maximum impact. We also provide ongoing advice and guidance to schools in order to help solve specific learning or teaching issues, to maximise progress, and to link teachers and tutors in a professional community.

MISSION

We work with schools to eradicate adolescent illiteracy so that no student leaves school unable to read well.

VISION

All schools have the means and commitment to ensure that all students, regardless of background, can read fluently.

VALUES

Commitment – we work to ensure that literacy is the highest priority in education.

Excellence – we strive for the best results through the best methods.

Integrity – we are committed to honest, transparent relationships and accurate objective use of data.

Knowledge – accumulated scientific knowledge is the basis of excellent practice.

Partnership – we work collaboratively with partner schools, as part of a wider movement, to achieve our mission.

researchED Guide to Literacy

James Murphy edits an international cast of contributors as they bring their knowledge and experience to bear in a discussion of literacy that covers: how we learn to read; myths and misconceptions; assessment; identifying and helping those with difficulties; spelling; the explicit teaching of vocabulary; and teaching writing skills. This book also includes a chapter by Dianne Murphy on effective secondary school literacy intervention.

Thinking Reading — What every secondary teacher needs to know about reading

This book is a short, accessible introduction to reading for secondary school teachers. Dianne and James Murphy argue that those students with the most serious learning problems deserve to be taught by teachers with the highest levels of pedagogical skills. They also explain how, despite the firm conclusions of reading science, popular myths and misconceptions about reading have led to systemic failure in education systems across the English-speaking world — and what can be done to turn this situation around.

What Does This Look Like in the Classroom?

Making sense out of the wealth of educational research, and relating it to the realities of the classroom, is the core purpose of this book. A mix of leading academics and practitioners discuss how we should apply these findings in the realms of behaviour, technology, psychology and memory, SEN, literacy and classroom discourse. Dianne Murphy contributes her expertise in the area of secondary school literacy and intervention.