Rebecca Shore

I have nearly 25 years of experience as a teacher (teaching across the entire primary ages) and in recent times work with teachers and schools to implement Reading Recovery and school improvement with literacy.

As a successful and ambitious class teacher in a challenging heart of Portsmouth school (where I taught every year group from Year 1 – 6) I developed from an NQT to leading English and being a member of the SLT within 9 years. I was also year leader for Year 2 and Year 6 with the responsibility for the accurate administration of key stage SATs and was involved with school and city moderation. In 2009 I became the Reading Recovery Teacher Leader & Every Child a Reader (ECAR) Adviser for Portsmouth City Council School Improvement Service.

While I trained as a Teacher Leader and completed my MA in Literacy Learning and Literacy Difficulties, I implemented the Reading Recovery programme in Portsmouth by recruiting schools, training teachers and creating a brand new training space with one-way mirror. In the initial years of ECAR I trained teachers across Portsmouth and the Isle of Wight – developing their CPD, monitoring outcomes with data collection, school visits and continued CPD. In 2012 I took on the role of the Teacher Leader (TL) for Hampshire LA while their TL was on long term absence and recruited new schools to Reading Recovery across Hampshire by hosting a county-wide Head teacher event. During this time I also extended the ECAR offer across Portsmouth and Hampshire via a new Traded Service and service level agreements (SLA).

The ECAR traded service offer included a range of literacy support and training which schools could commission. Since 2019 I have increased my support to include schools across the south coast including support to Brighton and Hove School Improvement Service and to schools in East Sussex to ensure the accreditation and continued CPD for Reading Recovery teachers and to extend the ECAR offer to further schools. I currently work alongside Brighton and Hove LA to provide their ECAR/ Closing the Gap strategic plan. In September 2024 I added the Bristol group of Reading Recovery to my portfolio.

As an ECAR Adviser, I have experience in delivering training a wide range of ECAR trademarked evidence-based literacy interventions which are researched and have a significant impact on pupil progress. As an accredited Reading Recovery Teacher Leader I am affiliated to the Institute of Education (IoE), University of London. I work alongside Reading Recovery Europe at the IoE which keeps me up to date with research and current literacy theories. I attend 5 CPD days a year at the IoE alongside the national trainers and in addition to this I attend regular research webinars. The work of a Reading Recovery teacher leader is varied, challenging and deeply rewarding. I work closely with teachers, helping them to grow professionally, as they develop a new and deeper understanding of literacy teaching and learning. I work with children, seeing their life chances change as they move from being non-readers to confident and enthusiastic learners. As a Teacher Leader, I work with schools, helping them to change expectations and outcomes for their most disadvantaged pupils and offer advice and guidance, enabling schools to adjust the implementation to local needs to get the best outcomes for children.

It was as a result of my role as a Reading Recovery Teacher Leader that I also gained the accredited trainer status for a range of other literacy programmes, including: Boosting Reading @Primary/Secondary, Fischer Family Trust Wave 3, Hi-Five Literacy, Write Away Together, Inference Training and Talking Partners. I work with schools to identify gaps in attainment and then offer guidance to the programme which would best suit their needs and the resources they have available. I provide high quality CPD for Headteachers, class teachers, teaching assistants, parents and other school stakeholders to ensure they are able to provide high quality intervention and I also offer bespoke literacy professional development.

I became the national trainer for Boosting Reading @Primary and Boosting Reading @Secondary Reading Support (educationworks.org.uk) in 2020. Since 2020 I have led many training sessions across not only the UK but also remotely via Zoom and Teams to schools internationally.

In 2011, I completed my MA in Literacy Learning and Literacy Difficulties. My report looked at how pupils with English as an Additional Language progress in reading/writing and how to support pupils with language barriers to make progress in literacy learning across the curriculum. My interest in how EAL pupils learn directly filtered into my work with Portsmouth Ethnic Minority Achievement Service (EMAS) who I worked alongside at Portsmouth City Council to provide additional capacity to their team. In this role I provided professional development training and school visits to EAL learners to complete assessments and support to schools and teachers. I also provided training to the bilingual assistants in the EMAS team on early reading and safeguarding training for EAL learners.

Despite my varied roles, I continue to teach and work with children with literacy difficulties in order to put my knowledge and passion for literacy into practise. Teaching children in Reading Recovery allows me to continually develop my experience of the wide-ranging nature of children's difficulties, building upon my knowledge and expertise. It enables me to solve children's diverse problems and support teachers who are working with the very hardest to teach by drawing on my own teaching of individual children and I find it a crucial and useful tool in order to provide honest reflective anecdotes when working with others who work with children with similar needs.

Since 2014 I have worked with Portsmouth Primary SCITT as their English Lead Trainer. I was also the trainer for Hamwic SCITT from 2018-2024. I work with up to 30 trainees a year to provide quality training in English, especially ensuring their phonics and early reading knowledge is secure for school placements and future employment. I was recently involved in Portsmouth SCITT's Ofsted and was interviewed for English with a deep dive into reading. I am thrilled and proud to share that the outcome for Portsmouth SCITT was a grade of ‘Outstanding' and the report states, “All trainees reach a sophisticated level in their understanding of the principles of early reading. They all learn to teach systematic synthetic phonics with impressive conviction through the different schemes in their placement schools.”

In September 2019, following my redundancy from Portsmouth City Council, I joined Thinking Schools Academy Trust (Multi-Academy Trust) to work at New Horizons Primary School (which was Meredith Infant and Isambard Junior Schools at the time and merged as a primary in September 2020). I joined the school to continued my work with ECAR and to ensure continued Reading Recovery support and accreditation to all my ECAR schools. In addition, I joined the school to Lead a Reading Team of one Reading Recovery Teacher and 4 teaching assistants to implement reading support across the school. Since September 2022 I have been part of the school's senior leadership team and been the school's Reading Lead. Over the past 2 years I have been driving the school's improvement plan which includes improving outcomes in reading. I have implemented a new systematic phonics programme across the school and been in charge of training, implementation and monitoring of phonics across early years and key stage one as well as intervention across key stage two. In just 6 months of the implementation of the new phonics programme we saw a rise of 10% in the year one phonics check outcome. I am also working with key stage two staff on the introduction of a new reading curriculum which will inspire a love of reading. I recently secured funding to open a new school library which will be used for family learning as well as a valued reading space for the pupils. I joined up with the National Literacy Trust to take part in the ‘World of Stories' project which secured the school 600 free books to boost the library and which meant we were able to participate in free author events.

In July 2023, my school had a visit from Ofsted for a section 5 inspection which I took a significant part in and completed the deep dive into reading. The Ofsted outcome was ‘good' in all areas and my swift work to improve standards in reading was recognised, “Leaders' mantra of ‘learning to read, to read to learn' is embedding across the whole school, and more children are now secure with phonics.' ‘Leaders have prioritised the teaching of reading. Teachers begin this work as soon as children join the school. Staff quickly create a love of stories and books that continues through the school.'

In September 2023 I became the TSAT Trust Lead Practitioner for Reading. As a Leading Practitioner I support the trust's schools in realising their educational improvement aims and works with schools to provide guidance and challenge to achieve those aims. I have worked with schools across the Portsmouth region but am also available to travel to school across our Kent and Devon hubs when needed. This year has offered an exciting opportunity to work with the feeder secondary school and I have enjoyed the challenge of familiarising myself with the KS3/4 curriculum. I am currently implementing a literacy plan to improve reading outcomes in Year 7/8 to target low reading outcomes and change life chances for students starting secondary school with a reading age below 9 years old. I am involved in work to improve transition from key stage 2 to 3 by using the Year 6 Big City Read as a vehicle to support the move from primary to secondary learning.

Last year I completed my BASIC Coaching training and I have qualified as a coach using the BASIC approach. I have been using the BASIC coaching method to develop my role as a literacy adviser and lead practitioner and to implement school improvement with colleagues at my school. I find the method useful in not only supporting staff development but also in lesson observation and monitoring situations so the observed person feels more open to feedback and through coached conversations is able to takes ownership for their next steps.

I hope this demonstrates my varied experience as a school leader and my extensive experience of working in Teacher Training. Although a lot of my work has involved reading and writing (literacy skills) these are transferable skills for implementing challenge, change and the best outcomes for learners.

• My love for art and design has not left me. I still enjoy painting and glass painting. I have also just rediscovered the joys of crochet.