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- abstract below
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Defining, recognising and celebrating dyslexia friendly schools- validating the kitemarking of successful schools in Wales and Liverpool

Neil MacKay

Action Dyslexia, Holywell, Flintshire info@actiondyslexia.co.uk

Abstract

Flintshire LEA and the City of Liverpool have established criteria of dyslexia friendly schools. This presentation describes the progress of the Dyslexia Friendly Schools Initiative from working with specialist teachers to establish criteria as the basis for the establishment of a national procedure and offers an action plan for further development. The case is made for a process run by LEAs and validated by an external and independent body which supports LEAs to accredit successful schools through a process of, inspection and kitemarking A key part of the process is the training programmes offered to teachers and LEA advisors. The programmes are designed to offer participants the opportunity to undertake action research aimed at improving dyslexia friendly good practice in schools and local authorities. Recommendations from the research projects range from classroom based innovations to the implementation of issues identified through a whole-school auditing procedure. These will be discussed and presented as "chalkface" solutions to perceptions of need. The presentation will identify issues, problems and solutions for schools and local education authorities and suggest a sequence of generic steps and procedures which have proved successful in Wales and Liverpool and which may transfer to the rest of the UK , Europe and beyond

Flintshire Education Authority and the City of Liverpool have established criteria of dyslexia friendly schools. This paper describes the progress of the Dyslexia Friendly Schools Initiative from working with specialist teachers to establish criteria to the establishment of a national procedure. The case is made for a process run by LEAs and validated by an external and independent body which supports LEAs to accredit successful schools through a process of, inspection and kite marking. Recommendations from the research projects range from classroom based innovations to the implementation of issues identified through a whole-school auditing procedure. These will be discussed and presented as "chalkface" solutions to perceptions of need.

The concept of "Dyslexia Friendly Schools" originated in Hawarden High School in North Wales, an 11-18 comprehensive school which hosted a specialist facility for dyslexic learners. The facility offered specialist, small group support for 5 hours each week and was recognized by the BDA as being a "flagship provision." However there was early recognition that the learners spent most of their time in mainstream classes, placing an imperative on the school to ensure that all teachers had an appropriate level of dyslexia awareness linked to knowledge of inclusive classroom strategies. As training proceeded it became obvious that the measures put in place on behalf of dyslexic learners were of benefit to all pupils in the school, and the concept of dyslexia friendly schools was born.

The working definition of dyslexia was as follows:

"Dyslexia is a specific learning difference which is constitutional in origin which, despite adequate opportunity for learning and ability appropriate skills in other areas, may cause unexpected difficulties in the acquisition of basic skills"
(MacKay 2003)

It will be obvious immediately that this definition places dyslexia within a continuum of learning styles and preferences with responsibility for effective resolution of issues falling to class and subject teachers. In particular it needs to be understood that effective dyslexia friendly schools initiatives are about whole school responsibility and whole school, classroom based responses to need - the key issue is for schools to establish procedures for teaching and learning which seek to remove dyslexia as a barrier to achievement in the mainstream classroom.

Dyslexia Friendly School to Dyslexia Friendly Education Authority

Interest in developments at school level led to activity within the education authority and which has become the model for many initiatives across the UK. Led by the author, who was working in a consultative capacity, an influential group of Special Needs Coordinators, Head Teachers and Inspectors/Advisers scrutinized various criteria of "dyslexia friendliness to establish a list of criteria which, while rigorous and challenging, also represented a goal which was achievable and which would support the achievement of whole school goals and targets.

This process of discussion and critical analysis was repeated across Wales as part of an initiative funded initially by the Welsh Dyslexia Project and then by the General Teaching Council for Wales. Groups of primary/secondary teachers, together with advisory staff, attended a series of training programmes prepared and delivered by the author. Each programme was designed to empower teachers to make a difference in the way dyslexic learners were taught in mainstream settings and focused on awareness, effective classroom strategies, alternative methods of recording and assessment etc. Each group also worked on the criteria to hone and polish the wording. A particular feature of the training was the funding for each teacher to spend two days off timetable to pursue a small scale action research project either in school or with a cluster of schools. This funding has resulted in a number of innovative ideas including classroom checklists, the use of reading comprehension scores as a trigger for intervention, whole class spelling strategies based on multi-sensory good practice and dyslexia friendly primary secondary liaison strategies. Many of these ideas are posted on the Welsh Dyslexia Project's website.

While most, if not all, successful schemes across the UK have followed this basic principle of empowering teachers to interact with the criteria in order to reflect local needs and special circumstances it is fascinating to observe the degree of convergence among the schemes. This finding seems to confer a degree of external validation from an action research perspective.

Becoming a Dyslexia Friendly Education Authority

Discussions in Wales made it clear that schools would appreciate recognition for their efforts to become dyslexia friendly and the notion of a "kite mark" award was embraced. It was felt that successful schools should have the right to a special "letterhead logo" to recognize their achievements with regard to inclusive good practice on behalf of dyslexic pupils. However it raised the issue of accreditation, monitoring and evaluation. At this point the focus of development moved out of Wales and in to England. Working with the author, a number of Education Authorities embraced the criteria and began to develop procedures to confer dyslexia friendly status on successful schools. Two schemes, in Liverpool and Staffordshire, have been particularly successful and are forming part of the model for a UK wide initiative now being coordinated by the British Dyslexia Association. The challenge within an LEA was to ensure that a dyslexia friendly school in one part of the authority would be the same in another and the criteria developed in Wales were found to be ideal for the purpose. These criteria formed the basis for an accreditation process through which the performance of individual schools could be standardized, measures and assessed with confidence and rigor.

Both schemes place a major emphasis on the importance of training, with Liverpool committing itself to the provision of a centrally funded training day for every school in the city. Although this has been a huge investment of resources, the benefits of all teachers in a school receiving the same message in a dedicated training event has been significant and is already yielding whole school gains. The training day, delivered by the author, is supported by a handbook for each teacher which supports the development of dyslexia awareness and lists pragmatic classroom strategies to common learning issues.

The format of the day is as follows:

• Dyslexia awareness - identifying and responding to the "unexpected difficulties
• Responding to diverse learning needs- establishing dyslexia friendly "house style" as the most effective response to the common range of special learning needs in the mainstream classroom
• Accelerating the learning - removing dyslexia as a barrier to achievement by utilizing learning styles and preferences
• Dyslexia friendly strategies for:

1. Marking and assessment
2. Presenting work in different forms
3. Information processing
4. Revision techniques
5. Learning how to learn
6. Retting ideas down on paper
7. Organizing thoughts using mind maps

For example, strategies are suggested to respond to a learner who has problems with finding labels or whose quality of writing rarely matches the quality of idea expressed orally. Although these issues are covered during the training day, the handbook is there as a reference source in the classroom. Staffordshire have also invested heavily in training and produced excellent support materials.

Recognising, supporting and accrediting Dyslexia Friendly Schools

In Liverpool, the Level 1 criteria listed below are used as the basis for school self evaluation and review

LIVERPOOL DYSLEXIA FRIENDLY SCHOOLS INITIATIVE (DRAFT)

Level 1 - Master Checklist

"ACTION" CHECKLIST

AUDIT CHECKLIST

DYSLEXIA FRIENDLY SCHOOLS INITIATIVE (DRAFT)

Level 2 - Master Checklist - Kitemark Level

"ACTION" CHECKLIST

AUDIT CHECKLIST

DYSLEXIA FRIENDLY SCHOOLS ACCREDITATION - A 2 Stage Approach (Draft Proposal)

Stage 1 (Foundation Level)

1. Completion of an audit
2. Preparation of an action plan
3. Action plan scrutinised centrally
4. Successful schools presented with certificate - press picture?

Stage 2 (Flagship Level)

1. Compilation of evidence against DFS criteria
2. Inspection visit to scrutinise evidence
3. Inspection visit to include interviews with:

• Pupils
• Parents
• Governors

4. Successful schools to receive kitemark for letterhead and additional certificate. Also big press event?

At Level 1 the Liverpool scheme invites schools to engage in self review and audit their position in relation to the criteria. An action plan is then submitted to the inclusion team, who audit and either confer Level one status or support the school to address identified issues. Level 2 status confers the kite mark and requires schools to be inspected by a trained team.

The way forward

There is ongoing discussion about the appropriateness of some of the criteria, a particularly controversial one being the requirement for a "trained teacher or teacher in training". Although this is a sticking point for some Education Authorities it is interesting to reflect that this criterion was inserted by Special Needs Coordinators because they believed it to be essential. Much debate continues regarding the definition of a trained teacher- the dyslexia friendly schools initiative requires a paradigm shift from teaching groups of dyslexic pupils to teaching mainstream classes containing groups of dyslexics, a shift which may not be reflected in many of the current ATS courses.

The strength of the initiative is that it has been and continues to be driven by schools and Education Authorities who have perceived that it is more effective to meet the needs of dyslexic learners in the mainstream classroom. The opportunity costs of these initiatives are already showing positive benefits, with LEAs reporting improvements in classroom and exam performance, attendance and parental confidence, with a corresponding reduction in tribunals, exclusions and appeals. Indeed there is anecdotal evidence of significant improvements in behaviour when a school embraces dyslexia friendly good practice - a member of the Behaviour Support Team in Flintshire reports that the only secondary school in which she is not working with dyslexic learners is the one which has received the Kitemark from the Education Authority.

Under the coordinating umbrella of the British Dyslexia Association there is now significant progress towards a national programme which empowers Education Authorities to continue their work at a local leave while receiving national recognition for the achievements of their schools. It is gratifying to reflect that an initiative that started very much a local level is now on course to remove dyslexia as a barrier to achievement in the mainstream classroom.

Disclaimer: all the abstracts presented here have satisfied the academic committee as appropriate for presentation at an international conference. However, the material reflects the views of the authors, not necessarily those of the academic committee or the BDA. No endorsement of any approach, product or service is intended or implied.

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