A fifth of all children in England, and close to a third of disadvantaged children, are unable to read well when they leave primary school. This prevents them from achieving their potential in secondary school, and beyond, and creates obstacles to a fairer society.
Read On. Get On. was launched in 2014 by a coalition of charities and education organisations committed to improving reading levels in the UK. The goal is to get all children reading well by the age of 11 by 2025, with an interim goal that all children will be achieving good levels of language, early literacy and reading development by the age of five, by 2020.
In April 2015, we were delighted to receive cross-party support for Read On. Get On’s 2025 goal, demonstrating the commitment of the three main parties to address the challenge of children’s literacy. The Fair Education Alliance and the National Literacy Forum also adopted the ROGO goals, working closely together.
In November 2016, we launched our strategy to get all children reading well by the age of 11. The strategy outlines ten steps to reach the ROGO goal of getting all children reading well by the end of primary school by 2025.
It emphasises that the vital importance of teaching phonics and comprehension in schools needs to be complemented by approaches that help every child to engage with and develop a love of reading. The strategy also builds on the expertise of teachers and the strengths of settings, schools, libraries and the third sector.
The ROGO coalition is currently working with the government and researchers to create a consistent national measure of children’s reading to reflect both cognitive skills and affective processes and will release a report on this in late 2017.
You can download Read On. Get On.: A strategy to get England’s children reading, along with a background literature review which supported the development of the strategy by clicking on the links on the right-hand side of the page.
The National Literacy Trust currently holds the secretariat of the campaign. If you have any questions about the campaign, email email@example.com.