Recently released figures show Welsh reading ability falls between primary and secondary school. The results of the first standardised national reading test, introduced amid fears about deteriorating standards, have suggested that the ability of Welsh children in terms of reading shows a marked decline as pupils move higher in the school system. Whilst 8.5% of pupils in year two scored below average, by year seven (the point at which pupils enter high school) this figure rises to almost 16%.

The test is designed to allow comparisons to be made between different age groups – as opposed to assessing overall performance on a global level. As such, the methodology for the test involves standardising test scores to give a range of average scores between 85 and 115. The number of pupils falling above and below this range is then used to determine whether reading ability is improving or declining between age groups.

The largest difference in attainment is between boys and girls. Between Year Two and Year Seven, the number of boys who had a reading level below the average rose from 10% to 19% – almost doubling as a proportion.

Despite the poor results for reading ability, the difference between boys and girls, and between age groups, remained fairly stable when considering numeracy.

Whilst Welsh government officials welcomed the results as providing a good indicator of the difference in attainment between Welsh learners and their peers, and acknowledged that the figures suggested girls outperformed boys at all stages of the literacy and numeracy cycle; the teaching union NUT Cymru met the results with skepticism.

Owen Hathaway, Policy Officer for NUT Cymru, stated that standardised testing in general fails to give a true reflection of the abilities of children – a reason why the union is opposed to the system. In addition, Hathaway suggested that the content of the tests was ‘difficult to understand’ and that they had little relevance to children in Wales and the lives they lead.

The results also led Angela Burns, the shadow Education minister for Wales, to suggest that middle schools for Welsh 8-14 year olds may help to solve the decline in ability between these age groups – this is a proposal that the Welsh Conservatives have put forward.

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