These include the Rotary Club Youth Speaks competition (now Youth Debate) with years 7-9 and the English Speaking Union public speaking competition for years 10-11. To support this, I have added free resources to my blog to run alongside the book – making it more user friendly.

Detailing the impact of a language gap when moving from Primary to Secondary school and the effects of school shutdowns on vocabulary.NEW REPORT: Download our newest report, How Schools are Closing the Word Gap: The Oxford Language Report 2021-22 for a series of case studies from teachers packed with ideas and suggestions for narrowing the Word Gap. If we know what words are in daily use, we can help our students improve their speech with the academic vocabulary that sets them apart for success beyond the school gates. I live in a place with the highest illiteracy rates of the country and I was still so surprised in the 'vocabulary gap'. We could never reduce the knowledge and understanding required for academic tasks to an annual word list. It’s one which I’ve been recommended to read for a while I’m pleased to say I finally got round to it!

It is convincing, compelling and challenging - the ultimate required response is to plan a whole vocabulary curriculum. The widening academic achievement gap between the rich and the poor: New evidence and possible explanations” in R.CTVG – 7 Strategies for Exploring Unfamiliar Vocabulary’– this is a companion resource to the SEEC model, offering accessible strategies to Explore an unfamiliar word. It is a truth universally acknowledged, that vocabulary knowledge is crucial for pupils’ school success.

Building on my predecessor’s legacy, I continued to deliver a ‘word-of-the-week’ to tutors during weekly staff meetings though not always convinced these were passed on to the student cohort. The word gap – or vocabulary gap as it is also known – is having an enormous impact on our students’ futures. Perhaps unsurprisingly, those students who have been successful in Rotary Club, ESU or in-house public speaking competitions in the past have all gone on to be selected for the Senior Students prefect team. The Common Core State Standards, with their deliberate emphasis on vocabulary in varied contexts, are an encouraging step toward acknowledging the value of vocabulary proficiency, and the national discussion around the importance of vocabulary across the curriculum is beginning to feel like a groundswell. Vocabulary knowledge is knowledge; the knowledge of a word not only implies a definition, but also implies how that word fits into the world.

I'm inclined to think there's a middle ground between "shelter vocabulary" and "learn lists of All the Words!