Mat Tobin, Senior Lecturer in Primary English, discusses the importance of fostering a love for reading and writing in primary education. Mat shares insights from his experiences and highlights the importance of creating a reading-friendly environment in classrooms. Through the conversation, he also presents numerous strategies for aiding young readers, such as involving parents in reading, using quality literature, and balancing phonics with comprehension. The conversation also touches on the challenges faced by teachers, the role of the Department for Education, and the need for a supportive curriculum that allows for creativity and joy in learning.
About our guests
Mat Tobin teaches English and Children's Literature in both the Primary BA and PGCE ITT courses. He also leads an MA/PGCert Course in Children's Literature and Reading for Pleasure. Since joining Brookes in 2014 after 16 years of Primary teaching in Oxfordshire, Mat is continually invited to deliver keynotes and workshops across the UK on Reading for Pleasure, Picture books and engaging children (and all stakeholders) in the reading and writing process. He is currently writing a doctorate on Children's Literature and using the outdoors: he is interested in the link between comprehension, language and locality through high-quality children's literature. In 2021 his co-written book, Understanding and Teaching Primary English, was published by Sage. Mat is also passionate about sharing the high quality work that his students do on his module. These cross-curricular plans that focus on the teacher 'knowing the text' and 'blending objectives across the curriculum' are shared publicly and well-received across the social media community.
Key takeaways
Quotes
"Books are intrinsically about culture and society and who we are and who we are not and other and self, that you just build up this relationship that you can't in any other subject." - Mat Tobin
"Books don't live in a museum, they live in our hands." – Ed Finch
"I felt that through the journal and through book talk [...] you help the child gain a sense of their own self-worth as a reader." – Mat Tobin
"I think it's important, isn't it? In that classroom [...] that there's that balance between texts you can enjoy just for the sheer pleasure and then texts you look at to understand the craft that's gone into it" - Mat Tobin
Resource recommendations
Chambers, A. (2011) Tell me: children, reading and talk: with the reading environment. Stroud, Glos.: Thimble Press.
Clements, J. and Tobin, M. (2021) Understanding & teaching primary English: theory into practice. Thousand Oaks, California: SAGE Publications.
Dolan, A. (2014) You, Me and Diversity: Picturebooks for Teaching Development and Intercultural Education. Trentham Books; Tch edition
Hacking, C. and Wyse, D. (2024) The Balancing Act: An Evidence-Based Approach to Teaching Phonics, Reading and Writing. Routledge.
Khan, S. (2024) Brave new words : how AI will revolutionize education (and why that’s a good thing). [New York, New York]: Viking, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC.
The Open University Reading for Pleasure. Teachers' Reading Groups led by volunteer leaders.
Children's Books
Goodfellow, M. (2023) The Final Year (J. Todd-Stanton, Illus.) Otter-Barry Books Limited.
Leonard, M. G. (2016) Beetle Boy. Scholastic India
Shah, V. (2022) Ajay and the Mumbai Sun. Chicken House.
Sterer, G. (2021) The Midnight Fair (M. Di Giorgio, Illus.) Candlewick.
The Reading Framework
Maine, F. (2015) Dialogic readers: children talking and thinking together about visual texts. London: Routledge. Available here.
Perkins, M. (2015) Becoming a teacher of reading. Los Angeles: SAGE.
Such, C. (2021) The art & science of teaching primary reading. Thousand Oaks, California: Corwin.
Tennent, W. et al. (2016) Guiding readers : layers of meaning : a handbook for teaching reading comprehension to 7-11-year-olds. London: UCL Institute of Education Press
What will you take away?
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