EEF publishes independent evaluation of Read, Write, Inc. Phonics and Fresh Start

Read Write Inc. Phonics is for children in Reception – Year 4 (ages four to nine) and begins with 20-minute daily lessons in the first term of Reception, building up to an hour a day for children in Year 1 and above.

Fresh Start is a catch-up programme for children in Years 5 – 8 (ages nine to 13) who have been identified as below their expected reading age. In this trial, it consisted of daily one-hour lessons for 33 weeks, in place of or in addition to regular English lessons. 

Both programmes start with the systematic teaching of phonics, before moving on to improving reading fluency and comprehension.

There is a large body of evidence, including in the Teaching and Learning Toolkit, that suggests that systematic synthetic phonics approaches have a positive impact on the development of early reading skills. Because of this, the EEF has funded several evaluations of different phonics programmes, including this randomised controlled trial of Read Write Inc. Phonics and Fresh Start.