Free decoding and encoding resource for primary teachers

The research case for structured, levelled texts for struggling readers and ESOL students aged 8–12

This free white paper by Dr Christine Braid sets out the research foundations behind the Story Seekers literacy series and the evidence for its use with students reading below year level or learning English as an additional language.

Drawing on the Simple View of Reading, the paper covers how the series controls for readability, vocabulary demand and sentence complexity to support genuine reading progress, not just access to simpler text. It makes a clear, research-grounded case for why developing readers need the right texts, and how Story Seekers provides them.

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Ages: 8-12 | Pages: 9 | Code: SSWP1

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Helen Walls

Dr Helen Walls is a professional learning facilitator and educational researcher, with 20 years’ experience working in schools. She is committed to raising achievement in writing by sharing evidence-based, practical methods to engage every student. Helen is managing director of The Writing Teacher, a consultancy that provides writing workshops and resources for teachers, all accessible online. She is also a member of the Massey University school support team. For her PhD thesis, Helen conducted two empirical studies into the teaching of writing, which included a trial of the Fast Feedback Formative Evaluation System outlined in this book. She has published with The Australian Journal of Learning Difficulties and The Education Hub.

Christine Braid

Dr Christine Braid has 40 years’ experience as an educator, including 12 years as a classroom teacher and 25 years as a teacher educator with a focus on literacy teaching. In her academic studies, she has specialised in literacy: she has a Diploma of Children’s Literature, her MEd thesis looked at using picture books for developing comprehension discussion with older primary students and her PhD examined the influence of teacher knowledge and practice on literacy outcomes for new primary students. Combining her practical and her experience, Christine works with teachers to promote systematic and explicit teaching and to provide opportunities for incidental learning. Christine has a particular enthusiasm for finding ways to inspire teachers and children using books.