Pilot Evaluation of Pathways Literacy
Client: Education Endowment Foundation
Duration: 2025 – 2026
Geography: England
Solutions: Evaluation, Research, Measurement
Writing involves multiple components – transcription, text generation, and executive functions – that pupils must master and coordinate. However, the evidence base around writing-specific interventions is limited. Understanding what works in supporting primary school pupils’ writing is particularly important: performance in writing lags behind other subjects, notably science, while in 2022, only 69% of all children left primary school having met the expected standard in writing, compared to 78% in 2019. Moreover, the gap in literacy attainment grows substantially throughout primary school for disadvantaged pupils, with pupils making less progress than their peers in both reading and writing. Supporting socially disadvantaged pupils through writing-specific programmes such as Pathways Literacy is therefore critical to closing the attainment gap between them and their peers.
The Pathways Literacy programme, developed and delivered by The Literacy Company, is designed to enhance the writing skills and fluency of Year 3 pupils (aged 7 and 8) in England through a combined approach of whole-class teaching (Pathway2Write) and targeted intervention (Pathway2Progress). The programme uses a mastery-based approach to ensure all pupils gain a deeper understanding of writing concepts, with additional support tailored for children who need it most.
Oxford MeasurEd is evaluating a pilot of Pathways Literacy. The evaluation will determine if the programme has the potential for future success, can be effectively implemented, and is suitable for a rigorous impact evaluation. Insights gained will deepen the understanding of how the programme works, its potential outcomes, and the measures needed to evaluate its impact accurately.
The evaluation report will be published at the end of 2026.
Key Activities:
Desk-based review to understand the theory underpinning the programme and identify potential outcomes measures that could be used to evaluate impact.
Qualitative research with the delivery team, school staff and Year 3 pupils to explore feasibility and evidence of promise.
Surveys of school staff to evaluate feasibility and evidence of promise.
Developing a questionnaire that could be used to measure pupil attitudes to writing, including confidence to write, desire to write, and pupils’ perceptions of their writing fluency and writing stamina.
Synthesis of evidence against success criteria to assess whether the intervention is ready to progress to an efficacy trial.
