Revealed: academy trust has taken almost all the schools income from one of England’s most successful phonics products, while LA partner primary received virtually nothing
Image: iStock/Getty Images.
Little Wandle appears to have handed the overwhelming share of schools income to the Wandle Learning Trust, whose work with it has been headed by a male headteacher. Meanwhile, the local authority primary school after which it also takes its name, which was led by a female headteacher, has received virtually nothing.
A local authority primary school, which contributed one half of the name to one of England’s most successful phonics programmes, has earned virtually nothing from the product, Education Uncovered can reveal.
The lack of revenue for Little Sutton primary, in Sutton Coldfield, Birmingham, comes despite the academy chain which makes up the other half of the product’s name, the Wandle Learning Trust, having received more than £12 million in income in three years from it.
The revelation, following a freedom of information request by this website, raises fresh questions about income generated by the product Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised (LWLSR), which operates in thousands of primary schools.
To continue reading this article…
You'll need to register with EDUCATION UNCOVERED. Registration is free and gives you access to one article per month. But please consider a subscription which will give you full access to all the news articles and analysis on the website. As a subscriber you'll also be able to comment on each news article. as well as support our journalism and extend the reach of the site.
By Warwick Mansell for EDUCATION UNCOVERED
Published: 8 September 2025
Comments
Submitting a comment is only available to subscribers.
Thank you for this. You have written over several years about the commercial relationships between education authorities (including academies) and authors and publishers of phonics materials. These relationships are the more disturbing in view of the limited validity of the product. Dominic Wyse and Charlotte Hacking’s recent book “The Balancing Act” is an excellent review of the history of phonics in education. Tim Shortis shows in the current issue in English in Education that Wyse and Hacking restore attention to the social and linguistic complexity of literacy learning. Shortis praises the authors’ courage in confronting the commercially influenced orthodoxy of synthetic phonics, and their effort to reclaim the teaching and learning of reading as complex, social and personal. (English in Education, 59(3), 206–218.)