LEARNING to read and write are the basic skills associated with the first lessons of school.

But with only five schools in East Lancashire managing to get all their 11-year-old pupils to reach target scores in the English Key Stage Two National Curriculum tests, teaching methods have been thrown into the spotlight.

Today local education chiefs and teachers laid out their literacy strategy and insisted: "We are continuing to improve."

The Government missed its targets nationally in English with only 75 per cent of 11-year-olds reaching the required standard.

And education watchdog Ofsted said the proportion of 11-year-olds who could not read at the expected level had fallen by three percentage points over the last two years.

Part of the problem is thought to be based in the teaching of phonics -- the linking of letters to form words -- with a split in policy-makers' opinions on which is the most effective system.

One school of thought heralds synthetic phonics with an emphasis on reading and another advocates analytic phonics which help with spelling.

But Lynn Braithwaite, senior literacy consultant at Blackburn with Darwen Council, said the major aim was to implement the progression of phonics material and training across the Borough.

"The emphasis is for youngsters to have the tools themselves to read and write and not be over burdened with memorising words. The key is that we are continuing to improve," she said.

Laneshawbridge Primary School in Emmott Lane, Colne, was one of three Lancashire County Council schools to reach the 100 per cent target in literacy and was randomly selected by Ofsted to be part of a national evaluation process over three years.

Diane Smith, literacy co-ordinator, said: "I feel there is superb literacy teaching in primary level and if we have produced top results it is because we put strong foundations in place in Early Years teaching.

"There is a workable model in place now which has evolved and can produce good results."

Holy Souls RC Primary in Wilworth Crescent, Pleckgate, also achieved 100 per cent results and headteacher Christine Davies puts the success down to "investing a lot of time and effort".

She said: "We are very proud of the children and have been improving over the last few years but we use a combination of phonics teaching methods.

But Accrington Spring Hill Primary School in Exchange Street attained 40 per cent in literacy.

Headteacher Stephanie Grimshaw said: "We have a high percentage of students from ethnic minorities and for a lot of these children it is like sitting exams in a foreign language. We follow the guidelines set out but have to adapt our teaching to suit the needs of our children with additional support staff."

Martin Fisher, regional officer for the National Union of Teachers in the North West, said: "The vast majority of teachers are very much against the whole idea of testing for the purposes of league tables. What they fail to reflect is all the factors that affect school performance."