How to Spend Your Pupil Premium on Reading: A 2026 Guide for Primary Leaders

Pupil premium can be spent on reading and books, and when it's done well it's one of the most defensible uses of the grant a primary leader can make. The Department for Education requires schools to spend pupil premium on evidence-informed activities set out in its menu of approaches, and reading sits comfortably across all three tiers of that menu [1].

The Money, Checked and Current

For the 2026 to 2027 financial year, primary schools receive £1,550 for every pupil eligible for free school meals or who has been in the past six years, known as Ever 6 FSM [1][4]. Pupils previously looked after by a local authority attract £2,690, and this funding is often managed in consultation with the child's Virtual School Head [1][5]. These rates changed from the 2025 to 2026 financial year, when the FSM rate was £1,515 and the post-looked-after rate was £2,630, so it's worth re-checking the current figures each time a strategy statement is written or refreshed, because citing an out-of-date figure undermines an otherwise strong plan [1].

Service pupil premium, for children of armed forces families, is a separate £350 per eligible pupil from April 2026 and sits outside the same evidence-informed spending requirement [1][4]. It's easy to conflate the three funding streams in a strategy statement, so keeping them distinct from the start avoids a common accuracy slip.

Where Reading Fits in the Three-Tier Model

The DfE's menu of approaches aligns with the tiered spending model used across the sector, which asks schools to balance investment across high-quality teaching, targeted academic support, and approaches to tackle wider barriers to learning such as attendance and wellbeing [1]. Reading touches all three tiers at once. Whole-class reading for pleasure and reading comprehension strategies build the first tier, targeted small-group or one-to-one reading intervention builds the second, and books that reflect a child's identity and circumstances can address the third by removing barriers to engagement.

The Education Endowment Foundation's evidence on reading comprehension strategies, such as self-questioning, clarifying, summarising and making inferences, shows an average impact of six months' additional progress over a year, at very low cost, which makes it an efficient use of a stretched budget [2]. The evidence also shows that pupils eligible for free school meals may see additional benefit from being taught these strategies explicitly, although the UK evidence base is less extensive than the global average [2]. The EEF's guidance on improving literacy at Key Stage 2 recommends developing both the language comprehension and word-reading skills pupils need to read fluently, rather than treating reading progress as finished once phonics is secure [3]. This matters for pupil premium planning because disadvantaged pupils are more likely to plateau after the early years if fluency and comprehension aren't deliberately sustained.

What Ofsted and Governors Actually Want to See

Ofsted inspectors may discuss a school's pupil premium plans during inspection, and governors are expected to scrutinise the strategy statement each year, so vague spending on "new books for the library" rarely holds up under questioning [1]. A defensible reading spend links a specific approach to specific evidence, states which pupils it targets, and sets out how impact will be measured, whether that's reading age data, engagement surveys, or borrowing rates. High-attaining disadvantaged pupils deserve the same attention as those working below age-related expectations, since evidence shows they are more likely than non-disadvantaged peers to fall behind by key stage 4 [1].

A Quick Self-Check for This Term

Before finalising your next pupil premium strategy statement, it's worth testing your reading spend against three simple questions:

• Does it name an evidence source, such as the EEF toolkit, rather than relying on instinct alone?

• Does it identify which pupils benefit and how progress will be tracked?

• Does it distinguish clearly between FSM-linked pupil premium and any post-looked-after funding, given the different rates and accountability routes [1][4]?

If any answer is unclear, that's usually the gap worth closing first.

Building the Case With the Right Books

Evidence-informed spending isn't only about intervention programmes. Curated, well-matched class sets and targeted reading packs can support both the teaching and engagement tiers of this model, particularly when they're chosen to reflect the pupils reading them. This is where a structured audit helps leaders see, in one view, where their current reading offer is strong and where the pupil premium spend would make the most difference.

A pupil premium reading spend holds up best when it's backed by evidence and easy to explain in one sentence. HEC's Reading Equity Scorecard gives primary leaders a clear, evidence-based snapshot of where their pupil premium reading strategy stands, and what to prioritise next.

References

1. GOV.UK. Pupil premium: overview [Internet]. London: Department for Education; 2026 [cited 2026 Jul 21]. Available from: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/pupil-premium/pupil-premium 

2. Education Endowment Foundation. Reading comprehension strategies. Teaching and Learning Toolkit [Internet]. London: EEF; 2025 [cited 2026 Jul 21]. Available from: https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/education-evidence/teaching-learning-toolkit/reading-comprehension-strategies 

3. Education Endowment Foundation. Improving literacy in Key Stage 2. 2nd ed. Guidance Report [Internet]. London: EEF [cited 2026 Jul 21]. Available from: https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/education-evidence/guidance-reports/literacy-ks2 

4. CBICT. Pupil premium funding rates 2026/27 [Internet]. 2026 [cited 2026 Jul 21]. Available from: https://www.cbict.org.uk/pupil-premium 

5. Virtual School Kent. Pupil premium for previously looked after children [Internet]. Kent County Council [cited 2026 Jul 21]. Available from: https://virtualschool.lea.kent.sch.uk/vskat/previously-looked-after-children/pupil-premium-for-previously-looked-after-children/