Oxford’s seven-year-olds have shown marginal improvements in their reading, writing and maths but are still near the bottom of the pile.

Last year the city was worst in England for the three Rs in Key Stage One results.

This year Oxford is still worst in the country for writing with almost three out of every 10 pupils unable to use capital letters and full stops in sentences, or spell “simple, monosyllabic words” such as cat or dog. Last year only 71 per cent of children achieved the Government’s expected level, compared to 72 per cent this year.

For reading, only Stoke-on-Trent had a lesser percentage of children (77 per cent) who met the Government’s target, although Oxford posted the same results as three other areas with 78 per cent.

Maths is where the biggest improvement has come.

Last year only 82 per cent achieved the expected level, compared to 86 per cent this. Nine other areas had worse results and nine more equalled Oxford’s results.

Crucially, though, Oxford is still bottom of 16 areas judged to have the most similar demographics to the city.

The national average is 85 per cent for reading, 81 per cent for writing and 90 per cent for maths.

The breakdown has been released as Oxfordshire County Council prepares to publish its new plan to drive up standards across its schools.

The councillor responsible for school improvement, Melinda Tilley, said she was “very excited” with the initiative.

She said: “Having talked to schools, they are up for it as well, and up for helping each other within little groups. I want this to be the turning of the tide.”

She said the maths result showed improvements could be made.

Mrs Tilley said: “There is improvement in maths, but it is very small. We will be targeting our plan at all schools but it needs to start at primaries because children are arriving at secondary school without being able to write properly or read very well.”

Meanwhile, the Government has published its allocation of Pupil Premium money to Oxfordshire schools.

Pupil Premium is designed to help schools with the most challenging intake of pupils, sending £488 directly to schools for each child receiving free school meals.

This year, £1.25m has been given to schools in the Oxford East constituency, with £562,000 going to Oxford West and Abingdon.

The national fund is set to double next year to £1.25bn and increase to £2.5bn by 2014/15.

But with spending freezes in place, the Department for Education must find the cash through savings or cuts elsewhere.

Education expert Professor John Howson said: “In terms, of international comparisons, countries which make the most improvement do so not by improving the attainment of top pupils, but of those at the bottom.”

Among Oxford’s primary schools, Bayards Hill Primary will receive the most, with an extra £84,424 going into the school coffers this financial year. Forty six per cent of pupils at the Barton school receive free school meals.

Head Keith Ponsford said the money would go on specialist support for pupils, but warned it may only replace services at risk through council funding cuts.

He said: “We are already getting specialist support from the local authority, but I could not predict how long that is going to last.”

Oxford lagged well behind its sister areas in Oxfordshire. In Cherwell, 85 per cent achieved the Government standard for reading, 80 per cent for writing and 91 per cent for maths. West Oxfordshire had 89 per cent, 83 per cent and 93 per cent respectively.

In South Oxfordshire it was 90 per cent, 84 per cent and 92 per cent and in the Vale of White Horse it was 87 per cent, 82 per cent and 91 per cent.