Reading Intent

Reading has a high profile and is a high priority in our school.  We know from research that good reading skills are critical to learning beyond Primary School, opening a world of imagination and being able to engage as adult in society. We aim for children to have a love of reading and enjoy reading a book as a self-chosen activity.  

Aims

• To develop the necessary reading skills, strategies and knowledge to equip each child for life as a reader.

• To foster a love of books and to encourage reading for enjoyment as well and information.
• To provide an environment in which reading is known to have purpose and meaning.
• To develop the partnership between home and school in order to support each child’s reading development
• To give equal opportunities to all children

Implementation

Teachers select engaging, diverse texts with rich vocabulary for reading lessons.  Carefully chosen texts form the basis of many of the writing units to inspire, give purpose and experience different text types.  Children engage in comprehension lessons each week to ensure that they have a well rounded understanding of the texts that they learn.  These sessions are known as 'VIPERS' where pupils discussion, question and work on comprehension activities relating to Vocabulary, Inference, Prediction, Explanation and Sequencing which are the key skills of comprehending a text.

We have linked texts in other subject topics to help children understand the importance of reading in all subjects and how authors write in different genre's such as books with a historic storyline.

Our school has a well resourced library with books representing our diverse school and UK community. Children and their families can visit our school library and borrow books to support reading for pleasure and learning at home.  In addition to their phonic reading books, children are also able to self select reading for pleasure books from a wide range of books suitable for their current stage of reading skill.

In addition to our school library, every classroom has a wide range of high-quality books in a reading corner which children can enjoy.  We have a reading shed on the playground for KS1 children to go inside and enjoying reading with their friends during break times. Our EYFS outside provision also has books available.

As a school we also promote reading through many other events such as:

• book fair
• listening to spoken stories from a professional story teller
• author visits
• world book day
• visiting the local library
• Essex libraries summer & winter reading challenge 

Other Implementation Strategies

• By acting as role models of the reading process
• By reading examples of good literature to the children
• By using a variety of methods to teach reading
• By giving the opportunity to read for a purpose
• By supporting the children’s progress with a structured reading scheme which caters for individual needs.
• By teaching the children through daily guided reading sessions specific skills and strategies to become confident and independent readers.
• By carrying out regular assessments to inform planning for the next stage of learning
• By keeping diagnostic records
• By encouraging reading at home - reading diary and ebooks.
• By carrying out Foundation stage profiling on children in their reception year to identify skills and knowledge acquired so far.

Opportunities for Reading

Across all stages children read in different contexts e.g. on their own, to the teacher or another adult, with peers and for a variety of audiences.

Children are exposed to a variety of texts including:-

• Picture books
• Books with interesting features (pop up, lift the flap, etc)
• Rhymes, jingles, poems
• Traditional tales, fables, Bible stories
• Plays
• Stories & poems from other cultures
• Reference books – encyclopaedias, dictionaries, non-fiction books, recipe books etc.
• Non-book material – photographs, brochures, posters, catalogues, letters,  . internet, ebooks.
• Dual language books

Reading Programme

Children are taught to read through structured daily guided reading sessions using the Read Write Inc. programme. Each session focuses on a particular reading skill or objective in accordance with the National Curriculum for English at Key stage 1 and the EYFS. Children will then take a copy of the focus book home to consolidate their learning. Children will also be given an additional “Book Bag Book” which has been selected to correspond to  their particular phonic knowledge and also used to consolidate class teaching.

Children in Key stage 1 also enjoy VIPER sessions which focus on comprehension skills.

Further reading materials have been banded to support these sessions in accordance with the National Curriculum level descriptors. Books range from the simplest text for emergent readers to text for fluent readers at the end of Key stage 1. Children can also take these banded books home for breadth of reading experience.

Several reading schemes and a variety of other texts, both fiction and non-fiction are incorporated into our book banding system. The children are encouraged to read at home with an adult each day.  Books are changed at least weekly, but generally more frequently.

Children are supported in their reading development through use of games and activities appropriate to their level during Literacy sessions.  These include word and sound games, discussion and investigation of stories, characters, comprehension activities, drama etc.

Role of the teacher

The role of the teacher is to encourage children to become independent readers by fostering a love of books and teaching them a range of access skills and strategies that enable them to decode text.

Children will be taught to:-

• Recognise an ever increasing range of high frequency words
• Recognise initial phonemes, Consonant, Vowel, Consonant (C.V.C.)  words, consonant blends etc.
• Use pictures as a prompt and for discussion

Phonics is the prime approach for decoding unfamiliar words. This is supported with other strategies including looking for small words within larger words, using the visual pattern of a word e.g. look, cook, breaking words down into syllables, missing out written word and reading on to the end of the sentence for meaning and using context of story/information to make and educated guess supported by one or more of the above strategies.

Assessment
Continuous teacher assessment through guided reading sessions and individual reading

RWI assessment approximately every 4 weeks

Termly reading comprehension in Yr2

Bank Band analysis

End of KS1 reading task

There is also a dedicated school librarian who takes children in small groups or for one to one reading sessions.

Reading for Pleasure

Our aim is to develop a love of reading and children that read for enjoyment. Reading for pleasure is promoted in a variety of ways, in school and with families and the wider community.We provide daily family library sessions before school, book competitions, challenges and sponsored events. We  take the children to the local library, have votes on favourite books in class and have a section dedicated to book recommendations on the newsletter. The children can also win prizes for reading challenges.

Printed copies of this page can be provided free of charge upon request from the school office.