Reading
We believe that creating a life-long love of reading in our children is of paramount importance. We encourage parents to read with their children at home and pupils to change their reading books as often as possible. We praise and reward recording at home through Class Dojo. Home Record Records are checked daily. We expect every child to read at home with an adult three times a week. Sessions should last no more than ten minutes. We have a group of Reading Volunteers who work across Key Stage 1 with children requiring additional support.
In order to foster a love of reading, we do not follow a prescriptive reading scheme. Instead, we use a wide variety of engaging, high-quality texts selected by staff. These books are levelled for difficulty and complexity using coloured book bands. We ensure that children have access to phonetically decodable texts (in line with their reading age), as well as language-rich texts, picture books and novels to help nurture and develop vocabulary and spark an interest in reading. All of our children have access to our fiction and non-fiction library and every classroom is equipped with an engaging and inviting Reading Corner: we want all of our children to ‘Love to Read’.
We aim to have 20 minutes of Guided Reading every day outside of English lessons. Throughout the week, every child has a session supported by their teacher and a follow-up activity, as well as stimulating and meaningful activities linked to reading in those sessions where they are not working directly with the class teacher.
In Nursery and Reception, children are given the opportunity to explore books in small groups. This may involve books without words where the children are encouraged to tell the story, learn how to handle books, discover the directionality of print, look at and learn high frequency words and talk about familiar stories.