Reading
What is the English Vision at Gosbecks?
The teaching of reading and writing underpins everything we do at Gosbecks and our rigorous and well organised English curriculum provides many purposeful opportunities for developing children’s love of reading, writing and discussion.
Our ambitious curriculum closely follows the aims of the National Curriculum for English 2014 to enable all children to:
- read easily, fluently and with good understanding
- develop the habit of reading widely and often, for both pleasure and information
- acquire a wide vocabulary, an understanding of grammar and knowledge of linguistic conventions for reading, writing and spoken language
- appreciate our rich and varied literary heritage
- write clearly, accurately and coherently, adapting their language and style in and for a range of contexts, purposes and audiences
- use discussion in order to learn; they should be able to elaborate and explain clearly their understanding and ideas
- are competent in the arts of speaking and listening, making formal presentations, demonstrating to others and participating in debate.
Our whole school aim
Our aim is to achieve a GLD (Good Level of Development) in EYFS in line with or above national standards, and be at or above the national standard in the Phonics Screening in Year 1, KS1 National Tests and KS2 National Tests. We want all children to achieve their potential and ‘be the best they can be.’ It is intended that every child in our school travels on their learning journey with a love for reading and writing that will last a lifetime. We are confident that our pupils will have developed the knowledge and skills that will help them as they continue on in their education.
Reading Intent
We believe that reading is an essential life skill which enables children to access all areas of learning, ensuring they can make progress and succeed. We aim to instil a love of reading in our pupils through our literacy-rich environment, high quality texts and many opportunities to read in English lessons and in the wider curriculum too. We aim to inspire an appreciation of our rich and varied literary heritage and develop a habit of reading widely and often. We work hard to foster a love of reading, providing regular opportunities to read for pleasure and to an audience. We understand the significance of parents and carers in supporting their children to develop both word reading and comprehension skills so we endeavour to build a home-school partnership which enables parents and carers to have the confidence to support their children with reading at home.
It is our intention that by the time children leave Gosbecks primary School, they are able to read fluently, and with confidence and can recommend books to their peers, have a thirst for reading a range of genres including poetry, and participate in discussions about books.
We therefore intend to encourage all children to read widely across both fiction and non-fiction to:
- develop knowledge of themselves and the world in which they live;
- to establish an appreciation and love of reading;
- to gain knowledge across the curriculum,
- to acquire a wider vocabulary, and
- to develop their comprehension skills.
Implementation
- Daily systematic teaching of synthetic phonics in EYFS and year 1 using the recognised Little Wandle programme.
- Daily Systematic teaching of synthetic phonics in Year 2 using Little Wandle moving onto NC spelling objectives. Some children may receive additional small group phonic intervention by LSAs if required.
- Staff are deployed throughout the school to work with children in order to improve their fluency, intonation, decoding skills and comprehension. Home reading is encouraged and is an integral part of the child’s development.
- In EYFS and year 1 children use fully decodable reading books for children to practise and apply phonic knowledge. They take two reading books home, one will be matched to the child’s level, with the relevant sounds that they are learning at that time and one which is a sharing book and read together with an adult to enjoy. The books are varied in their genres which encourages a love of different texts. Children read in a group three times a week, using the same text, following a process of decoding, prosody and comprehension.
- In year 2 children use fully decodable reading books books for children to practise and apply phonic knowledge. They select two books to take home, one matched to their child’s level which they can read independently and one as a challenge book to share with an adult to enjoy. The books are varied in their genres which encourage a love of different texts. When it is felt appropriate for individual children, they move onto the Accelerated Reader programme.
- Use of Accelerated Reader programme from Year 2 upwards. A star test is completed as a base line and then repeated termly to identify the child’s Zone of development (ZPD) Children are able to choose book from the appropriate ZPD and then take an on-line quiz to assess their understanding and comprehension of the book. Children are expected to score at least 80% on the quiz to show a secure understanding of the text.
- Weekly choral reading in upper KS2. Fluency and self-confidence is built upon by reading aloud in unison.
- DERIC - Whole Class Reading sessions take place up to 4 times a week in Y2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 using a carefully selected whole class text. Specific reading skills are taught in class through our DERIC approach (Decode, Explain, Retrieve, Interpret, Choice). Whole class, high quality texts are chosen to ensure the children experience rich language and are able to expand their vocabulary. Teachers plan and teach specific reading skills throughout each session so that children can build on their prior learning and practise their skills.
- A wealth of enrichment opportunities provided throughout the year. A variety of reading activities for engagement and pleasure occur such as reading assemblies, World Book Day, readathons, author visits and competitions.
In addition, we measure the impact of our curriculum through the following methods:
- Phonics assessment;
- Phonics screening results;
- ZPD scores;
- Reading ages given through the AR program
- Summative assessments each term; NFER National Standardised Reading comprehension tests
- Target tracker is used to track the performance of writing termly. Children who are not on track are identified for interventions in standards meetings
- End of Key stage SATs results.
These help us to ensure that our children are on track and if not intervention is quickly planned to support these children to make better progress.
All our teachers are trained and supported to improve their practice through CPD opportunities, regular staff meeting updates, peer review and subject leader support
Impact
Reading in our school is progressive and planned to meet the needs of all children. Assessments are carried out regularly to ensure children are accessing books of the right level and are being challenged in their reading. At the same time, we provide books to ensure that children read for pleasure and learn to love reading. If children are keeping up with or exceeding the curriculum, they are deemed to be making expected or more than expected progress.
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