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The Oaks

Infant School

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Reading

Intent

At The Oaks, we believe that all our children can become fluent readers and writers. This is why we teach children to read and write through a rigorous and consistent systematic synthetic phonics (SSP) programme. Research has proven that teaching phonics is the best way to teach children to read, and reading is fundamental to a child's ability to be successful across all areas of school life and beyond.

 

Implementation

At The Oaks, we have introduced the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised programme, which draws on the latest research into how children learn best. We start teaching phonics in Nursery and follow the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised progression, which ensures children build on their growing knowledge of the alphabetic code, mastering phonics to read and spell as they move through school.

Children are taught phonics lessons as a class every day, following the clear progression. Through careful daily and summative assessment, children are identified for additional phonics support if necessary to ensure progress, with the aim of no child falling behind and every child becoming a successful reader. Teaching phonics with fidelity to our chosen programme ensures learning stays in children’s long term memory and enables children to apply their learning to become competent readers and writers.

When the children have finished the Phonics programme within Year 2, they move onto coloured book bands and delve deeper into more complex comprehension. Reading comprehension is developed through high-quality shared-reading and discussion with the teacher during RIC (retrieve, infer, challenge) lessons. Year 2 pupils are introduced to a wide range of stories, poems and non-fiction. 

 

Teaching reading: Reading practice sessions three times a week

  • We teach children to read through reading practice sessions three times a week. These:
    • are taught by a fully trained adult to small groups of approximately six children
    • use books matched to the children’s secure phonic knowledge using the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised assessments and book matching grids.
    • are monitored by the class teacher, who rotates and works with each group on a regular basis.
  • Each reading practice session has a clear focus, so that the demands of the session do not overload the children’s working memory. The reading practice sessions have been designed to focus on three key reading skills:
    • decoding
    • prosody: teaching children to read with understanding and expression
    • comprehension: teaching children to understand the text.

 

Because we believe teaching every child to read is so important, we have a Reading and Phonics Leader who drives the early reading programme in our school. These people are highly skilled at teaching phonics and reading, and they monitor and support our reading team, so everyone teaches with fidelity to the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised programme.

Impact

At The Oaks, we value reading as a crucial life skill. By the time children leave us, they read confidently for meaning and regularly enjoy reading for pleasure.

Assessment:

Assessment is used to monitor progress and to identify any child needing additional support as soon as they need it.

  • Assessment for learning is used:
    • daily within class to identify children needing Keep-up support
    • weekly in the Review lesson to assess gaps, address these immediately and secure fluency of GPCs, words and spellings.
  • Summative assessment is used:
    • every six weeks to assess progress, to identify gaps in learning that need to be addressed, to identify any children needing additional support and to plan the Keep-up support that they need.
    • by SLT and scrutinised through the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised assessment tracker, to narrow attainment gaps between different groups of children and so that any additional support for teachers can be put into place.

We encourage our children to see themselves as readers for both pleasure and purpose. Our children speak positively and enthusiastically about reading through their experience of high quality texts, weekly visits to our school library and being regularly read to by adults.

Ensuring reading for pleasure

‘Reading for pleasure is the single most important indicator of a child’s success.’ (OECD 2002)

‘The will influences the skill and vice versa.’ (OECD 2010)

We value reading for pleasure highly and work hard as a school to grow our Reading for Pleasure pedagogy.

  • We read to children every day. We choose these books carefully as we want children to experience a wide range of books, including books that reflect the children at The Oaks and our local community as well as books that open windows into other worlds and cultures. We consistently use high quality texts, often linked to the current learning. These texts demonstrate aspirational language and grammatical structure; texts to inspire and enthuse; texts with themes which help the children develop and promote the school’s values as well as ensuring their personal, social, spiritual and emotional needs are met.
  • Every classroom has an inviting reading area that encourages a love for reading. We curate these books and talk about them to entice children to read a wide range of books.
  • In Reception, children have access to the reading corner every day in their free flow time and the books are continually refreshed.
  • Children from Reception onwards have a home reading record. The parent/carer records comments to share with the adults in school and the adults will write in this on a regular basis to ensure communication between home and school.
  • The school library is made available for classes to use at protected times. Children across the school have regular opportunities to engage with a wide range of Reading for Pleasure events (author visits and workshops, book fairs and national events such as World Book Day etc).

Our school library

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