Children start their reading journey with us following Read Write Inc, an excellent programme based on "synthetic phonics": that is, children learn what combinations of letters make all the different sounds in English, how to blend these sounds to make words, and how to decode words when they see these combinations.
The Year 2 Comprehension programme builds on this foundation, with children practising fluency and comprehension strategies with the Read, Write Inc Literacy and Language texts. From Year 3, the Reading Revolution progamme follows a five-day approach based on the Five Pillars of Reading (National Reading Panel Report 2000) and the Ark Reading KPIs (aligned with National Curriculum). Over the week, children focus on one text and build familiarity with the new vocabulary within it, which helps them improve overall comprehension and the ability to answer literal and inference questions.
We provide our children with a balanced reading diet comprising of fiction, non-fiction, poetry and classics. We choose texts carefully to draw on our literary heritage, and to entertain and inspire. These texts, set out in our Book Spine and Curriculum Maps, are explored in our timetabled Reading lessons, Literacy lessons or shared as Class Books.
We provide books from the Reading Roadmap (a scheme of dedicated, age-appropriate book titles for years 3/4 and years 5/6) for children to take home and read. We also have an incredibly stocked library with a variety of current genres and authors, as well book corners where children can choose an additional 'reading for pleasure' book to either read at home or at school.