Reading
Phonics and Spelling
Spelling is taught as part of a planned programme, following the requirements of the National Curriculum. In EYFS and Key Stage 1, phonic work is taught systematically from Reception to Year 2 using ‘Little Wandle.’ Children will be taught:
the grapheme-phoneme correspondence in a clearly defined sequence
the skill of segmenting words into their constituent phonemes to spell
that blending and segmenting are reversible processes. The children will also take home a matched phonics reading book to reinforce the phonics they are learning in class.
High Frequency Words
Throughout each phase the tricky high frequency words will be taught. Each teacher uses a variety of methods to ensure the correct spelling of the high frequency words appropriate to each phase plus specific tier 3 (subject specific) vocabulary. Teachers should recognise worthy attempts made by children to spell words but should also correct them selectively and sensitively.
In Key Stage 2 spellings will be explored in class lesson is given each week, followed by practise sessions so that children have the opportunity to embed new spellings. This will include the learning of the statutory word lists in the 2014 English curriculum, lists given each week. Where necessary, some pupils will consolidate their phonic knowledge and skills from Key Stage 1 through the structured intervention using ‘Word Aware’.
Reading
Pupils have daily opportunities to engage in shared and independent reading both in English and other subjects across the curriculum. We aim for children to become independent, able readers, who understand and demonstrate a passion for reading and a love of books. Reading sessions will encourage children to respond to high quality texts in a number of ways through the use of reading journals and the VIPERS approach. Our school literature spine identifies high quality, age appropriate texts that we believe should be read by the time our children leave each year group. Some of these books have been specifically chosen to be used as whole class texts, some for guided reading and some for independent reading. Each book has been chosen specifically to expose our children to the best stories, poems and authors that exist and therefore the essential ingredients to support them as both readers and writers.
Fundamental reading skills
In order to master the reading curriculum teachers must develop the core comprehension skills. Using the reading VIPERS question stems, questions can be quickly generated. Teachers can ensure that all of the main comprehension skills are covered weekly, taken from VIPERS. Class teachers must ensure that they choose high quality and age appropriate texts to share with their class. In school we have several resources that provide a wide range of text types.
Children must have time to also free read to help develop the love of reading.
Children have a range of reading schemes to choose from including Oxford Reading Tree, Bug Club, Big Cats and a range of real books. In Reception and Key Stage 1 the children will take home a reading book from one of the above schemes and also a matched phonics reading books (this will be matched to the phonics they will be learning at that time in class).
All children are encouraged to read at home – not just their reading book, it could be a library book, the newspaper or comics!
Spellings are sent home each week and tested the following week.