Reading at Westonzoyland Primary School
Intent
At Westonzoyland Community Primary School, we seek to ensure that children are supported to be confident, lifelong learners with a love of reading. Reading plays a very important role in developing children culturally, emotionally, spiritually and socially and we believe literature plays a key role in such development. Reading enables pupils both to acquire knowledge and build on what they already know.
Word reading – the ability to decode words- is taught through the use of the Twinkl phonics scheme. Any child who is finding it difficult to learn to read is identified through regular and ongoing assessments and is given additional interventions.
In Key Stage 1 and 2, children take part in daily Guided Reading sessions where the whole class share the same text with a specific focus. Our main aim is to ensure that children are developing their decoding and comprehension skills within these discussions and independent activities. Teachers are able to scaffold the children in their learning by stretching their depth of understanding within a text. Children are heard reading regularly, by Learning Support staff, teaching staff and also volunteer readers.
Implementation
Good comprehension draws from linguistic knowledge and on knowledge of the world. Comprehension skills develop through pupils’ experience of high-quality discussion with the teacher, as well as from reading and discussing a range of stories, poems and non-fiction. All pupils must be encouraged to read widely across both fiction and non-fiction to develop their knowledge of themselves and the world they live in, to establish an appreciation and love of reading, and to gain knowledge across the curriculum. Reading widely and often increases pupils’ vocabulary because they encounter words they would rarely hear or use in everyday speech. Every classroom at Westonzoyland Community Primary has a Word Wall that celebrates exciting and subject-specific vocabulary. Dictionary skills are developed from Year 1 and all pupils have access to their own dictionary.
Key Stage 1 reading books follow a clear progression of banding, ensuring fluency is developed. Children who progress to free readers are able to access the school library on a daily basis and can be supported to select books by adults who act as librarians at set times every day. Pupils are encouraged to take home fiction and non-fiction texts.
Children are expected to read at home daily as this helps to develop confident and fluent readers. Children’s reading logs are checked to ensure this is taking place. Where children are not reading the required amount in school, they are invited to attend a break time book club. There is also opportunity to read to a member of staff at Afterschool Club.
World Book Day is celebrated annually at Westonzoyland Community Primary School.
Impact
All pupils are assessed at appropriate intervals as they progress. Foundation Stage pupils are tracked using a phonic tracker, and also on the amount of sight words they can read. Pupils in Year 1 – 6 take Testbase assessments. Year 6 are prepared for the SATS with mock papers..
During daily sessions of guided reading, there are opportunities for staff to regularly assess children’s understanding. Outside of these lessons, there are numerous opportunities for pupils to apply their reading skills, across all areas of the curriculum.
Regular monitoring of the assessment outcomes allows teachers and practitioners to ensure that all children are making expected progress. This information is also used to identify children who are not making expected progress and therefore early intervention can be put in place.
Children’s reading assessments are added to a tracker and monitored by the English Lead teacher, Phase Leaders and Senior Leadership team.
Intervention
Through careful monitoring and tracking practitioners are able to identify children who are not making the expected progress and therefore need intervention to catch up. Depending on the needs of individuals, this may include specific phonic support, developing skills of comprehension and additional individual or small group tutoring. It is important that children who are struggling to learn to read not only need to catch up with their peers, but also to continue to make progress.
Inclusion
Our aim at Westonzoyland Community Primary School is that every child’s needs are catered for and every child is given the chance to succeed and become a competent reader. It is our aim to give every child the opportunity to experience success in learning and to be the best that they can be. Differentiated work, appropriate to individual children’s needs, is provided in the independent work during the day and also during intervention sessions. SEND pupils have Individual Learning Plans, which may include specific literacy targets.
Reading assessment and monitoring