Aston All Saints
Aston All Saints C of E Primary School
Our literate children in action...
English
Reading At Aston All Saints
At Aston All Saints C of E Primary School we believe in the importance of developing children’s word-reading skills and comprehension together with the need to stimulate a love of books and reading. We recognise how closely these two elements are intertwined and that each relies on the other if children are to become life-long readers.
We also believe that every child can learn to read and every child can develop pleasure in reading, motivation to read, vocabulary and understanding given the right environment and teaching and learning opportunities.
To ensure effective delivery of Aston All Saints’ English curriculum intent, the following approaches have been adopted:
- Every teacher is an advocate for reading, and we strive to inspire children to become ‘hooked on books’.
- Reading and books are at the centre of our whole curriculum: reading drives and inspires our topics, visits, cross curricular opportunities and our writing. We use ‘reading-into-writing’ strategies in every year group and have carefully sequenced progression across the genres in our reading and writing curriculum.
- We combine discreet teaching of reading, including teaching specific comprehension skills, with opportunities for children to practice reading and develop reading fluency and stamina.
- All staff are trained to deliver our Read-Write-Inc phonics programme daily and RWI spelling. Children who are still learning to crack the phonic code practise their reading using only decodable books.
- Teachers plan opportunities for children to develop their confidence when talking, including planning rich opportunities for vocabulary development, drama and debate.
Our Reading Curriculum.
The teaching of phonics begins with our youngest pupils and continues throughout school until the children are secure in their understanding and application of the techniques. A variety of approaches are taken to ensure that lessons remain engaging and challenging at all levels and every opportunity is taken to reinforce knowledge and understanding across all areas of the curriculum. Lessons are little but often and use pictures, puppets and rhymes in order to make them interesting and entertaining as well as educational.
Books often form the basis of classroom projects too and children have the chance to study a book in detail and use it as a stimulus for other kinds of written or creative work.
Good-quality texts provide opportunities for children to meet objectives drawn from across the National Curriculum for English and a combination of whole class teaching and smaller guided reading opportunities help to introduce and reinforce skills successfully.
Our teaching of comprehension includes teaching literal, inference and evaluation skills with progression being provided through the increasing challenge of texts being used and from the complexity of the questions a teacher asks or the tasks set, and the quality of the answers they’re willing to accept. To support the teaching of comprehension skills we use Cracking Comprehension and Headstart materials.
Family involvement is an important part of our reading culture. Results of international reading studies have shown that children who are supported in their reading at home are more likely to enjoy reading and tend to achieve more highly at school. We want our children to read at home through choice and for this to happen we ensure that we engage with families to extend the culture of reading that the school has developed. Strategies include:
– Inviting parents into school to read with their children, weekly in Foundation and Key Stage 1.
– Training parents, grandparents and adult volunteers from the local community to come in to school and listen to children read.
– Offering reading advice during open days and parent evenings.
– Parents and teachers communicating regularly in home/school reading diaries.
– Ensuring that our environment celebrates reading in all its forms.
Reading for Pleasure.
Research shows that reading for pleasure has a positive impact on children’s attainment in reading assessments. Children who read for pleasure have enhanced levels of text comprehension, an increased knowledge of grammar and show improvement in their writing. They also have more positive attitudes towards reading than peers.
“Pupils should be taught to read fluently, understand extended prose, both fiction and non-fiction, and be encouraged to read for pleasure. Schools should do everything to promote wider reading… [Pupils] should be reading widely and frequently, outside as well as in school, for pleasure and information.”
2014 National Curriculum
At Aston All Saints we provide plenty of opportunities for children to read for pleasure and enjoy a variety of texts. We build in time for all children to read independently, share books and hear stories and rhymes being read to them. Books are displayed attractively around school and in classrooms reading areas promote different authors and their work. We hold book fairs and reading related competitions for pupils of all ages and organise regular visits to the local library and visits from authors and poets.
At Aston All Saints we believe that anything we can do to help children to become life-long readers is time and effort well spent.
Link to National Curriculum:
English Phonics
Our school uses:
Read Write Inc. Phonics for our children in Foundation to Year 2 and for our children in Years 3 and 4 who need to catch up
Read Write Inc. Fresh Start for our children in Years 5 and 6 with a reading age of nine and below
Read Write Inc. Spelling for our children in Years 2 to 6
Read Write Inc. Phonics, Fresh Start and Spelling are highly successful literacy programmes for 4-13 year-olds created by Ruth Miskin and published by Oxford University Press. The training and support from Ruth Miskin Training, rated Outstanding by the Department for Education, ensure the programmes have the best chance of success in schools.
The Read Write Inc. programmes are carefully matched to the new curriculum, giving your children the best chance of success in the national tests. They show teachers, teaching assistants and parents step-by-step how to teach all children to become fluent readers, confident speakers and willing writers.
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The teaching and Learning of Phonics |
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Read Write Inc. Phonics is used by over a quarter of the UK’s primary schools. It is a comprehensive literacy programme, weaving decoding, comprehension, writing and spelling together seamlessly. Ruth Miskin developed the programme during her time as a headteacher in Tower Hamlets. She believes that in order for a school to be successful, every headteacher needs to adopt a consistent whole-school approach to teaching reading, writing and spelling. Fidelity to the teaching programme, rigorous assessment, tracking and one-to-one tutoring ensure that schools guarantee progress for every child.
For information and tutorials on how to support your child learning to read go to: http://www.ruthmiskin.com/en/parents/ |
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The ability to read and write is a key life skill that paves the way to success at school and in the world beyond. Read Write Inc. is the programme we use to teach children to read and write. Children learn phonemes (segments of sound) and the corresponding grapheme (the letter/s that represents the sound). Sounds are divided into 3 sets. In Reception children will learn Set 1 sounds, all Set 2 sounds and where appropriate Set 3 sounds. In Years 1 and 2 (Key Stage 1), children will secure Set 2 sounds and learn new Set 3 sounds. To begin children are taught individual sounds daily during 'Speed Sounds' sessions. After these have been learnt, children begin to learn how to blend these sounds into words during regular 'Word Time' sessions. Word Time sessions are repeated while new sounds are learned and these are then incorporated into further Word Time sessions.
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The teaching and Learning of Spelling |
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Read Write Inc. Spelling embeds impressive skills in just 15 minutes a day, quickly and effectively filling the gaps in children’s knowledge. To keep children engaged, aliens introduce spelling rules on an exciting online spelling planet and children complete quick-fire activities in their spelling logs. Progress is accurately recorded using practice tests and teachers learn how to move children on quickly.
For more information on Read Write Inc. Spelling go to: https://global.oup.com/education/content/primary/series/rwi/spelling/?region=internationa |
Policies
Click on the link below for the DFE Website and the National Curriculum documents
https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/department-for-education
Reading is the gateway skill that makes all other learning possible. Barak Obama
