Reading

Subject Lead - Miss S.Cawkwell

At Priory Lane Community School, we are all readers!

Reading is a vital part of English within the national curriculum and it is an essential skill to access all areas of the curriculum. We teach our children to read, and develop a habit of reading, to allow them to develop culturally, emotionally, intellectually, socially and spiritually. Through the study of reading at Priory Lane, children are able to develop a wide range of fundamental skills, knowledge and understanding that they will need, and use, for the rest of their lives. For most of us, being able to read is imperative to succeed in our daily lives, whether that is at home or at work. Reading also allows escapism - we teach our children to read widely and often, for both pleasure and information.

For English, the national curriculum puts a clear emphasis on two areas of learning:

• word reading: this involves working out the pronunciation of unfamiliar words (decoding) and speedy recognition of familiar words.
• comprehension: this draws on linguistic knowledge (in particular the vocabulary and grammar) and knowledge of the world.

At Priory Lane Community School, reading is taught daily across the whole school. This ensures that children are able to develop depth in their knowledge and skills which they can then apply to all areas of the curriculum. The implementation of the curriculum ensures a progressive coverage of early phonics reading, using Read Write Inc, ‘The 5Ps of Fluency’ to develop the children’s fluent reading and ERIC (Explain – Retrieve – Interpret – Choice) sessions which develop the children’s comprehension.

Reading Fluency

We deliver regular fluency lessons from Key Stage 1 onwards, when the children are secure in their phonetic decoding. These sessions focus on Priory Lane’s ‘5Ps of Fluency’. Each session involves the children developing their fluent reading skills, which is core to them being able to comprehend.

ERIC – Comprehension

Within our school, all children from Year 1 to 6 experience two taught ERIC sessions a week. These sessions include a Short ERIC exploring all four question types (ERI and C). They then complete an extended reading comprehension activity working at their level, focusing on their area to develop.

The reading curriculum at Priory Lane looks like:

• Cross-curricular links made to other curriculum subjects, such as reading about significant people from history, or how things work in science.
• All children in school can access the library during play times and lunchtimes; here they can explore books for pleasure, listen to stories and take part in literary competitions.
• We have a number of well-skilled pupil librarians who support other children. This involves: sharing stories, supporting book selections and providing support and guidance for our early readers.
• The children within upper key stage 2 have access to The Knowledge Centre; here they can explore books for pleasure, take part in competitions and access digital reading resources.
• Each class has regular class story book time where they share a book with their teacher
• Focused planning and assessment to ensure that progression of knowledge and skills is effective and consistent across the school.
• Where opportunities arise, the children engage with inspirational authors, or business owners, who link to the taught topic/area taught.
• Repeated participation in whole school extra-curricular events, such as World Book Day. This allows the children to celebrate the books and authors they are passionate about.

Reading documents and website links...

• BBC Nursery songs - A collection of nursery songs from the Early Learning series Listen and Play and Playtime, both of which are currently available on iplayer and as podcasts
• Book Trust - Suggested books for children, advice on how to read with your child, book lists, fun games, competitions to win free books, Children's Book Club etc.
• Love Reading - Expert recommendations and opening extracts of books.
• Newsround – access up to date news articles on events which are currently taking place.
• Storyline - Storyline Online features accomplished actors and actresses reading some of their favourite children’s books. Each story comes with a free Activity Guide and can be viewed on YouTube or SchoolTube.
• Storynory - Storynory features a collection of original, fairytale, and classic children’s audio stories.
• BBC Bitesize – here there are many areas which the children will cover in reading, and other areas of the curriculum. There are guide videos, activities and games.
• Words for Life from the National Literacy Trust – here you will find information about reading related milestones for your child, books or texts to share and activities to complete.
• Love Reading 4 Kids - This website offers hundreds of free book recommendations “from toddlers to teens”, and a dedicated Kids’ Zone including competitions, quizzes and other reading-related activities.