Reading

At St Joseph’s we believe that reading is a gateway to the world!

We promote a positive attitude towards reading, a love of literature and hope to instill a lifelong passion for reading in your children. The use of carefully selected class texts for each year group will provide the stimulus for the majority of lessons as well as giving the children the opportunity for Reading for Pleasure. Our aim is to establish each child as a lifetime reader. The children read daily; with an adult, either 1:1, or as part of a guided reading group, through whole class reading or individually. They are also given lots of opportunities for reading simply for pleasure.

As well as decoding, the children are taught comprehension skills such as inference, deduction and how to use a text to retrieve information.

Reading Aims

Here at St. Joseph’s we will develop pupils’ reading, vocabulary and spoken language, as integral aspects of the teaching of every subject. English is both a subject in its own right and the medium for teaching; for children, understanding the language will provide access to the whole curriculum. We emphasise the importance of demonstrating high quality reading and writing throughout the curriculum. Teachers plan interesting, stimulating lessons that allow the children to practice and apply their English skills across the curriculum, with opportunities to consolidate and reinforce learning.

Aims

The National Curriculum for English aims to ensure that all pupils:

· Read easily, fluently and with good understanding.

· Develop the habit of reading widely and often, for both pleasure and information.

· Acquire a wide vocabulary, an understanding of grammar and knowledge of linguistic conventions for reading, writing and spoken language.

· Appreciate our rich and varied literary heritage

· Write clearly, accurately and coherently, adapting their language and style in and for a range of contexts, purposes and audiences

· Use discussion in order to learn; they should be able to elaborate and explain clearly their understanding and ideas

· Are competent in the arts of speaking and listening, making formal presentations, demonstrating to others and participating in debate

Reading in the Curriculum

At St Joseph’s we prioritise reading to allow all pupils to access our curriculum. Our wider curriculum stems from core texts read with the children each half term, and each subject is linked where possible to the themes encountered within that text. As a result, we approach the teaching of reading from all angles, so as to miss no opportunity to spark a child’s interest. Our rigorous and sequential approach to our reading curriculum develops pupils’ fluency, confidence and enjoyment in reading. Choral reading plays a major part in all learning - maximising the amount of purposeful reading experienced by every child, every day.

Our approach is, 'Read wherever possible.’

Story has always been the ultimate teaching vehicle. Whether it be in the form of a parable to explore right and wrong, a story problem to launch a maths lesson or the exploration of a deep theme through a powerful text, we use story to make learning, and life, meaningful.

Additional reading support

Throughout St Joseph’s, the pupils’ reading skills are assessed and gaps are addressed quickly and effectively for all pupils. This allows all pupils to make progress. This work is done through extra support, 1:1 reading, additional reading opportunities within the curriculum and home and parent support.

We buy in to the services of Beanstalk Readers and have teams who come to school to work with readers.
We use Pets as Therapy and have a weekly visit from Lilly the Labrador so children can practice reading out loud
We buy Orretts Meadow outreach to provide focused reading support
We use Teaching Assistants to deliver reading sessions after school
We purchase computer software to provide extra support
We have regular parent volunteers who come to school weekly to read with children

Children enjoy, listen attentively and respond with comprehension to familiar stories, poems, non-fiction, rhymes and songs that are appropriate to their age and stage of development.

Promoting reading

We promote reading across the school and identify it as a priority.

Each classroom has its own library and reading corner so that the children have constant access to a range of age appropriate books, as well as somewhere inviting to curl up and read.

We participate in National incentives, such as Word Book Day, but we extend so that we have Book Week with lots of different exciting events taking place all week.

We have regular Book Fairs, from companies such as Usborne Books and Scholastic so that children can purchase books at reduced rates. We always ensure a company is present at Parents Evenings, so that parents also have the opportunity to buy books with their children.

We have regular reading themed competitions, such as sponsored reads, reading challenges, and book review tasks.

We have regular visits from professional authors, to talk to the children about life as an author, show the process of writing and publishing a book, and then deliver workshops.

Our homework return reward is a £10 book token each half term.

The school timetable includes designated reading sessions, including each day having the teacher read a story out loud. The stories read will include texts above the children’s reading ability so that they are also exposed to advanced texts.

Our staff read to children in a way that excites and engages them, they introduce new ideas, concepts and vocabulary. This allows children to be fully immersed in the world of the book.

Reading for pleasure

At St Joseph’s Primary School the active encouragement of reading is a core part of every child’s educational entitlement, whatever their background or attainment. St Joseph’s School takes the view that extensive reading and exposure to a wide range of texts makes a vital contribution to every child’s educational achievement.

Reading for pleasure at St Joseph’s Primary aims to establish each child as a lifetime reader. Becoming a lifetime reader is based on developing a love of reading (Sanacore, 2000). Studies are accumulating that emphasise the importance of reading for pleasure for both educational as well as personal development. These studies show that promoting reading can have a major impact on children, their future and their life chances.

Our approach to Reading for Pleasure is for the promotion and encouragement of reading as a pleasurable activity and should be used to engrain the philosophy for a wide range of reading within the fabric of the school.

Reading Ambassadors

St Josephs Reading Ambassador Charter.jpg

Being a Reading Ambassador is all about reading for pleasure and sharing the deep enjoyment of reading a great book with others. Reading Ambassadors are voted for by their class based upon their love of reading and their enthusiasm for sharing this. There has been much research to show that children who read regularly at home perform better at school. As well as being academically beneficial, it is great for wellbeing and is also lots of fun! The role of a Reading Ambassador also includes running reading assemblies, helping to organise and run school book fairs and World Book Week, assisting in purchasing new books to ensure book areas are inviting and up to date and reading and reviewing books to help other children through their recommendations.

Our Reading Ambassadors also write a termly magazine - Reading Rocks! To celebrate all things reading! Book reviews, competitions, news and much more!

Click here to visit our Newsletter page and scroll down to Reading Rocks!

What the School will do

Access to a wide range of texts/books

There are a wide range of texts available for children in each classroom. Texts include:

· Age related fiction and non-fiction

· Magazines, Newspapers, comics and Top Trump cards

· Children’s own work (within books and displays)

· Class Novel sets

Provision is made to provide texts that accommodate all reading ages within a class.

Every Classroom within St Joseph’s will have a Classroom Reading Corner set up to promote reading for pleasure. Each Reading corner will contain books from a variety of genres, by a variety of authors and cover a wide range of potential areas of interest.

Teacher’s Role

Regular time spent reading aloud by the teacher

Teacher’s at St Joseph School regularly read to children. Children can benefit tremendously from being read to aloud. Studies show that children who are read to aloud are more likely to do better in school both academically and socially. Teachers are encouraged to have a regular reading slot in which to read every day.

Effective reading aloud time is all about creating a positive reading experience to engage the students, so teachers model their enthusiasm for books and reading them. Teachers do not just read to the class but interact with them, ask questions about what has been read or the pictures they have been shown. This helps improve students’ comprehension of the story.

When choosing books to read aloud, a balance is struck between the students’ preferences and inviting them to try new types of books to expand their horizons and spark new interests.

Pupil’s Role

Children will rate books and review books to encourage other children to read more widely on a regular basis and will be kept in the Reading Corner.

Actively encourage a love of reading : promote reading of a wide range of books

Through discussing books of personal interest, regularly referencing books and promoting different kinds of books, teachers foster a love of reading that is passed onto the children. Teachers also encourage children to read widely by promoting reading and by using class rewards and reading diaries to stimulate this love of reading.

Other ways we foster a love of reading for pleasure include;

School Assemblies, Book Clubs, links with home and parents, staff modelling reading behaviours

Pupils are encouraged to read at home for pleasure and to bring in books from home that will interest their peers.

St Joseph’s Primary has strong links with Birkenhead Central library; by taking part in the Summer Reading Scheme and actively promoting the library service.

Catering for all needs

As an inclusive school we recognise the needs to tailor our approach to support children with special educational needs as well as those who are identified as gifted and talented.

We teach English to all children, whatever their ability. English forms part of the school curriculum policy to provide a broad and balanced education for all children. We provide learning opportunities that are matched to the needs of children with learning difficulties.

Vocabulary

All children are encouraged to read often. A child who reads only 20 minutes per day reads almost two million words per year! 70-80% of a child’s vocabulary comes from reading. It is because of these reasons why reading is a priority for all children at St Joseph’s.

We ensure there is a clear focus on ensuring that all children acquire a wide vocabulary, and are able to communicate effectively. We do this through modelling of good vocabulary, exposure from the outset to a wide range of vocabulary and including key vocabulary in our working wall displays.

We categorise vocabulary in to three tiers:

Tier One - Basic Vocabulary

Tier one consists of the most basic words. These words rarely require direct instruction and typically do not have multiple meanings. Sight words, nouns, verbs, adjectives, and early reading words occur at this level. Examples of tier one words are: book, girl, sad, run, dog, and orange.

Tier Two - Ambitious, multiple application

Tier two consists of high frequency words that occur across a variety of domains. That is, these words occur often in mature language situations such as adult conversations and literature, and therefore strongly influence speaking and reading. The following is a list of standards for tier two words:

 Important for reading comprehension
 Contain multiple meanings
 Used across a variety of environments
Characteristic of mature language users
Increased descriptive vocabulary

We place greatest emphasis on Tier Two words

Examples of tier two words are: masterpiece, fortunate, industrious, measure, and benevolent.

Tier Three - Subject Specific

Tier three consists of low-frequency words that occur in specific domains. Domains include subjects in school, hobbies, occupations, geographic regions, technology, weather, etc. We usually learn these words when a specific need arises, such as learning amino acid during a science lesson, or nimbus clouds in Geography. Examples of tier three words are: sedimentary, continent, integer.

Phonics and Spelling

From the start of their time at St Joseph’s, the children are taught to read by using phonics. The children in EYFS and Year 1 have a daily phonics session, focusing on key sounds, graphemes and digraphs, following the Read, Write, Inc Progression model. This means that they learn how to ‘read’ the sounds in words in increasing complexity and how those sounds can be written down. This is done using flashcards, repetition and ‘Fred Talk’. Children learn the English alphabetic code: first they learn one way to read the 40+ sounds and blend these sounds into words, then learn to read the same sounds with alternative graphemes.

They experience success from the very beginning. Lively phonic books are closely matched to their increasing knowledge of phonics and ‘tricky’ words and, as children re-read the stories, their fluency increases.

Along with a thought-provoking introduction, prompts for thinking out loud and discussion, children are helped to read with a storyteller’s voice.

Any child who did not achieve the required standard of phonics by the end of Year 1 receives further support during Year 2. This is continued in to Year 3 and beyond if necessary.

For more information about Read, Write Inc, click here to visit the Ruth Miskin Phonics website.

Spelling

Beyond Read, Write, Inc children are taught spelling using a wide range of strategies following the Babcock No Nonsense Spelling scheme. All year groups have regular timetabled spelling lessons, spellings homework and are given regular opportunities to apply and practice the spellings they have previously learnt.