English

At Normanton All Saints CE (A) Infant School we highly value reading and understand that reading is fundamental to function in today’s society. Reading is a life skill that needs to be taught, nurtured and developed. Enjoying books and reading stories from a very early age is crucial in reading development and therefore this begins with our youngest children in our nursery setting.

We value that reading teaches children about the world around them, develops imagination and enables them to understand and use a wide range of words. We understand the need for children to gain good phonics knowledge alongside an understanding of vocabulary and comprehension in order for them to become confident and fluent readers.

Reading has a unique contribution to learning as it enables children to achieve success in all other areas of the curriculum. Therefore, the teaching of reading is given a high priority throughout the school with all staff recognising the importance of teaching skills thoroughly and instilling positive attitudes towards reading.

Time in the school day is dedicated to story time where children have the opportunity to listen to a story read to them by an adult who brings the book to life through our ‘magic of stories’ approach. These books are carefully chosen to provide an engaging and enjoyable experience and aims to develop a love of reading. Initiatives such as the class reader of the week, our top 5 and top 20 texts, whole school book weeks, reading cafes, parent and child story time and weekly visits to the school library continue to promote reading for pleasure. High-quality books and texts are used to drive the curriculum and each classroom has an inviting and engaging reading area to promote a further love for reading.

Teaching reading

We teach reading through:

• Structured daily phonics and additional ‘keep up’ for children requiring this.
• Group guided reading practice and guided reading.
• Literacy weekly teaching structure.
• Whole class taught reading sessions (ERIC), which focuses on comprehension knowledge and skills.
• Listening to pupils read individually.
• Reading for pleasure through dedicated story time.

The school’s reading scheme consists of:

• Collins Big Cat for Little Wandle Letters and Sounds revised
• Home readers- Phonetically decodable book
• Free readers for pupils who are secure with their phonics and can read with accuracy and fluency

Our Literacy curriculum is driven through high-quality texts for a 3 week period, which are used to stimulate writing and enable the children to read the text and become fully immersed in the book. The start of the literacy teaching will be focused on introducing the text in an engaging way and will provide the children with the opportunity to unpick the text and the vocabulary used by the author. As part of the literacy teaching, talk for writing will also be used focused on developing the children’s speaking and listening skills by ensuring they are confident in retelling a familiar text.

Reading at home

We encourage all our pupils to read regularly at home. Children will bring home books which are matched to the stage of their reading development.
Children will work through a phonetically decodable reading scheme starting in Reception. When children are assessed to be phonetically secure they then move on to free readers. The aim of our reading scheme is to ensure that:

• Children are applying their phonic knowledge to words and sentences.
• Children have the opportunity to read tricky words/high-frequency words linked to their current phase in phonics.
• Children work through a progressive scheme that links to their understanding of phonic sounds.
• Children are not asked to read words with sounds they do not know and they are not asked to guess words.

For early and developing readers phonics books will be sent home linked to the letters and sounds which have been taught. This book will have been introduced to the children in class during their guided practice session and therefore will be a familiar text to allow them to read at home with confidence and fluency and to celebrate reading success. The home books also allow the children the opportunity to practise reading words by blending and segmenting enabling them to gain secure phonic knowledge.

As pupils become confident and fluent in their reading and once they have a secure phonic knowledge they will then be provided with a large range of books from other publishers known as ‘free readers’. This will further develop children’s knowledge, vocabulary, language and comprehension enabling them to continue to read for pleasure.

Please see the Reading Flyer for further information about our home reading scheme.

In writing, pupils will have the opportunity to:

• develop their skills as a writer through transcription (spelling and handwriting) and composition (articulating ideas and structuring them in speech and writing)
• write clearly, accurately and coherently, adapting their language and style in and for a range of contexts, purposes and audiences.

Pupils will be able to develop their skills as a writer by:

• writing for a range of contexts including different purposes and audiences
• practising writing throughout the school day and across all subjects
• develop their understanding of different types of punctuation and the impact it has on the reader
• expressing their own unique ideas through the texts they write
• choosing the words they write carefully for effect
• carefully organising their writing
• learning how to spell key words correctly in their writing
• practising their handwriting making sure that it is correctly formed to make sure others can read it.

Our writing curriculum is built on the foundations of a high-quality systematic and synthetic phonics programme, an enriched reading curriculum and also well-planned opportunities for talk. The teaching of writing is based around ensuring that our children master the fundamentals of writing, i.e. sentence structure and punctuation, which will then be continuously practised and built upon until they are fluent in these skills. Writing is an important part of the phonics teaching which ensures children are spelling tricky words and also learning spelling patterns and rules which can then be applied to independently write words. Teachers, especially those in the earliest stages, are dedicated to ensuring that children secure basic skills which will allow children to become confident and fluent writers.

Our writing curriculum is based around high quality texts and authors, which are carefully selected and chosen to allow children to experience ambitious vocabulary and add creativity into their writing. Writing is taught through a carefully considered three-week sequence based on the chosen text which allows the children to learn the features and content of a high-quality model as they imitate this and then independently apply their knowledge in a new context. We value the importance of talk and children orally rehearse stories and texts to become confident in writing the learnt content. The sequence teaches children the importance of editing and improving their writing. We expect high quality writing outcomes which the children are proud of.

Across the school, we expect high standards of presentation. From an early stage, teachers expect pupils to correctly hold a pencil with a firm grip in order to correctly form letters. Print is taught in the Early Years Foundation Stage and then a cursive style of handwriting is taught in Key Stage One.

The development of children’s phonics is a key skill that impacts on their progress as a reader and a writer. It is through their knowledge of phonics that children can read and write unfamiliar words by saying the sounds which match the letters in the words and then blending the sounds together.

Aims

• Through a strong focus on the teaching of phonics we aim:
• To provide all children with a systematic and synthetic approach to teaching phonics which ensures all children achieve.
• To teach children all of the sounds (including alternative pronunciations) included in each phase of the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised programme.
• To teach children how to orally blend spoken sounds to pronounce words.
• To read words by segmenting the sounds in a word and then blending the sounds back together.
• To write words by writing each of the sounds they can hear in a word.
• That children by the end of Year One will have developed a secure knowledge of all phonics sounds in order to develop as fluent readers to access and enjoy a range of books.
• To quickly identify children who need extra support and provide extra practice to enable them to keep up.

Structure of phonics and resources to teach phonics

Pupils across the school have a daily phonics session, which follows the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised structure of Revisit and Review, Teach and Practise, Practise and Apply and Guided Practice (reading a decodable book). Phonics is taught on a morning immediately after the daily register and will last for 20 minutes in Upper Foundation Stage and 25-30 minutes in Year One. Children in Year Two who require additional phonics teaching also receive this in a small group session.

Revisit and Review – The children have the opportunity to re-cap sounds that have already been taught to them. They will then have the opportunity to practise reading words containing familiar sounds. The children will then practise reading the tricky words that are linked to their current stage in the phonics progression.

Teach and Practise – The new sound of the day is explicitly taught.
The new sound of the day will be taught and children will have the opportunity to practise orally segmenting and blending words alongside reading words containing the sound. During this time teachers will further support understanding by giving examples and definitions of some of the words in a sentence. A new tricky word will then be introduced and children will practise reading the word.

Practise and Apply – The children are given the opportunity to practise using the new sound, by reading and writing words/sentences containing this sound. The children will then further apply this sound by writing further words containing the sound of the day and a previously taught tricky word.

Guided Practice – Applying known sounds in fully decodable books.
During phonics teaching, we use phonics books (Collins Big Cat – Little Wandle for Letter and Sounds revised) to support children in applying their phonic knowledge to words and sentences by segmenting and blending sounds together. These phonics books are linked to the secure sounds that your child knows. In school children will be listened to read in a small group 3 times a week. Each time the group will be focusing on a different reading skill; fluency, prosody (readers voice) and comprehension (understanding the book). Once children have completed their three reads in school they will be bringing this book home to read and share with you. This is a time to celebrate reading success with your child and share a love of reading together.

The reading lead will oversee the teaching of phonics and the delivery of the programme by monitoring the impact of this and by coaching and training the staff.

The school follows the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised Programme. Further information about this phonics programme can be found at: https://www.littlewandlelettersandsounds.org.uk/resources/for-parents/

Further information about the progression of phonics from Upper Foundation (Reception) to the end of Year 1 is available via this pdf.

Phonics in the classroom environment

There will be consistent phonics displays across the classrooms. Each classroom will display tricky words relevant to the age group and all the phonics sounds which are taught in that year group. There will be a specific reference to the sound taught that day on the display. High-quality phonic resources from Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised will be also available including sound flash cards, word flash cards and also other resources to support with spelling such as word cards, colour mats. Phonics learning lines and working walls will display the taught sounds for the week and will be added to throughout the week with words containing that sound. Each classroom area will have a well organised and stocked reading area with high-quality books which the children can access. Phonics books will also be displayed in this area to provide pupils with a further opportunity to read independently the sound taught.

Interventions in phonics

Daily phonics interventions through regular and short keep up sessions will take place for identified pupils who require additional support. This will follow the same structure as above and will be a familiar routine to the children. Intervention will focus on targeted pupils identified through recent assessments and will be based around sounds that the pupils do not know whilst also recapping sounds they do know to ensure they can achieve success. Additional phonics intervention will be delivered to targeted pupils through daily phonics breakfast clubs. This will focus on sounds which pupils are unfamiliar with or are not fully secure with. The breakfast clubs will be led by trained teaching assistants who will regularly communicate with teachers regarding pupil progress.

Assessment of phonics

Phonics assessments will take place to assess pupils’ knowledge of the sounds that have been taught throughout the focused phase. It will also assess children’s decoding skills as they read unfamiliar words by applying their phonics or familiar words accurately. From the assessments, teachers will quickly identify the pupils who require further support and they will be provided with a targeted intervention. Daily assessment through the ‘speedy sounds’ using flash cards will also take place by the teacher and teaching assistant. The reading lead will oversee the assessment of phonics and will analyse data and will monitor the impact of interventions.

Phonics screening check

The phonics screening check is an assessment for the pupils in Year One which takes place during the final summer term. The check assesses the children’s ability to segment and blend words effectively by reading a series of real and non-words (‘alien words’). The check takes place on a one to one basis with the child and their class teacher. Results are submitted and parents are informed whether their child has met the required standard or not. Any child who does not meet the required standard in Year One will have the opportunity to re-take the check the following year during Year Two.