READING

What is our INTENT?

At Greave, we intend to create a love for reading and ensure that all children make at least good progress with their fluency, which will have a positive impact their comprehension skills.   We want children to want to read and have good comprehension skills to help them beyond their time with us.  Our reading curriculum is structured in a maintainable way with the ‘little and often’ approach.  This is to help the children to constantly be open to reading opportunities.  Our school ethos supports this approach and links with the personal capabilities: confidence, perseverance and resilience.  All staff are aware of the approaches and reasons for them; as a school we need to develop a culture for a love of reading and this is demonstrated by staff.  At Greave, we ensure that all pupils are catered for; within the reading curriculum, we are using our Learning Support Service to embed SERI (Stockport's Early Reading Intervention) for those children identified with special educational needs.  For those children who are Pupil Premium, we intend to use PM Benchmark to track and monitor their progress.  

 

How do we IMPLEMENT?

Within our school day, we strive to make sure that all children are given the children opportunities to discuss and explore texts and vocabulary.  Consistency across school within guided reading and implementation of weekly reading lessons are paramount for children to become confident and develop a love of reading. 

 

What will be the IMPACT?

By the end of the school year, we want children to have the skills which will enable them to further deepen their knowledge and love of reading.  Children should leave their current year group with a greater understanding of what a good reader looks like, and how they can use skills to comprehend what they are reading. It is important for us to understand that the progress of the children should not be defined by hitting the next data point, rather they should be engaging with the curriculum that we have developed, which, in turn, will show progress. 

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In order to be able to read, it is essential that children have good comprehension skills.  These skills can help to understand words as well as building upon their knowledge of the world and developing vocabulary.  It is very common that children can understand rather complex stories and books that have been shared with them more so than what they can read independently.  Therefore, most comprehension teaching will focus on children listening to, experiencing and responding to texts that are read to them (or with them) and then completing tasks to develop their comprehension skills.  

 

To ensure that the children at Greave are exposed to a range of different text types, we have a variety of publishers within our levelled books.  Every child at Greave has the opportunity to read a levelled reading book as well as a book for enjoyment from their class library.  Our priority is to help children to want to choose to read.  With this in mind, we don't want children to struggle with independent reading at home; their levelled reading book that they bring home may seem 'easy', however be assured that they are suitably challenged within their reading sessions at school. 

 

New research actually shows that children make the most progress when being read to, rather being made to read.  If you need some more books to be able to share together at home and would like to read more to your child, please don't hesitate to get in contact and we will endeavour to help. 

 

Our reading books are levelled in accordance to Reading Recovery which focuses on reading behaviours.  Please do not compare the reading level your child is on with those of their classmates.  We don't expect all children to read at the same level and although there are recommended reading behaviours for specific age/year groups, these are separate from the age related expectations.  

 

What will have the biggest impact on your child's reading?  Reading is an extremely complex skill with multiple layers to it; lots of practise over time will help children to become fluent and confident.  Children also mirror what they see adults around them do, which is why it is important that, as teachers, we show positive examples of our enthusiasm towards learning; this is something that could easily be demonstrated at home to encourage your child to pick up a book (or magazine, instruction booklet, recipe etc.). 

If you have any concerns about your child's progress in reading or would like some further advice, please speak to the school office to arrange a meeting with your child's class teacher.  

 

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