English Reading
Reading is the most important skill to make a life successful. At Pyrgo, priority is given to ensuring that all pupils (regardless of starting points) have a level of reading to support their next stage of education.
Children at Pyrgo are taught to read using the Read Write Inc phonics programme. It is a synthetic phonics reading programme. The Children learn to form each letter, spell correctly and compose their ideas step-by-step. This systematic approach ensures consistency for all children and we work closely with the New Vision English Hub to ensure that high quality teaching is delivered by all practitioners.
Within the programme children are grouped according to their reading abilities and are regularly assessed to measure their progress. When progress is made they move through the book levels below. These are the end points we aim for:
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Expectations |
Sound play |
Ditty (*)
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Green Purple |
Pink (*) |
Orange |
Yellow |
Blue |
Grey (*) |
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End of Reception |
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End of Year 1 |
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End of Autumn term, Year 2 |
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Children’s reading progress is assessed by the ‘Reading Leader’ who is an experienced senior member of staff.
If children have difficulties in remembering particular sounds or require extension work to develop their fluency or comprehension skills then they will attend a Read Write Inc 1:1 phonics session with a member of staff that will enable them to ‘keep up’ with the programme’s daily learning and expectations.
From an excellent starting point of Read Write Inc, reading is a taught lesson for all pupils to Year 6 and the curriculum for reading is based upon the increasingly complex reading materials in Pie Corbett’s Reading Spine. As far as possible, books which support curriculum learning are used as focus texts or available for children to choose from the book corners in classrooms.
Our school library helps to encourage a love for reading for all pupils from Reception to Year 6. Each class has a weekly slot where they can take home a reading for pleasure book. All of the classes also have a 15 minute storytime at the end of the day relevant to their topic of study or a thematic link to society.
On their reading journey, children will read phonetically decodable books that are matched to their ability. Once they have finished the Read Write Inc phonics programme they will be able to select books which are organized into Book Bands and then able to select from a wide range of quality texts in each classroom. Pupils are expected to read daily at home in order to practise skills learnt in school, research by using non-fiction books and electronic forms and enjoy sharing new skills with their parents and carers. Vocabulary development and comprehension skills will be equally important and focus on these through Home Learning, resources and planning will ensure progress for all pupils.
In Key Stage 2, the children have timetabled reading lessons. These sessions focus on automaticity and prosody using a range of strategies such as choral reading, partner reading and echo reading to develop the children’s fluency. The children’s comprehension skills are developed using the Schofield and Sims programme which develops key reading skills such as inference, word choices, prediction etc. These skills are then mapped across the curriculum to consolidate their knowledge.
