Intent
At Consett Infant School, we believe that being able to read confidently and fluently, opens the door to learning. It is our intent that children not only learn the technical aspect of reading through the teaching of Systematic Synthetic Phonics (using Little Wandle) but also develop a love of reading by being exposed to a range of high quality texts throughout their day and week. It is our intention that all children develop a love of reading.
Implementation
It is our belief that learning to read is one of the most important skills a child will ever learn. It underpins everything we do in school, so we believe in putting as much effort into this to make sure every child learns to read as quickly as possible. We want our children to develop a real love of reading and believe that it is essential to encourage children to want to read for themselves. This is why we work hard to make sure children develop a love a of books as well as simply learning to decode text.
At Consett Infant School we have introduced Little Wandle as a Systematic Synthetic Phonics Scheme to enable children to tackle any unfamiliar words they read by developing their alphabetic code. Alongside this, children are taught ‘tricky words’ which are those words which do not follow a regular phonemic pattern. Phonics and reading activities are taught as discreet sessions to the whole class.
In addition to this, teachers read regularly with children so that children get to know and love all kinds of stories, poetry and information books. We are developing our provision to ensure that children have access to a range of text types in all curriculum areas. Throughout all subjects, texts are used within the teaching of National Curriculum topics and children have opportunities to read and use books and extracts which further develop their word reading and comprehension skills as well as develop their subject knowledge in subjects such as history, science, geography, art and DT.
Reading at home is encouraged and promoted on a regular basis. Children learning within the Little Wandle Phonics Programme use e-reading books which is directly matched to their current phonic level . They are also encouraged to choose a Reading For Pleasure book to share with their family at home. Once children are fluent, confident readers in Year 2, they access colour coded banded books. Children take home books are to practice fluency and develop understanding whilst reading for enjoyment.
Impact
At Consett Infant School, the impact of developing children’s skills, knowledge and understanding of what it means to be a reader can be identified in both technical terms and through teacher’s observations of children’s passion, engagement and enthusiasm for reading.
As part of the technical aspect of reading, children’s progress in phonics is continually reviewed through daily informal and half termly formal assessments. Assessments are used to monitor progress and identify children needing additional support as soon as they need it. Further details can be found in the Phonics Section of the English. The impact of children’s knowledge and understanding of phonics is identified through:
Assessment for Learning:
- Daily within class to identify children in need of support and catch up sessions
- A weekly review lesson to assess gaps, address these immediately and secure fluency of GPCs, words and spellings
- Children read decodable readers matched to their individual knowledge and skills three times per week. This focuses on decoding, prosody and comprehension – assessments are made by staff to inform future teaching and learning.
Summative Assessment:
- Every six weeks to identify gaps in learning that need to be addressed, identify children needing additional support and plan for this.
Statutory Assessment:
- Children in Year 1 sit the Phonic Screening Check and children in Year 2 who did not pass this check re-sit this.
- Children in Year 2 complete the Reading Comprehension SAT during May.
In addition to this, we follow the age related expectations which set out in EYFS and National Curriculum to ensure that children become confident, fluent and accurate readers who understand what they have read and develop a love of books from a wide range of genres.