MERSEY DRIVE COMMUNITY PRIMARY SCHOOL
Reading
At Mersey Drive, we place reading at the heart of all of our learning. Our reading curriculum has been carefully designed to ensure that children are exposed to a variety of high quality texts, ranging from modern fiction, classic texts, traditional tales, fairytales, myths, legends, picture books, poetry and non-fiction. These texts have been selected to support and enhance learning throughout the wider curriculum, allowing children to make connections beyond their English lessons and develop a deep love of learning.
Intent
We believe that all pupils should have the opportunity to be fluent, confident readers who are able to successfully comprehend and understand a wide range and variety of texts. We want pupils to develop a love of reading, a good knowledge of a range of authors, and be able to understand more about the world in which they live. We provide a diet of high quality texts, rich in vocabulary, which will enable children to learn how to coordinate the use of phonics, semantic and synaptic cues as they become increasingly mature, independent readers.
The five key aims of our reading curriculum are:
- To develop speaking and listening skills and have a wider understanding of language.
- To use a balanced and engaging approach to develop reading by teaching both decoding and comprehension skills.
- To expose the children to a breadth of high quality texts which are rich in vocabulary.
- To provide a consistent approach and structure to the teaching of Reading in which we carefully plan exciting and engaging lessons which will enable all children to thrive as readers.
- To develop and promote a love of reading.
Implementation
Phonics and Early Reading
Please refer to the 'KS1 Phonics and Reading Scheme' HERE for further information.
Daily Story Time
All children take part in a daily class story time session. Children usually have access to the book being shared and will listen carefully to an adult read the story to them. Class reading texts are designed to be slightly more challenging than the children's reading ability and these sessions provide fantastic opportunities for children to hear 'expert', fluent modelled reading. These sessions also provide children the opportunity for 'book talk' with the adult guiding children to discuss character, setting, plot, themes and even make connections between what they are reading and what they have read.
Guided Reading
Children in KS1 and KS2 participate in daily guided reading sessions. These sessions run on a carousel, with children taught in smaller groups at an instructional level suited to their current reading attainment levels. Children are exposed to a variety of text types and extracts from texts linked to their topic learning, and sessions aim to challenge and develop decoding, word recognition, fluency and comprehension of text. Children participate in a variety of follow-up activities each week as part of their guided reading carousel, including tasks to develop and explore vocabulary and tasks to allow children to independently demonstrate their developing reading skills.
Reading Gladiators
We use Reading Gladiators to support the reading of our most-able learners from Year 2 - Year 6.
"The rigorous requirements of the reading framework require deep engagement and response to texts. Reading Gladiators™ helps prepare pupils for these demands immersing children in quality, challenging and varied books while fostering reading for enjoyment. Participation in high-level discussion helps develop deeper reading skills, builds reading stamina, and nurtures adventurous readers." Reading Gladiators (2021)
Texts have been carefully selected to enhance the Mersey Drive curriculum.
Please find details about the Mersey Drive Reading Gladiators journey HERE
Additional Support for Readers
Through the use of our school assessment systems, children who are identified as requiring additional support for reading are routinely targeted and receive additional daily support in school. This additional intervention is designed to assist children to develop their decoding, fluency and comprehension skills in focused, 1:1 or small group sessions. Children work on SMART targets and are given regular verbal feedback from adults to assist them in making progress.
Home Reading
Please find parental guidance documentation for home reading HERE
Impact
We use Accelerated Reader to carefully monitor and track home reading for children who have moved beyond phonetically decodable reading books. Accelerated Reader allows children to quiz on the books they have read at home. Children who score 80% or greater on their reading quizzes are considered to have sufficiently comprehended their reading, and teachers monitor quiz scores to move children up through the Accelerated Reader scales regularly to ensure children are exposed to texts of increasing difficulty.
Linked with Accelerated Reader, Star Reader Assessments are completed each half term to ensure that children are working at the appropriate reading level. These assessments allow teachers to track progress in reading and also identify any children who may require additional support quickly, to prevent children from falling behind.
At key assessment points throughout the year, children are assessed using the NTS Reading Assessments. These assessments provide teachers with key attainment and progress data on how children's reading is progressing, and allows teachers to identify children who may need additional reading support.
Additionally, teachers make use of formative assessment during weekly guided reading sessions to inform future planning and provide reading support at the appropriate level for each child.
Reading for Pleasure
As part of our school's 'Reading for Pleasure' agenda, key authors have been mapped across the curriculum. The aim of the key author study is to raise the profile of a variety of significant British authors and broaden our children's reading repertoire. Class reading areas will provide space for children to explore the work of their termly key author, and time during the guided reading carousel is also dedicated to allowing children to explore the work of their key author.
World Book Day 2022
This year for World Book Day, we decided to focus on developing our love or vocabulary. Our book focuses were 'The Word Collector' by Peter Reynolds and 'The Word Collector' by Sonja Wimmer.
The children were encouraged to come in to school dressed as a word, and in class, they explored a variety of high level vocabulary that they might use in their writing.
Using the books as a starting point, children completed a vocabulary hunt around school and worked collaboratively to create our own Mersey Drive Wow Word Journal.
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Photographs coming soon...
