Reading at Barnsole

At Barnsole, we prioritise reading across the school and believe it is fundamental to success within our curriculum and beyond. Developing strong reading skills is key for all children to be able to access the full curriculum and to give them the best possible outcomes at all stages of their education and into their adult lives. We work hard to promote and embed a love of reading in every child.

In Reception and Year One, children learn to read through our Systematic, Synthetic Phonics Scheme: Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised, and access to carefully matched Collins reading books, which give them the opportunity to practise the phonics they have learnt. The aim is for children to be successful and to realise early on that they are readers, which brings confidence and excitement to young children as well as a sense of accomplishment.

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 In school, the children have adult-led reading sessions throughout the week. Children are introduced to their new book, they learn to decode the words and ensure that they can start to build a level of fluency when reading it. We then focus on prosody (patterns of stress and intonation) and move onto developing children's comprehension of what is happening within the text.  We ask all parents to support their child's reading development by listening to them read every day at home and by showing this by writing a short comment in their reading record to say how they have got on and where they need help. 

As the children move beyond the need for explicit phonics teaching, they begin whole class reading. For the majority of children, this is in Year Two. We use carefully chosen texts from the Steps to Read reading scheme, which build children's vocabulary and which, when appropriate, are linked to our topics and projects. Reading sessions are a combination of practising and continuing to develop fluency skills and prosody, as well as deepening the children's understanding of texts. Children have lots of opportunities for discussion, to work in groups as well as to express their thoughts in writing.

Our Whole Class Reading curriculum and our planning of lessons is based on  the reading content domains from the National Curriculum to ensure a broad coverage in our reading lessons. 

Core Steps to Read:

Year 2

 Year 2 Reading Implementation and Progression Overview

Year 3

Year 3 Reading Implementation and Progression Overview

Year 4

Year 4 Reading Implementation and Progression Overview

Year 5

Year 5 Reading Implementation and Progression Overview

Year 6

 Year 6 Reading Implementation and Progression Overview

Some of the ways we promote reading at Barnsole

- We read with your child at school and add additional sessions for those who need them. 

- We expect children to read at home daily and to record this in their reading records.

- We have the Bookmark initiative, which encourages children to read as many books as they can and fill up their bookmark. Completed bookmarks are then placed into a lottery and each half term we draw winners who are taken to a local bookshop with a book token to buy a book of their own choice.

- We celebrate reading through displays across the school.

- We have book sales to encourage children to children to read new books and to raise money to be able to buy more books for school. 

- We have 'book character dress up days to help us celebrate World Book Day. 

- We have reading based assemblies. 

- We invite parents in for parent reading sessions.

-We share recommended reading lists.