“The more that you read, the more things you will know.

The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go.” – Dr. Seuss

The aspiration for each of our children is based upon the need for them to enter the world of work as articulate and literate individuals with a strong  love of reading. Competence in reading is the key to independent learning and has a direct effect on progression in all other areas of the curriculum. At St Peter's, our aim is not only for all children to develop the key skills they need but to foster a love and passion for language and literature and encourage imagination, curiosity and new interests and outlooks. We support children to:

• Become fluent, independent and reflective readers
• Read a wide variety of genres
• Develop a broad range of reading skills
• Use texts to broaden vocabulary

We aim to create “readers for life” - children who develop a love of books, who enjoy reading and read for pleasure. We provide opportunities for children to listen to their teachers read, read themselves, with partners and with other children across the school on a regular basis.

We play an important role in helping children to develop into confident readers. We believe that parents play an essential role in helping their child to learn to read.

Guided Reading

Guided reading is taught throughout the school and explicitly addresses the skills children need to become successful readers. Guided reading is delivered in two ways – in group and whole class sessions. In these sessions, children are taught the decoding of words and the skills needed for fluent and expressive reading. As the children become fluent readers, the focus for these guided sessions moves towards improving comprehension skills.  

From Year 2, all children take part in whole class reading sessions. As a class the children are introduced to text and through a carefully planned set of lessons, they will identify and discuss new vocabulary, develop their reading fluency and practise their comprehension skills. This whole class approach enables all children, whatever their reading ability to have exposure to high quality, texts and to be taught explicitly the comprehension skills required in the curriculum.

Children in Reception and Year 1 undertake group reading sessions 3 times a week as per our phonics programme. The sessions focus on decoding, prodsody and comprehension. 

Key Stage 2

We expect our children to be fluent readers by the time they move into Key Stage 2, and therefore our approach to teaching reading evolves into the development of expression, comprehension and exposure to a greater range of texts. Children are still given opportunities to read aloud and develop their fluency and expression further, not just in reading sessions but in drama and poetry recital opportunities in English or topic lessons.

Additional Reading Support

Whilst every effort is made to ensure that children develop the necessary literacy skills within a whole class context, it is sometimes necessary for children to be provided with additional support. In reading, this support is provided through:

• Voluntary readers
• 1:1 and small group reading interventions
• Phonics support

What difference can I make as a parent?

You can make a huge difference! Parents are the most important educators in a child’s life – even more important than their teachers – and it’s never too early to start reading together.

Further evidence suggests that children who read for enjoyment every day not only perform better in reading tests than those who don’t, but also develop a broader vocabulary, increased general knowledge and a better understanding of other cultures.

Reading for pleasure is more likely to determine whether a child does well at school than their social or economic background.

‘Read On. Get On.’ is a national campaign from Save The Children aimed at getting all children in the UK reading well by the age of 11. Watch their powerful film 

Please click below for some helpful reading tips:

https://www.booktrust.org.uk/books-and-reading/tips-and-advice/reading-tips/

Read this ‘Guide to help choose books for reluctant readers and readers with dyslexia’

https://www.nct.org.uk/baby-toddler/learning-talk-and-communication-your-baby/reading-your-child-whats-fuss-about