Wendell ParkEnglish - Reading and Phonics
Reading Intent
At Wendell Park, we aim to give all of our children the skills to listen and learn, and give them the confidence to express their own individual voice. We believe that nurturing proficient readers is a necessity in developing happy, independent and motivated life-long learners.
At Wendell Park, we understand that enthusiastic readers make proficient writers. We aim to model and nurture a love of reading and language, and to facilitate the safe space to play with words, acquire new vocabulary and to simply explore the effects of language.
Reading Implementation
At Wendell Park, fostering a love of reading underpins all of our learning. Throughout our school, we use dynamic book exploration and imaginative learning sequences to bring texts to life; we delve into high quality texts to explore and celebrate a range of authors, genres and cultures.
At Wendell Park, the foundations of reading are embedded in the early reader through the methodical teaching of phonics, subscribing to the Read Write Inc. model. At an early age, these fundamental skills are complimented by a love of story and book discovery: daily story times, habitual text exploration, stimulating story discussions and role-play of characters.
As our children continue on their journey, we provide reading lessons that delve into the seven Core Areas of Reading with directed activities and questioning; Vocabulary, Retrieval, Summary, Inference, Prediction, Compare & Contrast and Author Choice. We believe that good reading comprehension is a product of developing active readers that are enthusiastic and responsive, whilst given them the skills to verbalize their responses.
At Wendell Park we aim to bridge the gap between reading as a tool for learning and reading as a gateway to life! We provide timetabled storytelling and our adults help guide children to make reading choices that are accessible, appropriate and ambitious.
Reading Impact
Regardless of culture, background or ability, all of our children have access to high quality teaching and a rich range of text types. At Wendell Park, we are determined to create voracious readers that are ambitious, responsive and, above all, develop a life-long love of reading.
Early Reading
Our Early Reading at Brackenbury document reviews the points raised in the Ofsted framework and provides parents and inspectors further detail about the teaching of early reading at Wendell Park Primary.
Progression of Skills and Knowledge
Our ‘Reading subject progression of skills and knowledge' document gives further information about what the children are taught in this subject by year group.
Progression of skills and knowledge
Phonics Scheme
Phonics is taught daily throughout Reception and Key Stage 1 to develop phonological awareness, early reading and speaking and listening skills. We use the Read Write Inc which is written to be in line with the government’s ‘Letters and Sounds’ guidance to provide high quality teaching of these skills. A wide range of materials are used throughout the school to develop a love of reading and children are encouraged to read a range of genres. We have developed information documents for parents which can be downloaded below.
Phonics Expectations of Progress
Phonics Parent Presentation
We have shared a phonics parent workshop annually for parents and the presentation slides can be viewed here
Long term Phonics Plan
Our Long Term Phonics Plan details the learning journey that all children will undertake when they are learning to read. This gives week by week details for Nursery to Year 2 can be viewed below.