________________________________ Reading

 

What reading activities do we do in school?

 

Shared and modelled reading through reading aloud

In shared reading the teacher models the reading process to the whole class or on a 1:1 level as an expert reader, providing a high level of support. The teacher’s role is that of the expert reader who models how the text is read. The pupils, the learner readers, join in where appropriate with the reading of the text. The texts selected are rich and challenging, being beyond the current reading ability of the majority of the class.

Teachers should match the children’s interests, age and class topic to a range of books throughout the year to be used to read aloud to the class. Reading aloud should be used by the teacher to encourage the children’s own reading interest, and to model reading with intonation and expression. This will also allow for the discreet teaching of speaking and listening skills and oral comprehension.

 

Guided reading

Guided reading is an approach to teaching reading that supports pupils’ development as active and independent readers. In guided reading, the responsibility for reading shifts to the learner. The teacher structures all reading tasks with pupils, who can be grouped by ability, are required to read and respond to the text themselves with the teacher supporting. Texts of graded difficulty are carefully chosen and matched to the reading ability of the group/pupil. The focus for the reading is concerned with reinforcing and extending strategies and/or objectives already taught in shared reading.

 

Core and Theme Vocabulary

 

 

 

Reading for pleasure

Reading for pleasure and enjoyment is given a high priority at Riverside Bridge School; especially to those pupils who are unable to engage in the actual ‘decoding’ yet as they can find interest and enjoyment from the content of books and thus ‘develop their powers of imagination, inventiveness and critical awareness’ at a level appropriate to their own particular stage of development. Sufficient time is allowed for this in the curriculum during daily “DEAR TIME” – Drop Everything and Read. They are given opportunities to consolidate their reading and to use their developing skills in a range of contexts as being involved in reading and writing activities, with any degree of support, will develop language knowledge even if the child does not become an independent reader.

 

Other Reading Opportunities

Reading skills are cross-curricular and many opportunities are provided for pupils to practise and extend their reading at all time as well as celebrate favourite authors and/or books.

Pupils have access to a wide range of quality texts in order to extend and develop their reading skills and interest in reading. Books are organised according to the Letters and Sounds Scheme and staff choose the books according to the individual needs of their pupils.

Further Reading Opportunities:

• Every year the whole school takes part into the “Read for Good” Readathlon in which pupils are motivated to read to raise money for charity. They are able to read from comics to classic and audio books to blogs.

• The school has also is own termly challenge “Read-o-meter”. Pupils are encouraged to read as much as possible and the number of pages they read goes towards their phase overall score.

 

Parental Involvement

Pupils are also encouraged to read at home and support from parents/carers is vital in ensuring consistency of learning within literacy.

Workshops and coffee mornings give the opportunity to parents to understand the school teaching strategies around phonics, reading, word semantics schemes and enquiry about any aspects of the curriculum.

Parents are invited to DIAR (Drop In And Read) sessions to model good practice and share tips to read with their child at home. For those who are not able to attend those sessions a “How to read with your child” guide has been publicised and shared on our website.

Every family has access to RNIB book share, which is a great opportunity to get parents and their child involved with reading at home. The school provides every child with their own login which is linked to their Curriculum Pathway. Books that are  suited to each child’s ability  can be added every term as and when. These books can be downloaded on to various electronic devices and can be adapted into PDFs, Word documents or audio. Some texts also have the option to be adapted in the browser, to change the size of font, colour of background and size of margins.

 

Progress is reviewed and parents are informed of their child’s development regarding phonics and reading regularly as well as being given updates to targets through the pupils’ Development Profile being sent home termly and the annual EHCP review process.