In school, your children will experience a range of reading opportunities, which include:
Some of these will happen in English lessons but equally, children will have these opportunities across the curriculum.
It is expected that children will continue to develop their reading at home through reading with adults and older siblings and completing allocated home learning tasks.
Unlocking Letters and Sounds Phonics is a synthetic phonics programme that provides everything needed to help children succeed in early reading.
The teaching program and reading books are grouped in a developing order based on the order of sounds introduced in synthetic phonics programs.
At Woodlands Academy, we teach phonics every day to our children. Each child will be given a book to take home which focuses on the sounds they need to practise.
Books will be changed regularly and children will need to have read their books at least three times at home. They will be heard reading aloud by an adult in school before their books are changed.
At Woodlands Academy children are taught a balance of reading strategies through whole class Active Reading sessions.
Active Reading takes place at least three times a week with one strategy being taught each week. Once all strategies for the year group have been covered, they will be revisited to embed the strategy further and push the pupils’ learning and reading forward. Active Reading is taught from Early Years through to Year 6.
During Active Reading lessons, teachers will use the session to teach the different strategies, hear your child read and ask questions to ensure development of reading. Teachers will model the strategy at the beginning of a week and children will develop their use of it as the week progresses.
Regular comprehensions are taught as part of English. These may or may not be linked to a specific genre or text.
Year 2:
Children will be given opportunities to read their books to themselves silently. During this time, adults will read with individual children. For those children who are on Accelerated Reader books, they can quiz on their books during this time too.
Being heard by an adult:
When hearing readers we ensure the atmosphere is purposeful and that the child feels comfortable. All children will be heard read at least once a week in Reception and Key Stage 1, with targeted children being read with more frequently.
Each week your child will be expected to read at least three times at home. They will be expected to read their book that is matched to their phonics level, or their associated ZPD level in Accelerated Reading later on in the year, if they are in Year 2.
Books will be changed when a child has read their book at least three times and it has been recorded in their reading records.
They can also bring a library book home with them each week. This is a book that your child will have chosen from the library themselves and can be read independently or with an adult/older sibling at home.
For every 25 reads completed at home and recorded in their reading diary, pupils can earn coloured karate reading bands that they can wear to school. These will be presented in assembly on a Friday.
White band ~ 25 reads
Yellow band ~ 50 reads
Orange band ~ 75 reads
Green band ~ 100 reads
Blue band ~ 125 reads
Brown band ~ 150 reads
Black band ~ 175 reads
Dragon status ~ 200+ reads
Year 2:
If it is the first time your child has read the book, look at the cover and title with them to predict what they think the book might be about. Make links to other books read with similar themes, the same characters and/or similar authors/illustrators. Give them time to flick through the book and read the blurb.
Here are some questions you may choose to ask your child after finishing their book –
In school, your children will experience a range of reading opportunities, which include:
Some of these will happen in English lessons but equally, children will have these opportunities across the curriculum.
It is expected that children will continue to develop their reading at home through reading with adults and older siblings, reading to themselves and completing allocated home learning tasks.
At Woodlands Academy, children are taught a balance of reading strategies through whole class Active Reading sessions.
Active Reading takes place at least three times a week, with one strategy being taught each week. Once all strategies for the year group have been covered, they will be revisited to embed the strategy further and push the pupils’ learning and reading forward. Active Reading is taught from Early Years through to Year 6.
During Active Reading lessons, teachers will use the session to teach the different strategies, hear your child read and ask questions to ensure development of reading. Teachers will model the strategy at the beginning of a week and children will develop their use of it as the week progresses.
It is expected that regular comprehensions are taught as part of English. These may or may not be linked to a specific genre or text.
Comprehensions may be published or written by teachers and will enable children to be exposed to different text genres linked to their writing.
During reading comprehensions pupils will have opportunities to apply the reading strategies taught during Active Reading.
Comprehensions should include questions that cover some or all of the specific reading objectives and cover a range of text types, fiction, non-fiction and poetry.
Standardised comprehensions will be used to test children at various points throughout the year. This information will then be used to assess the children’s learning so far, and to identify any areas of their learning that they may need to develop further through class teaching/interventions.
From the end of Year 2 up to Year 6, pupils’ individual reading books will be taken from levelled Accelerated Reader books. At the start of the year, pupils in KS2 will take a star reader test to determine which level books they should be reading. They will be given a ZPD level range to select books from.
As soon as a pupil has finished their book, they must take a quiz online. The quiz will assess children’s understanding of what they have read and whether they are ready to move up to the next level.
At regular points throughout the year pupils will retake the star reader test to be given a new ZPD range.
For every Accelerated Reader quiz completed, the number of words a child has read in the book will be added to their profile. Throughout the terms we will collate how many words each class and child has read and celebrate this in assembly.
Children will be given daily opportunities to read their reading book to themselves silently.
During this time, adults will read with individuals.
Children may also quiz on their Accelerated Reader books during this time.
When hearing readers, we ensure the atmosphere is purposeful and that the child feels comfortable.
All children will be heard read at least once every two weeks in Key Stage Two, with targeted readers identified and heard read more frequently.
Each week your child will be expected to read at least three times at home. In Key Stage Two, this will be their Accelerated Reader book or, if your child is not reading at an Accelerated Reader level, they will bring home an appropriate book that matches their reading level.
Children may also bring home a library book of their choice, which they can read to themselves or have read to them by an adult.
Please encourage your children to read the book to you, or independently, until they are familiar with the words and demonstrate a good level of understanding.
All children in the school are given a Reading Record Book. We ask that you sign and date when you hear your child read at home and make a comment when you hear your child read. Year 5 and 6 children can fill in their reading diary independently.
Children can use their home reading to count towards their Karate Reading bands (see below).
For every 25 reads completed at home and recorded in their reading diary, pupils can earn coloured karate reading bands that they can wear to school. These will be presented in assembly on a Friday.
White band ~ 25 ‘reads’
Yellow band ~ 50 ‘reads’
Orange band ~ 75 ‘reads’
Green band ~ 100 ‘reads’
Blue band ~ 125 ‘reads’
Brown band ~ 150 ‘reads’
Black band ~ 175 ‘reads’
If it is the first time your child has read the book, look at the cover and title with them to predict what they think the book might be about. Make links to other books read with similar themes, the same characters and/or similar authors/illustrators. Give them time to flick through the book and read the blurb.
