Reading
At Wentworth, we value reading as a key life skill and therefore ensure it is at the heart of our curriculum. By the time our pupils leave here, we believe they will be confident in selecting and reading a wide range of material and have developed a real love of reading. Our readers are equipped with the tools to tackle unfamiliar vocabulary and material. They are able to recommend books to their peers and enjoy reading a wide range of genres, including non-fiction. Pupils enjoy participating in book talk, including evaluating an author’s use of language and how this can affect the reader. We encourage our pupils to see themselves as discerning readers and to be confident in discussing not only whether they enjoy a text but also the extent to which they agree with it. We ensure the books we read are part of our rich reading diet. In our books corners and school libraries we ensure they highlight areas of life where our pupils are not regularly exposed to in every day life such as diversity in society.
How we teach Reading (KS2)
We teach reading comprehension through daily Whole Class Reading lessons. Each half term, pupil will read and analyse a fiction, a non-fiction or a poetry text. Our Class novels are chosen with a clear rationale of how it can help teach pupils about life. Reading lessons include:
- An element of prosody (reading with feeling)
- A close look at key vocabulary that pupil may be unfamiliar with
- Unpicking the key skill focus for that lesson (retrieval, inference, prediction, summarising, vocabulary, making links)
- Modelled answering of questions
- Opportunities to apply the day's reading skills independently
- A weekly reading for pleasure session
- Teaching fluency by model reading, echo reading, choral reading and paired reading
In addition to our reading lessons in KS2, we also provide pupil with:
- Opportunities to read for pleasure
- Daily rapid catch up for pupil in years 3-6 (for any child who is not a fluent reader)
- Regular storytimes
- Regular, open ended discussions about stories and books.
- Opportunities to read and discuss a wide read of genres including poetry and non-fiction (including weekly newspapers to ensure pupils are aware of local, national and global issues).
Books that the pupils take home are carefully chosen to match the pupil's interests and their level of fluency.
We also have a number of reading enrichment activities, including:
- Regular visits to the school library.
- Visits from authors and poets.
- Book fairs every term- pupils are timetabled in for browsing sessions.
- Celebrations for World Book Week including competitions and lots of amazing costumes!
- Events such as "A winter's Tale" where pupils can listen to another staff member read stories relating to a particular event.
- Access to their teachers reading stories on the school website.
- Book fairs every term- pupils are timetabled in for browsing sessions.
- A reading breakfast every year with family participation.
- Reading buddies- teaming up older and younger classes to share favourite books together.
In addition, 1:1 reading is put in place for pupils that need extra practise. Books that the pupils take home are carefully chosen to match the pupil's interests and their level of fluency.
