Reading & Phonics

‘Books and doors are the same thing. You open them, and you go through into another world.’ Jeanette Winterson

At Seamer and Irton CP School we are a ‘reading school’. We believe that the teaching of reading is integral to a child’s understanding and appreciation of the world around them, allowing them to explore possibilities both imagined and real and develop the vocabulary needed to express themselves effectively. Our reading curriculum strives to foster a love of reading in all pupils. We cultivate the reading behaviours and teach the techniques needed for pupils to access, understand and discuss texts fully. Our curriculum is delivered through synthetic phonics; systematic, whole-class and guided group reading sessions; reading across other curriculum subjects; opportunities to hear texts read aloud every day; and home reading. As a staff, we model what effective reading looks like and share our enthusiasm about texts. We maintain a well-stocked, current, welcoming school library in order to enhance pupils’ reading for pleasure opportunities.

We use the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised synthetic phonics programme to teach pupils to read and John Murray’s Reading Explorers: A Guided Skills Based Journey approach to teach reading for meaning techniques and comprehension strategies.