Early Reading in Foundation Stage and Key Stage 1
At St.
Gerard's, children begin their reading journey by learning phonic
sounds. As they progress through KS1 they begin to read at length,
showing greater fluency, comprehension and (most importantly) a
love of reading.
READ / WRITE INC - Phonics at St.
Gerard's
Read Write Inc. Phonics is a literacy programme
developed by Ruth Miskin and published by Oxford University Press.
It is taught in over 5000 schools in the United Kingdom.
In the programme children learn sounds and the letters that
represent them, and how to form the letters. Then, they read books
written using only the letters they have learnt (and a small number
of separately taught 'tricky words'). This gives the children
plenty of early success and builds up their reading
confidence.
CLICK THE LOGO ABOVE TO VISIT THE OFFICIAL READ
WRITE INC PAGE, WHICH INCLUDES USEFUL GUIDES FOR PARENTS.
Reception and Year 1
At St Gerard's, children begin RWI when they start in Reception and
will continue through Key Stage One. All children are screened in
Phonics to determine the group they will be working in. Children
from Class 1 and 2 are mixed depending on abilities. This is to
ensure that all children are working at a level which is most
suited to their needs.
RWI lessons take place on 4 days each week in
school.
Children begin each lesson learning a new phonic sound and recapping on sounds previously learnt. They will read a different story each week and develop reading with fluency and comprehension skills. Children will also complete daily writing tasks and a longer piece of writing at the end of the week.
Teaching in lessons is briskly paced, with strong visual elements
that help to engage all learners. Children at St. Gerard's
make great progress when they start the program and feedback from
the children themselves has been very positive.
The Read Write Inc. Phonics approach teaches children to read sets of sounds and then blend them to read words. The books that they read at school will only contain the sounds they’ve already learned, so children learn quickly and confidently.
First your child will learn to read:
Whilst they are practising reading stories with words made up of Set 1 Speed Sounds, your child will also learn to read:
Whilst they are practising reading stories with words made up of Set 1 and Set 2 Speed Sounds, your child will also learn to read:
Reading at Home
Each week, children working in Foundation and
Year 1 will bring home a Read, Write, Inc book. This will be the
book they have been working on throughout the week and they should
be able to read it quite easily. Children should work for about 10
minutes each night on the reading activities and then return the
book to school the following week to get a new
one.
Activities in the book:
Speed sounds
Green and Red words
Story
Speed words
In addition to this reading book children in Year
1 are encouraged to also take home a book banded reading book to
share with parents to ensure that they experience a variety of
texst and to help them develop an interest in all
books.
Year 2
When children reach year 2 they will begin
reading a range of texts in class linked to our "Literacy and
Language" lessons.
These texts include: fiction, non-fiction, poetry and play scripts. We also link many texts to our termly topics which are read as a whole-class story time.
Book Banded reading
Children will be assessed by their teacher and
given a colour book banded book to read at home. Each week children
will read with an adult in school to check they are at the correct
level.
Reading Challenge
In addition to book banded books, children in
Year 2 will also take part in a "Reading Challenge". Children will
be given a list of texts to choose from to read at home including
picture books and also chapter books.
To pass the Year 2 reading challenge, children will need to read at least 10 of the books throughout the year. When children have read one of the texts they will write a book review and recommend it to a friend before getting a new one. This will lead-in directly to the Key Stage 2 Reading Challenge.
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