Intent

At Honilands, reading is at the core of our curriculum and is a vital part of all children’s learning and progress. We believe that all of our pupils, whatever their needs, have the right to become independent, fluent and confident readers, allowing them to go on to progress and flourish in the wider world.  Reading lays the foundations for all pupils to be able to access and succeed in all areas of the curriculum, as well as progress and succeed in the world of adulthood with confidence. With access to a range of genres and quality and diverse texts with rich vocabulary, we nurture our children to recognise that reading allows them to consistently discover new knowledge, not only across the curriculum, but in the world around them.  Building a love of reading in our diverse community allows children to escape into worlds that would otherwise be inaccessible, developing the cultural capital needed to support them with their future aspirations. We intend to foster a true love and passion for reading, language and comprehension, whilst providing them with the skills needed to take them wherever they aspire to be.

Implementation

Foundation Stage at Honilands

The systematic teaching of phonics through quality first teaching is a high priority throughout the Foundation Stage in order to make a strong start with early reading. As soon as children begin their journey at Honilands the teaching of reading begins. In Nursery, the focus is on developing children’s vocabulary through nursery rhymes, poems, stories, songs and planned talk. They are introduced to letter sounds through the RWInc phonics programme in the summer term. During the first half-term in Reception, children receive whole class teaching of phonics sounds every day. After the first half-term, children are taught in matched ability groups to ensure their individual needs are consistently met and learning is accessible to all. Children read  words consistent with their phonic knowledge by sound-blending. Any children who are seen as struggling or have additional needs will receive regular one-to-one support to ensure they keep up and are not left behind. All children are exposed to rich texts and vocabulary each day through story times and the use of core texts, where they hear intonation and expression out loud from the reader. Children are able to demonstrate their understanding of a text by predicting and retelling familiar stories. 

Key Stage 1 at Honilands  

As the children progress into KS1, the systematic teaching of phonics continues every morning in matched ability groups to target all needs, as well as a whole class session each afternoon to expose all children to sounds they may not yet have heard in their group. Children are taught to apply their phonic knowledge and skills to decode familiar and unfamiliar words with the sounds they have been taught. All children have one-to-one reading time with both an adult and their peers during the RWInc sessions. For children identified as needing extra support with phonics, one-to-one and small group interventions take place in the afternoons  in order to close gaps and  build confidence and skills in sound knowledge, word reading, fluency and comprehension. By the end of spring half-term, when decoding has been embedded and reading has become more fluent, children in year 2 will progress onto the RWInc ‘Comprehension programme’ to further build on, and secure, their fluency and comprehension skills before moving to whole-class English lessons. 

Key Stage 2 at Honilands 

Once children have progressed through the phonics and comprehension programmes, they will attend whole-class reading sessions through our ‘Honilands Inference Programme(HIP), for 30 minutes each day.  Pupils are introduced to a variety of quality, rich and age-appropriate texts/novels where they are able to utilise the skills they have gained, and continue to build on their fluency and comprehension skills as well as the skills to compare, contrast, infer and learn new vocabulary.  Any children in KS2 who remain on the RWInc programme as an intervention, continue to attend daily groups as well as having daily one-to-one sessions to support closing gaps in their word reading, fluency and comprehension skills and to support them coming off the programme. 

Planning & Teaching

RWInc

The RWInc programme provides daily and weekly planning as well as resources for all levels of the programme, ensuring consistency in teaching and learning across all groups. 

• A new sound with related vocabulary (green words), is taught each day depending on the level being taught. 
• Children practise sounds taught through daily spellings. 
• New vocabulary related to the focus story is explicitly taught at the start of the week and is recapped throughout the week to support fluency when reading the storybook. 
• Each group will have regular one-to-one reading time with an adult and also through partner reading.
• ‘Hold a Sentence’ activities are completed each week to support early writing.

HIP (Honilands Inference Programme)

Our HIP programme works through a cycle of skills to address the reading content domains from the National Curriculum:  vocabulary, retrieval, summary, inference & prediction, and compare & contrast. A variety of decodable text extracts & novels are used which offer conversational opportunities for pupils to develop their speaking and listening skills through reading out loud and through class discussions where they can communicate what they know and understand by justifying their views and opinions. At the end of each text/unit, learning is consolidated through a variety of  targeted comprehension questions to further assess understanding. 

Home Reading

Each week, children on the RWInc programme take home a reading for pleasure book which can be shared with an adult at home, a copy of the book they have read in their reading group that week and a phonetically decodable book containing the sounds they have learnt, that can be  read independently with confidence. Once children are off the RWnc programme, they will become free readers and take home a book of their choice. These books are monitored each week by class teachers to ensure an appropriate level of challenge is provided, and the book is accessible for the pupil.  Books taken home by pupils each week are recorded by class teachers.

Our Reading Time Spine

Our Reading Time spine includes core ‘Reading Time’ texts for daily reading out loud in each class. We aim that each year, the group is exposed to a variety of diverse texts reflecting our community, which includes poetry and non-fiction as well as picture books and fiction texts from a range of authors. Children have the opportunity to discuss new vocabulary and illustrations and hear texts read out loud with expression and intonation. We aim to update this list each year in order to include newly published and engaging titles to keep our children immersed in the love of books.

Reading for Pleasure

Reading for enjoyment is a high priority at Honilands and is promoted and celebrated through:

• Regular half termly class visits to our local library as well as the school library.
• KS1 & KS2 libraries open for children at lunch times. 
• Reading class swaps each term.
• Visiting authors.
• Book fairs.
• World Book Days.
• Daily ‘Reading Time’ in all classes
• Class reading corners containing a range of age-related, diverse texts and genres.

Impact

Feedback 

RWInc sessions

• Children mark & assess their own work using purple pens with close adult monitoring.
• Group leaders support children in reflecting on, and editing their spelling work & ‘Hold a Sentence’ activity.

HIP sessions: 

• Oral discussion and feedback is used to improve pupils' understanding of the text throughout each lesson.

Assessment

• All children on the RWInc programme are assessed at the end of each half-term using RWInc assessments. Children are regrouped to ensure they are being challenged, gaps are identified and support is put in place for the lowest 20% of children. 
• Termly comprehension reading assessments are used for pupils from Years 1–6 who are fluent readers, including past SATs papers for year 2 and 6. Gap analysis is used to inform future planning.
• Reading age screening is also carried out each term.