English Reading

Learning to read is the most important thing your child will learn at our school. Everything else depends on it, so we put as much energy as we possibly can into making sure that every single child learns to read as quickly as possible.  We want your child to love reading – and to want to read for themselves. This is why we put our efforts into making sure they develop a love of books as well as simply learning to read.

At Thatto Heath Primary School, we use Read Write Inc Phonics/Reading.

Read, Write Inc is a tried and tested, highly successful phonics programme for children aged 4 to 7 who are learning to read and write. It teaches children how to both decode and understand written language to become confident and enthusiastic readers and writers. This is achieved by a dynamic approach to teaching phonics that is consistent across the school using the Read, Write Inc phonics resources and fully decodable reading books.

Children are grouped according to their ability in Foundation Stage and Key Stage 1 to ensure that teaching is matched to their level. Phonics in Foundation Stage and Key Stage 1 takes place on a daily basis. Children in Key Stage 2 that still require phonics teaching, continue with a specially tailored programme (RWInc) to meet their individual needs.

Whole Class Reading – After the children have completed the RWI programme they continue their learning through acquisition of higher order reading skills. A range of reading strategies are developed through shared reading sessions. We use the acronym VIPERS. (Vocabulary, Inference, Prediction, Explanation, Retrieval and Summarise) for these daily reading lessons.  Each skill is explored during sessions to develop overall reading comprehension.