Reading at Bradfield CE Primary

At Bradfield CE Primary School reading takes priority and our students consistently exceed national and local authority data at the end of Key Stage Two.   We believe that reading is an essential life skill and we are committed to enabling children to become fluent, critical and avid readers. We aim to provide our students with a challenging reading curriculum based on purposefully chosen whole class texts, which they truly enjoy. Our goal is that reading is fun, engaging and is used as a tool for learning across subjects.  

Children’s love for reading is of upmost importance at Bradfield. To aid this, there is a Literature Spine of texts which have been carefully chosen with a clear rationale to ensure students are exposed to a diverse range of authors, genres and challenge, some of which the children may not choose for themselves. We encourage a love of reading through many different strategies including: book hooks, daily reading for pleasure, 'our school is a library', dedicated daily reading time, book boxes and reading scrapbooks. In addition, reading is interlaced within the wider curriculum and used as a tool for learning.  

In EYFS and Key Stage One, high quality and systematic teaching of phonics, via the Little Wandle scheme, plays a central part in the teaching of early reading.  The consistent, high-quality teaching of phonics is considered of upmost importance. Regular, accurate assessment of phonics enables any student falling behind to be identified quickly so they can be caught up using interventions. While children are learning phonics, their reading books are phonetically decodable and closely matched to their phonetic knowledge. 

Post phonics, reading is taught through whole class texts, which become increasingly more challenging as children move through the school. Teachers read texts daily, through a ‘Book Talk’ lesson, modelling what it is to be a good reader, thoughts about the text and thinking aloud, as well as fluency and prosody. Reading skills (VIPERS): Vocabulary, Inference, Prediction, Explanation, Retrieval and Summarising/Sequencing are explicitly taught in reading lessons once per week. Children’s reading books are matched to pupils’ fluency and comprehension ability through PM Benchmarking and book bands. Children have access to a well-stocked library, where they regularly borrow books, which interest them. Books in classrooms are arranged in book corners, which are inviting and appealing. Books are displayed by book band and genre and there is a wide selection of non-fiction texts which link to the topics being covered in the class.  

The Bradfield Book Spine Y2-6