Reading: 

Intent 

At Roman Hill we aim to ensure that every child leaves our school as competent, confident readers. We want to enable the children to have a passion for literature, so that they can share their love of reading confidently and develop culturally, emotionally, intellectually, social and spiritually. We recognise that reading is a key skill needed for children to be able to access all areas of the curriculum. We aim to expose our children to a rich and diverse range of texts and be challenged to deepen and apply their reading skills throughout the curriculum. At our school  

This is achieved through our CUSP Reading Curriculum by Unity Schools Partnership, which is deliberately designed to be ambitious and aspirational, ensuring that every child leaves our school as a competent, confident reader. Drawing on the latest research around explicit vocabulary instruction, reading fluency and key comprehension strategies, this curriculum is a synthesis of what we know works in helping children make outstanding progress in reading. Our CUSP Reading Curriculum ensures that learning is taught and revisited over time. 

Implementation:

The clear structure and principles of the CUSP curriculum ensure that teaching is progressive, challenging and engaging and the rich, diverse literature spine acts as both a mirror so that every child can see themselves in the core texts and as a mirror to engage pupils with experiences beyond their own .The texts are mapped carefully to ensure a breadth of experience, authors, texts and themed are accessed across the Primary years. In addition to these texts, there are core poems that each year group will study in detail. 

From year 1 to year 6 each learning sequence follows the same structure:  

• Explicit vocabulary instruction 

• Deliberate fluency instruction and prosody training 

• Explicit teaching of comprehension strategies 

• Clear focus on what pupils should know, be able to do and remember 

Each CUSP reading lesson follows the same structure: 

• Connect
• Explain 
• Example 
• Attempt 
• Apply 
• Challenge 

From EYFS up to year 6 children will read daily as part of their CUSP reading, phonics or guided reading session. Children working at the expected level for reading, read with an adult weekly. The first 20% of children and those who require additional support to progress in their reading, read with an adult 5 times over a two-week period. Children who need significant support to progress in their reading are heard daily. Each class also develop their library skills regularly by selecting their own books, to read with an adult when visiting our school library. Adults across the school model a love of reading by sharing stories daily, embedding the exploration of vocabulary and organising challenges and events that encourage children to take part consistently, with regular parent involvement. This is achieved through discussion and exploration so children can unlock skills of communication that have been modelled to them.  

In EYFS we understand the importance of pupils having access to rich language from an early age and respond to pupils needs, talents and interests. The CUSP EYFS core literature spine sets out 25 core texts that are carefully selected to contain key themes, ideas and language which is fundamental for laying strong foundations. All EYFS pupils have a structured story time, reading and writing sessions each week using a core text.  

Impact 

As a result of our reading teaching, children are engaged, excited by reading and our children have a love of reading. These assessments are used to inform next steps and set individual pupil targets. The short-term assessments that teachers make as part of every lesson help them to adjust their daily plans and plan next steps for pupils. They use medium term assessments to measure progress against the key objectives, and to help them plan for the next unit of work. Teachers make summative assessments and use them to assess progress against school and national targets. Children are assessed termly through Pixl reading tests and/or mock SATs within years 2 and 6. Children undertake the national tests at the end of Year 2 and Year 6. Additionally, in KS2 children take a reading speed test each term and KS1 pupils are assessed in their phonics through Little Wandle Letters and Sounds each half term. With the help of these assessments, teachers can set targets and summarise the progress of each child before discussing it with the child’s parents. The next teacher also uses these assessments as the basis or planning work for the new school year.  
The subject leader keeps samples of children’s work in a portfolio. This demonstrates what the expected level of achievement is in reading in each year of the school. Teachers meet regularly to review examples of work. Regular monitoring of books is carried out by the subject leader and staff to assess the quality and progression of work throughout the school.  

Monitoring of the standards of the children’s work and of the quality of teaching in readings is the responsibility of the reading subject leaders. The work of the subject leaders also involves supporting colleagues in the teaching of reading, being informed about current developments in the subject, and providing a strategic lead and direction for the subject in the school. The subject leaders meet with the Head teacher regularly in which they evaluate the strengths and weaknesses in the subject and indicate areas for further improvement. The leaders have allocated management time to enable the review of the samples of the children’s work and undertake lesson observations of reading teaching across the school.  

Phonics

As a school, we use the Little Wandle program to teach Phonics. You can read more about the program with this link:

https://www.littlewandlelettersandsounds.org.uk/resources/for-parents/

All pupils who are learning phonics will have a home reading book matched on their current phonics sounds. 

We have a broad range of books to cater for the interests of all children. Books after phonics are colour banded to meet individual children’s needs.

Teachers and TAs regularly read with children at school and books go home daily to encourage parents and children to read together. Please ensure all reads are recorded in reading records.