Reading
The teaching of the National Curriculum for English at Central Park Primary consists of the following:
Phonics: We use a synthetic phonics programme called RWI to help children learn to read and spell.
Phonics is one method of teaching children how to read and write using sounds. There are 44 sounds
in the English Language, which we put together to form words. A phonics lesson begins with revising
any sounds the children have already been taught. Then the teacher will introduce a new sound and
its spelling. Children then have an opportunity to practice the skill and apply it. We run parent
workshops to support parents in helping their children at home. The school is very well resourced
with phonic games and equipment and ICT is utilized where appropriate. Children’s phonics progress
is assessed regularly and children who need support are offered individual or group tutoring. Phonics
will be taught as a strategy to support reading across KS2, where needed, and a personalised
programme will be created.
We follow a Mastery approach to English through the programme Pathways to Read. Units of work are delivered using high quality texts and children in all year groups are given varied opportunities
for reading. Skills are built up through repetition within the units, and children apply these skills in the reading activities provided.
In KS2, the programme is delivered through whole class shared reading lessons. In Y2, children participate in one whole class lesson followed by bespoke grouped reading at least once a week as well as individual reading. In our whole class reading, there is a clear teaching focus with the opportunity to master key reading skills in each session. There are follow on reading tasks to enable pupils to evidence the skills they have mastered independently.
Many opportunities for widening children’s vocabulary are given through the Pathways to Read approach and this builds on the extensive work we do in school to provide our children with a rich and varied vocabulary.
You will find the end of year expectations for reading for each of our year groups in the attached documents. For further detail on the skills that your children are learning on a termly basis, please contact your class teacher.
We also use Pathways to Write to drive our writing curriculum. This aligns with Pathways to Read ensuring meaningful links for our pupils with texts and topics that are used across Literacy, Humanities and Science.