Orchid Vale Primary School

Reading has a high profile in our school. Adults read aloud to children, ensuring that they become familiar with a range of stories and authors from our literary heritage, including a range of texts from a wide range of cultural and historical contexts.   Reading areas are attractive, prominent and well-stocked. There is a timetabled and a whole class structured reading session every day in school. This allows children to read for pleasure, while improving reading fluency, developing a rich vocabulary and widening their comprehension skills.   Children of all ages read 1:1 with an adult, with vulnerable groups identified for additional work with support staff. All children take books home; for our younger children, these are colour-banded reading scheme books selected from a range of commercial reading schemes, while older children make their own selections. Books are inclusive and accessible, supplemented each year by an affordable book fair in school. In Year 1, children undertake traditional carousel guided reading; from Year 2 onwards, reading comprehension is taught as a discrete whole class reading lesson planned as part of the week’s sequence of teaching. We use the VIPERS mnemonic to help children understand and utilise a full range of skills to comprehend age-appropriate texts. Teachers have a strong knowledge of children’s literature and take a personal interest in supporting and developing individual children’s love of books. Reading is assessed formatively by teachers and summatively through NFER tests at three points each year. Standards are monitored through regular planning and book scrutiny by the English leader plus learning walks, observations and pupil voice.

Our school library is supported by Libresoft - an online system that enables children to take books out and return them like they would in a local library.

In our school, the emphasis is placed upon writing having both a genuine purpose and an audience. Writing is inspired by a range of high quality text (CLPE Power of Reading scheme) and engaging experiences such as trips or visitors to the school. Children are taught to write to entertain, inform, persuade and discuss; they may produce writing from a range of genres. There are also regular cross-curricular writing opportunities in science and humanities. Children of all ages are taught to edit and improve their own work and that of their peers. From the earliest age, children are encouraged to develop their writing stamina in order to produce longer pieces of work. After a sequence of structured, teacher-supported lessons, children are given the opportunity to write independently, with older children exercising some degree of choice over subject matter and / or genre.