St Simon’s Catholic Primary School
‘Whatever you do, do it for the glory of God.’
Reading Policy
The purpose of teaching reading at St Simon’s Catholic Primary School is to assist in
the fulfilment of the school’s mission statement. It is our aim that each child will reach
his/her full potential that will be realised both for the glory of God and the service of
others.
Reading, with writing and oracy, is the foundation of the entire curriculum. It is our
aim that all pupils become enthusiastic, competent and creative users of language
in speaking, listening, reading and writing. This plicy sets out the meas by which a
consistent, systematic approach to the teaching of reading is assured throughout
the school, from the beginning of Foundation Stage, through Key Stage 1 and to the
end of Key Stage 2.
The school has considered the evidence offered by a range of recent research
outcomes1 and has adopted the ‘simple view of reading’ model offered by Sir jim
Rose in his Independent Review of the Early Teaching of Reading. The model shows
that skilled reading requires two processes:

that the reader recognises and understands the words on the page (that is,
word recognition processes or decoding)

the development of language comprehension (that is, written texts as well as
spoken language are understood and interpreted).
Rose, J The Independent review of the teaching of Early Reading ,March 2006
Reading by six: how the best schools do it 2010
OFSTED Excellence in English; what we can learn from 12 outstanding schools May 2011
OFSTED The impact of the Early Years Foundation Stage: a good start February 2011
1
Reading Policy EI August 2012
From the very beginning, a love of stories, poems and information is fostered through
exposure to a wide range of printed texts which are shared with every pupil as well
as stories which are told.
At St Simon’s Catholic Primary school a rigorous programme of synthetic phonics is
planned and taught systematically from Foundation Stage 1onwards. There is a daily
phonics lesson in Foundation Stage and in Key Stage 1 classes in addition to shared
reading, guided, group reading sessions and individual reading where identified as a
required intervention. Planning and assessment is explicit and well defined; there are
clear expectations for all pupils. (See below) From the beginning the correct
terminology is used by all staff with all pupils. Pupils are taught, and use, letter names
to talk about phonemes and graphemes.
It is commonly agreed that there are 44 phonemes (sounds) in the English language,
represented by combinations of the 26 letters of the English alphabet. A single
phoneme can be spelt in a different way and a single grapheme can represent
different sounds. Beginner readers must be taught how the letters of the alphabet,
singly or in combination, represent the sounds of spoken language and how to
synthesise the sounds to read words.
Synthetic phonics refers to the process of blending (synthesising) the individual
sounds in a word together, working from left to right, to read them. Synthetic phonics
work begins with oral blending, that is, the pupils listen to sounds and then blend
them. They learn to say sounds, in order, that are represented by individual letters
and pronounce these together to say a word. Very quickly, pupils learn to segment
and blend CVC (consonant-vowel-consonant) word such as cat, pin or top, CCVC
(consonant-consonant-vowel-consonant) words such as clap and from and CVCC
(consonant-vowel-consonant-consonant) words such as mask or belt. Synthetic
phonics also teaches pupils to segment (break down) a word that they hear into its
individual sounds, starting from the first sound and working systematically through the
word. For each sound that they hear, they choose the grapheme (letter or
combination of letters) to represent that sound in order to spell the word.
There are a number of very commonly used words that do not follow phonic rules,
such as said and the, and have to be learned by sight. These are known as key
words and are commonly called ‘tricky’ words.
Reading Policy EI August 2012
Letters and sounds
A multi –sensory approach is essential in the teaching of phonics.
The school uses the Letters and Sounds phonic programme:
www.letters-and-sounds.com
Phase
Phonic knowledge and skills
Phase One
Activities are divided into seven aspects,
including environmental sounds,
instrumental sounds, body sounds,
rhythm and rhyme, alliteration, voice
sounds and, finally, oral blending and
segmenting.
Learning 19 letters of the alphabet and
one sound for each. Blending sounds
together to make words. Segmenting
words into their separate sounds.
Beginning to read simple captions.
Foundation Stage
(Nursery/Reception)
Phase Two
Foundation Stage 2 (Reception)
up to 6 weeks
Phase Three
Foundation Stage 2 (Reception)
12 weeks
Phase Four
Foundation Stage 2 (Reception)
4-6 weeks
Phase Five
Throughout Year 1
Phase Six
Throughout Year 2 and beyond
Reading Policy EI August 2012
The remaining 7 letters of the alphabet,
one sound for each. Graphemes such as
ch, oo, th, representing the remaining
phonemes not covered by single letters.
Reading captions, sentences and
questions. On completion of this phase,
pupils will have learned the ‘simple
code’ i.e one grapheme for each of the
44 phonemes in the English language.
No new grapheme – phoneme
correspondences are taught in this
phase. Pupils learn to blend and
segment longer words with adjacent
consonants, e.g swim, clap, jump
‘Complex code’. Pupils learn more
graphemes for the phonemes which
they already know, plus different ways of
pronouncing the graphemes they
already know.
Working on spelling, including prefixes
and suffixes, doubling and dropping
letters etc.
Resources
Oxford Reading Tree is the core scheme used in school, and sent home, to support
the early teaching of reading. This is supplemented by Alphakids. There are clear,
minimum expectations of where each pupil should be by the end of each class,
linked to the expectations of Letters and Sounds. It is anticipated that, at St Simon’s
Catholic Primary School, many pupils will exceed these broad, generic expectations
and all pupils will have an agreed target based on their performance to date.
Foundation Stage: end of ORT Stage 2
Year 1: end of ORT Stage 5
Year 2: end of ORT Stage 8
From the beginning of Year 2 it is expected that all pupils are reading a green
labelled library book and non –fiction text in addition to ORT as part of their home
reading.
Year 3: end of ORT Stage 11
Year 4: end of ORT Stage 13
From the beginning of Year 4 it is expected that all pupils are, additionally, reading
from a supported selection of library fiction and non- fiction titles.
Year 5: end of ORT Stage 14
From the beginning of Year 5, it is expected that all pupils will read from a selection
of yellow labelled books (picture books for older readers) in addition to a widening
range of contemporary and classic children’s fiction.
Year 6: end of ORT Stage 16
From the beginning of Year 6 all pupils must be continuing the development of
reading stamina and reading from increasingly lengthy, challenging texts.
Virtual Learning Environment
All pupils have a personal login to the school’s Virtual Learning Environment through
which there are links to a range of resources to support learning in reading both at
school and at home..
Reading Eggs
From Foundation Stage onwards, all pupils have their own login to Reading Eggs
www.readingeggs.co.uk
Reading Policy EI August 2012
Reading eggs is an online resource which offers additional practice of key skills
introduced in school through interactive animations and a range of books which the
children access as per their demonstrated competence.
Assessment of phonics learning
Ongoing, informal assessment informs planning and teaching.
Summative phonic assessments are submitted to the Senior Leadership team at the
end of every half term so that appropriate interventions can be put in place. The
record sheet is stored electronically with this policy.
The national phonics screening check takes place in the June of Year 1. Information
from this screening check supports the identification of those pupils who require
additional interventions which are then planned for.
Language Comprehension Key Skills
In addition to learning decoding skills and word recognition, pupils must be taught,
and learn to, understand and interpret texts as well as engaging with, and
responding to, texts. The school has adopted the Lancashire Literacy Team Key Skills
in Reading, attached as a supplement to this policy and available at
www.lancsngfl.ac.uk
Assessment of reading
Ongoing, informal assessment of pupils’ reading informs planning and teaching. All
pupils have a clear target for improvement that they know and understand.
Accurate records are maintained in Classroom Monitor. The Senior Leadership Team
reviews each pupil’s progress in reading four times a year and appropriate
interventions are identified and agreed.
Each September, on returning to school after the summer break, the NFER Group
Reading test is administered to all pupils from year 2 onwards and a standardised
score calculated.
Organisation

Whole class reading is taught through the class English lesson. Where extracts
are used to support a teaching point, teachers must give the pupils access to
the full text, at the very least showing the full book.

Classes are divided into ability guided reading groups.
Reading Policy EI August 2012

Each group works with the teacher in a guided reading lesson for 20 minutes
each week.

This session takes place outside the English lesson.

Teachers are responsible for ensuring that books used are appropriate and
meet the needs and interests of the pupil.

Pupils are expected to read for at least 20 minutes each night at home and
make a note of the book and pages read.

At the end of each half term reading records are collected and marked by
the teacher to monitor and evaluate what has been achieved at home. The
Headteacher periodically scrutinises pupils’ reading records as part of whole
school evaluation.

After each half term holiday, each child has a reading interview within their
guided reading group that week and a note is made in the home reading
record of points discussed and expectations.

Children are not expected to write a review of every book they read.
This policy was prepared by Mrs Elizabeth Inman, Headteacher, in summer 2012 to
reflect the practice agreed and adopted by the school and approved by staff and
the governing Body in the autumn term 2012.
Reading Policy EI August 2012