Reading Practice

We teach Reading Practice sessions in EYFS and Key Stage One three to five times a week, depending on the size of classes. These sessions are taught by a fully trained adult to small groups of approximately six children.
 

We use books matched to the children’s secure phonic knowledge using the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised assessments and book matching grids on pages 11 to 20 of ‘Application of phonics to reading’. These are monitored by the class teacher, who rotates and works with each group on a regular basis.
 

Each reading practice session has a clear focus, so that the demands of the session do not overload the children’s working memory. The reading practice sessions have been designed to focus on three key reading skills:
 

1. Decoding: teaching children to use phonic knowledge to read words
2. Prosody: teaching children to read with understanding and expression
3. Comprehension: using dialogic talk to help children to understand the text.
    

In Reception, these sessions start in week 4 of teaching at the latest. Initially, children will read wordless books. In these sessions, children review GPCs and are taught blending using teacher-led blending.

Once children can blend, they progress onto decodable books matched to their secure phonic knowledge. Children read each book three times to develop phonemic awareness, vocabulary and comprehension as well as book behaviours.

Children will progress from Phase 2 of Little Wandle to Phase 5 over the course of two years (following the Reception and Year One programmes of study).
 

In Year Two, we ensure children complete reading the core programme decodable books (up to Phase 5 Set 5). To exit the programme, we complete the final fluency assessment to ensure children can read with adequate speed and accuracy: approximately 60 words per minute with 90%+ accuracy.

Reading in Rapid Catch-up lessons mirrors the core programme. Children following the Rapid Catch-up programme are taught to read using the 7+ fully decodable books. These follow the same progression as the core programme but are more appropriate for older readers.