Reading

At St Laurence we believe that reading is an integral part of the school curriculum and a fundamental life skill that impacts on all learning. We want every child to love reading and to want to learn to read for themselves. Therefore, we aim to inspire a true love of reading, whereby our children are enthusiastic and motivated readers who feel confident to be able to talk about books and authors. We ensure our children have access to a high-quality English curriculum that is both challenging and enjoyable for all readers. 

Reading is taught as part of the English learning journey but also discreetly in daily whole class reading sessions, where teachers use high quality texts and explicitly teach  reading comprehension skills to children using the meta-language of Reading Vipers.

Children who need additional support to embed their phonics knowledge attend weekly Read Write Inc sessions.

All children receive an appropriate level reading book to take home and it is expected that children read at home at least three times a week and fill in their reading diary. Children are informally assessed on a regular basis to ensure that they are reading at the right level. Children should be able to read the books sent home to an adult with ease and should be able to discuss the content of the book and make predictions. Books of a higher level are used within whole class reading session within school to teach new skills and to make sure that children are making progress. 

We believe it is important that children have a rich diet of texts so we ensure that our home reading books are supplemented by a selection of other reading material. All classes have a weekly trip to the school library where they are shown how to select their own books using the Junior Library system and encouraged to read a wide selection of books. 

Please refer to our Reading for Pleasure section of our website for additional information about how we promote Reading for Pleasure in our school community.