Reading

 

Literacy is a key strategic focus for all at Wellacre.

We want all our students to read from a diverse pool of literature during their time at Wellacre. Our English curriculum is crafted to develop students' knowledge of literary classics, which is well supported by our fantastic library, which offers students wider opportunities to access and read a range of texts.

Form time reading

During form times, we have designated two sessions per week which focus on sharing a love of literature with our students. These sessions are designed to develop students' understanding of a range of diverse topics whilst supporting the whole school curriculum. Our form tutors lead these sessions to ensure that our students experience a rich and scaffolded prosody of the selected text. Texts such as: Windrush Child, Refugee Boy, High Rise Mystery and Ghost Boys are just a small selection of the books we share with our students.

English lessons 

The English curriculum has been crafted to enable our students to engage with the rich literary history of English. The recent redevelopment of the KS3 curriculum means we have moved away from extract-based teaching, instead focussing on the depth and breadth of full texts. These texts have been judiciously selected to enable students to progress academically and culturally, as well as humanely, taking their rightful place in the world and contributing to the betterment of society.

All English lessons are delivered with a consistency of teaching and learning across the faculty to ensure that the diet each student receives is equitable.

In addition to our challenging schemes built on high expectations, we have integrated a bespoke grammar scheme to be delivered alongside the curriculum. This has been designed to ensure that the foundational knowledge of all students is secure as they move their way through KS3.

Celebrating reading

We celebrate reading throughout the year and also hold special events including author visits, World Book Day activities and the Bookbuzz reading programme.

Support and monitoring

We take a graduated approach to supporting reading in addition to the universal offer and support for all.

Students in Years 7-10 take biannual reading tests (NGRT). NGRT data, summary findings and strategies to support are produced for all students in Year 7-10 and made available to all staff. Using this data, we are able to identify students who require intervention and tailor support accordingly.

This includes:

• Lexonic Leap/IDL-a highly structured phonics-based programme for students who are significantly struggling with reading.
• Catch Up Literacy-a 1:1 intervention to support learners in their reading of a book so they activate both dimensions of reading – word recognition processes (including phonics) and language decoding and comprehension processes.
• RDC – the Reading Development Course is for our amber readers who have gaps with phonics and need to develop their decoding and comprehension, through choral response.
• Reading mentors -peer mentoring for more fluent readers
• Reading outreach-support for KS2 readers in a local Primary school.

 

Whole School Priorities 

Our key priorities to support reading, writing and oracy are:

• Explicit teaching of vocabulary and extended writing skills in lessons across all subjects
• Integrating clear processes to support and scaffold writing
• Explicit teaching of strategies (decoding and comprehension) to support reading in all subjects.
• Consistent implementation of oracy strategies to support classroom interactions and checking for understanding.

Supporting Independent reading at home

Talking to young people about the books they read is one of the best ways to support their literacy development. They need to engage in critical thinking to discuss a book.

Here are some tips on how you might help at home: 

Before they start a new book

• Why did you choose this book?
• What makes you think it is going to be interesting?
• What do you think the book is going to be about?
• What do you think is going to happen?

While they are reading a book

• What's happened so far?
• What do you think will happen next?
• If you were that character, would you have acted differently in that situation?
• Where is the book set? Would you like to visit? 
• If the main character in that story was in your class, do you think you would be friends?
• What does the place look like in your head as you read? Would you want to visit there?
• Did you learn any new words or facts so far?

After they have finished a book

• What was your favourite part of the book? Why?
• Who was your favourite character? Why? Which adjectives would you use to describe them? 
• What was the most interesting thing you learned from the book?
• Why do you think the author wrote this book, What were they trying to show?
• Did it end the way you thought it would?
• If you could change one thing in the book, what would it be?