Reading

Reading at Pool House

Learning to read requires children to develop many skills alongside one another. The first stage involves children learning to look at the book from left to right, to enjoy talking about the pictures and to create their own story. Finally, they need to make the connection between the pictures and the story-an important skill to help children read unfamiliar words in the future. Discussing the books that your child brings home is also an important skill to develop. You can discuss the context (where the story is set), the characters (their emotions, appearance, good or bad etc.) and the plot (what happens) through the illustrations and this is invaluable throughout the reading process.

Your support with your child’s reading is vital, please make sure that you read with your child and that they bring their reading books and reading record in their bags each day.

The Searchlights for Reading

All of these strategies are to be encouraged as your child learns to read. Please discourage your child from relying on one strategy and help them to use them all. Initially, you will need to help your child to choose which strategy to use if they are finding a word difficult. After a time, give your child time to decide which strategy to use and let them solve their problem themselves, try questions like: What can we do if we don’t know this word?

(Sounding out unfamiliar words)

Reading Schemes

We use the following reading schemes within school;

• Oxford Reading Tree
• Ginn
• Cambridge
• Literacy Links
• Collins