Teaching of Reading
At Hamsterley Primary School we value reading for pleasure. In 2011 we undertook a complete revamp of our school library, and bought new books to update our stock. The school council are actively involved in buying new library stock each year. We use Renaissance Learning’s Accelerated Reader to help guide our children in their choice of books, to reward good readers, and to monitor
children’s understanding of their reading.
In Class 1, children use the Rigby Star reading scheme to help them develop and cement their phonic skills. They also take home other reading books to share with parents or carers. In school every day after lunch, children from Class 2 will read with the younger children, both reading to them and hearing them read.
In Class 2, the focus is more on developing the skills that fluent readers need to enjoy their reading – discovering their own tastes, reading between the lines, and discussing their reading in focused guided reading groups. We are proud of our children’s reading, and we consistently achieve results that are well above the national average. We take part each year in the CILIP Kate Greenaway award shadowing process.
Teaching of Phonics
At Hamsterley Primary School, we teach phonics in the Foundation Stage and in Key Stage 1 using Jolly Phonics, a well established and successful synthetic phonics scheme which is on the DfE list of effective phonics teaching programmes.
It uses a multi-sensory approach to teach the 42 main letter sounds (including digraphs such as sh, eu and th) in a structured programme. We hold a parents information evening in the Autumn Term where we explain how the scheme works, and how parents and home work with us in partnership in the teaching of phonics and reading.
We also use Read Write Inc. One-to-One Phonics Tutoring for children who need additional support in both Key Stage 1 and 2.
Additional Phonics information
