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Developing Our School
Our main School Development Priorities this year are increasing achievement in Reading, Spelling and Maths.
Reading and Spelling
As you are aware, further improving our pupils’ progress in reading and spelling is a whole-school priority. We have done many things in the last few months to improve this, including the re-opening of our library and the improvement of the reading reward scheme.
After successfully trialling ReadWriteInc last year, we are continuing to use the materials this year to improve Reading and Spelling.
The majority of the children in Year 3 and approximately half of the children in Year 4 will be following the ReadWriteInc programme in their Literacy groups. The groups have been determined by a comprehensive screening done with one child at a time by either Mrs Kingman or Mrs Saunders-Nield.
At the core of ReadWriteInc is the rigorous teaching of phonics. Children learn the 44 common sounds and how to sound-blend words. The more sounds they learn, the greater the range of texts they can read. This daily lesson will include spelling.
Some children in Year 5 and 6 will be grouped together according to the screening to follow ‘ReadWriteInc Fresh Start’, an intensive programme to support them in catching their peers up. This daily lesson will also include spelling.
Children NOT doing ReadWriteInc or Fresh Start will have daily reading lessons including a 10-minute spelling session. They will be given a Spelling Log, which they will bring home in the place of traditional ‘spelling lists.’ This Log will contain a personalised set of words for them to learn. We ask that you support your child in helping them to learn these spellings, initialling next to each of the words once they have practised and learnt it. The children will not be tested on these words in isolation, but class teachers will note that the words are correctly spelt when they are being used in context in pieces of written work.
We are confident that this will raise standards in reading and spelling, particularly for the children who lack confidence in their phonic knowledge.
Useful Resources from ReadWriteInc.
The main ReadWriteInc website Please note that we do not use 'Language and Literacy'.
The 'Speed Sounds' (This clip has Reception children in it, but a Year Three one is not available online)
A brief summary of the Spelling programme
The Grammar, Punctuation and Spelling test