At Billesley Primary School we know that phonics is the foundation of reading.  We begin the Little Wandle phonics programme ‘Foundations for Phonics’ in Nursery which focuses on nursery rhymes and story time as the basis for phonics knowledge and skills to develop from. 

The Little Wandle phonics programme covers Phase 2 - 4 across Reception and is taught daily.  Teaching is delivered in small, family groups.  Any children who are identified as falling behind the class are quickly placed into intervention groups to effectively close the gap so that they can continue learning at the pace of the programme.  Across our Early Years provision, phonics is threaded throughout the curriculum to give children opportunities to apply their knowledge. 

Our reading lessons in Reception are delivered in small groups.  Teachers effectively use summative assessment to match children to the correct book level so that they are able to decode the text fluently as they are secure in the appropriate skills and knowledge.  Reading lessons are planned to teach and assess both word level and language comprehension skills.  In Reception there is a focus on oral comprehension.  Our provision means that vast majority of children leave Reception able to decode at Phase 4. 

As the children move into Year 1, our focus on the importance of phonics remains and the Little Wandle scheme introduces a range of alternative grapheme phoneme correspondences.  Phonics continues to be taught daily.  Teachers assess children everyday in phonics lessons and children at risk of falling behind receive a quick intervention to close their gap. 

Reading lessons happen four times a week in Year 1. Year 1 is a transitional year between Reception and our whole class reading approach in Year 2.  As such it adapts throughout the year to meet the needs of the children.   Teachers use summative assessment to group children and ensure that they are reading the correct level book.  In Autumn all children read in small groups, facilitated by an adult, focusing on a key word level or language comprehension domains each day.  Across the week the focus progress from decoding to comprehension and culminates in children applying their knowledge and skills independently  Through Spring and Summer the reading groups become larger for the children who are secure decoders and fluent readers.  Thus by the end of the year most children in Year 1 are reading within a whole class structure. 

Early Years and Year 1 lay the foundation for children to be able to succeed within our whole class approach to reading from Year 2 onwards.  Our Billesley Primary School Reading Spine structures the texts that the children will read and discuss in each year group.  These are designed to be progressive across school and have a breadth of genre, purpose and audience.  Our reading curriculum is delivered through a two week Reading Cycle.  Teaching is delivered through several book study lessons.  These lessons give teachers the opportunity to teach both reading strategies and language comprehension skills within the context of a text.  Within these lessons, teachers are rehearsing key skills such as skimming, scanning and identifying evidence. They are also modelling the process of being an effective reader through comprehension monitoring.  After several book study lessons, the teacher models a series of comprehension questions based around one to three of the domains. To support children to achieve, teachers use an I do, we do model to explicitly lead children through the process of answering questions effectively.   Following on from this lesson, children apply these skills to independent questions.  

For children who are not secure decoders or fluent readers, we have two Little Wandle pathways across Year 2 - 6.  Children are either in a Rapid Catch Up group or a SEND reading group.  The Rapid Catch Up group follow the accelerated Little Wandle programme for phonics and using the accurately matched books teachers plan reading lessons mirroring the Year 1 model.  Children, who are identified as needing a more bespoke SEND approach, are placed onto our SEND pathway.  These children follow the Little Wandle SEND programme which is a graduated approach, moving at the pace of the children. 

We know the importance of children becoming readers, not just children who can read.  Children in Reception, Year 1 and Year 2 have a planned story time and reading for pleasure sessions each week.  Our planned story time follows a curriculum overview which means that by the time the children leave Year 2 they have read, explored and discussed 60 texts.  In these sessions teachers identify key vocabulary to teach the children and read the text multiple times over the week so children have the opportunity to discuss it in depth. Children in Year 1 and 2 also have Reading Celebration sessions where they can explore texts in their class or year group library and engage in informal conversations about the books they are reading. 

From Year 2 onwards our pedagogical approach to our reading curriculum inspires children to read more widely as it gives them guided experience of reading texts and develops a deeper understanding of text which they can take to other texts.  To further enrich our reading for pleasure culture, children from Year 2 have Reading Celebration sessions every week where they engage in informal book talk, explore new texts with their teacher and celebrate their home reading - including changing their home reading book.  Our library offers a fantastic resource to extend children’s reading in particular subjects that interest them.

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Billesley Primary School
Trittiford Road
Billesley
Birmingham
B13 0ES
0121 675 2800