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Reading

At Summerseat, our approach to reading is to ensure that children develop: 

The Thrill, The Will and The Skill

"Without the ‘thrill’ there is no ‘will’ to engage. If children don’t engage then they will never acquire the ‘skill’."

Alistair Bryce-Clegg

We aim to foster a love of reading in all our children here at Summerseat. This is vital both as a life skill in order to enable children to access a wide range of information in the world around them but also a means of enjoyment where books can transport them to many new and exciting worlds. We ensure that children get to read and hear a wide range of genres as part of our holistic approach to reading for pleasure.  Approaches we use to develop a love of reading include: daily storytime in all classes, 'Summerseat Super Story' collections for every year group as a reading challenge with high quality stories, books as 'hooks' into new topics across the curriculum or collective worship themes  and inviting book areas in all classes. 

Our classrooms are full of diverse and engaging books to try to give the children the will to read. We also have regular reading rewards to encourage children further. 

To support reading skill development, we use 'Supersonic Phonics Friends' as our systematic synthetic phonics programme. Further information can be found in the phonics section. Our reading scheme is closely matched to phonics teaching to enable children to practise the new skills they are developing. Our main reading scheme is Big Cat Phonics supported by other phonic readers to add breadth and further opportunity to practise. 

To support comprehension skills, we use 'VIPERS' to guide parents in how to assist their own child in developing good comprehension skills when listening to them read at home. It details a number of useful question types that are perfect to check and assess that your child has understood their book and can retrieve information from it.

Reading is given high priority at Summerseat. To find out more about our reading strategy, please watch the  video below. This Powerpoint has been shared as a reading workshop for parents in the autumn term. see the links below. This was shared during our reading workshops in the autumn term.