Reading

Reading Intent 

At Bryn Offa C of E Primary School, our intent for English is to develop articulate, confident, and enthusiastic readers, writers, and communicators who can express themselves clearly and creatively. We aim to foster a lifelong love of reading and writing, providing our pupils with the tools they need to succeed across the curriculum and in life beyond school.  

Children are encouraged and steered towards reading widely to develop knowledge of themselves and the world around them, establish an appreciation of reading and also to gain knowledge across the curriculum. We strive to ensure the children at Bryn Offa have the opportunity to develop culturally, emotionally, intellectually, socially and spiritually. Reading is viewed as a key skill across the curriculum so is an integral part of every child’s school day at Bryn Offa. Our reading curriculum is underpinned by VIPERS (Vocabulary, Inference, Prediction, Explanation, Retrieval, and Sequencing/Summarising), which ensures a consistent and progressive approach to reading comprehension from EYFS to Year 6. We want all children to develop fluency and comprehension skills while exploring a rich variety of texts that reflect the wider world and promote empathy, curiosity, and imagination. 

Reading Implementation 

• We follow the VIPERS framework to explicitly teach the key reading comprehension skills across the school. These skills are taught through whole-class reading sessions using high-quality, diverse texts.  

• Other strategies to develop reading skills include whole class teacher led reading, group or individual reading with an adult, sharing a text with peers, echo and choral reading and completing journal activities or follow-up comprehension. 

• Phonics is taught rigorously in EYFS and KS1 using the systematic phonics programme ‘Little Wandle’ to ensure early reading success. 

• Pupils read widely and often through access to our well-resourced and engaging whole school library and diverse class libraries, regular whole-class texts, and opportunities for independent reading. 

• We encourage a love of reading through events such as World Book Day, our regular local author visits, trips to our local library and reading challenges. 

• Children are assessed throughout the year using PM Benchmarking to ensure fluid progression through book bands and PIRA termly to provide accurate scaled scores. Interventions are regular, supporting our lowest 20% of readers with high quality support which is closely monitored and tailored to the specific needs of our children.