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 synthetic phonics programme Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised to ensure early reading success. Pupils who require additional support, including those in Key Stage 2 who have not yet secured phonics knowledge, receive Little Wandle Keep-up sessions, ensuring gaps are identified quickly and addressed through targeted teaching so that pupils keep up rather than catch
- 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.
- Reading for pleasure is embedded through our daily Bryn Offa Reading Café, where Reading Ambassadors foster a whole-school reading culture by supporting younger pupils, promoting high-quality texts and encouraging meaningful discussions about books.
- 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.
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Impact
As a result of our reading curriculum, pupils become confident, fluent and enthusiastic readers who develop the knowledge and skills needed to access the wider curriculum and become lifelong readers. Through the consistent implementation of Little Wandle, children build secure phonological knowledge and decoding skills, enabling the vast majority to become fluent readers by the end of Key Stage 1. Those requiring additional support receive timely, targeted interventions to ensure they keep up rather than catch up.
Pupils develop increasingly sophisticated comprehension skills through the explicit teaching of VIPERS, enabling them to retrieve information, infer meaning, predict, explain, summarise and discuss vocabulary confidently across a wide range of high-quality texts. They are able to articulate their thoughts, justify opinions using evidence and engage in meaningful discussions about what they read.
A rich and diverse reading culture ensures that pupils read widely, encounter authors and characters from a broad range of backgrounds and experiences, and develop empathy, curiosity and a wider understanding of the world. Regular opportunities to read independently, with peers and alongside adults foster positive reading habits and a genuine enjoyment of books.
Robust assessment and regular monitoring ensure that pupils' progress is identified quickly and that teaching and interventions are responsive to individual needs. As a result, pupils make good progress from their starting points, with those at risk of falling behind receiving effective support to accelerate their learning.
By the time pupils leave Bryn Offa, they are fluent, confident and reflective readers who read for both pleasure and purpose. They possess the reading skills, vocabulary and confidence needed to succeed across the curriculum and are well prepared for the next stage of their education.
Resources to support your child's reading: - Year 1 Bryn Offa Reading Booklet
- Year-2-Bryn-Offa-Reading-Booklet
- Year-3-Bryn-Offa-Reading-Booklet
- Year-4-Bryn-Offa-Reading-Booklet
- Year-5-Bryn-Offa-Reading-Booklet
- Year-6-Bryn-Offa-Reading-Booklet
- English websites: