Reading at Monkseaton Middle School
Reading is fundamental to personal growth, knowledge acquisition, and cognitive development. It opens doors to new worlds, ideas, and perspectives. Through books, articles, and other written materials, we gain insights into history, culture, science, and human experiences. Reading enhances vocabulary, critical thinking, and empathy. Whether for pleasure or education, dedicating time to reading enriches our lives and broadens our horizons and children are expected to read for 30 minutes per night and to record this in their reading journals.
Being able to read is the most important skill pupils will learn during their schooling and has far-reaching implications for lifelong confidence and wellbeing. As a school we want our children to develop a love of reading and sharing stories.
Reading in school
At Monkseaton Middle School we use Read Write Inc Phonics (RWI) early in Year 5 to get children off to a flying start with their Literacy development. Read Write Inc is a method of learning centred around letter sounds and phonics, and we use it to support and encourage children in their reading and their writing.
Read Write Inc. was developed by Ruth Miskin and provides a structured and systematic approach to teaching literacy. It is designed to create fluent readers, confident speakers, and willing writers.
Pupils are taught three reading lessons in KS2 per week and once per week in KS3, exposing them to high quality fiction and non-fiction texts. These lessons are whole class reading sessions which a balance between practicing and applying fundamental reading skills.
By teaching our pupils how to make sense of what they read, reading becomes a skill they can use to support all their learning, in all subjects. We use two key approaches to support pupils’ understanding of a text: book talk and building a mental model of the text, using prediction, clarifying, questioning and summary skills.
We use Accelerated Reader (AR) to support and track progress in reading for all pupils. Our tutorial reading sessions are dedicated to AR reading, and quizzing provides an opportunity for pupils to make rapid progress. Welcome (renaissance-go.com)
AR is a powerful tool for monitoring and managing independent reading practice. The information generated from children’s AR reading quizzes is used to ensure that pupils read appropriately challenging books – difficult enough to keep them engaged but not so difficult that pupils become frustrated.
