Our vision is that all children at Hermitage Primary School will be happy and confident learners, achieve their full potential and develop a love of learning.

Learning to read is one of the most important gifts we can give a child – reading opens the door to learning, imagination and opportunity. Our aim is for every child to develop the knowledge, skills and confidence to read accurately, fluently and with understanding, while developing a lifelong love of books and reading.

Developing a lifelong love of reading –

Learning to Read at Hermitage​

At Hermitage Primary School, we follow the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised phonics programme to teach phonics throughout Reception, Year 1 and early Year 2.

 This Department for Education validated programme provides a clear, systematic and carefully sequenced and structured approach to learning the sounds and letters that children need to become successful readers and writers. 

From the earliest stages, children learn to recognise letters (graphemes), their related sounds (phonemes), blend them together to read words and segment words to support spelling. As their knowledge develops, children apply their phonics skills to increasingly complex words and build a bank of words that they can read automatically.

In addition, children are taught to read 'Tricky words'– words which are used frequently but are not easily decodable.

Please see below for the Reception and Year 1 teaching programme overview.

Alongside daily classroom assessments, half-termly assessments in Reception and Year 1 enable staff to quickly identify pupils at risk of falling behind, spot gaps in phonological knowledge and inform future teaching, including targeted ‘Keep Up’ interventions if required.

Reading Books

Decodable books

The half-termly assessments enable us to carefully match the books your child reads in school to their correct phonic stage.

Children in Reception and Year 1 read fully decodable, 'Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised Big Cat', books with an adult several times per week during our ‘Reading Practice’ sessions. These  reading practice sessions each have a different focus; decoding, prosody and comprehension.

Although your child will be taught to read at school, you can have a huge impact on their reading journey by continuing their practice at home. 

Therefore, these books are then sent home for your child to read independently to you, showcasing their developing skills – reading fluency, prosody (expression) and phonetic knowledge. Please don’t worry that it’s too easy – your child needs to develop fluency and confidence in reading. Listen to them read the book. Remember to give them lots of praise – celebrate their success! If they can’t read a word, read it to them. After they have finished, talk about the book together.

Sharing book

Children will also bring home a class library book for you to share together.

In order to encourage your child to become a lifelong reader, it is important that they learn to read for pleasure. The sharing book is a book they have chosen for you to enjoy together.

Please remember that you shouldn’t expect your child to read this alone. Read it to or with them. Discuss the pictures, enjoy the story, predict what might happen next, use different voices for the characters, explore the facts in a non-fiction book. The main thing is that you have fun.

 

The Phonics Screening Check

During the Summer term in Year 1, children are tested on their phonic knowledge. This helps us to identify children who have gaps in their phonic knowledge and may need further support in Year 2. The children are asked to read 40 words from a list, using their phonics to ‘sound out’ the word and then blend it if they need to. Parents are informed whether their child has achieved the national expectation within the child’s end of year report. 

If children fall behind or have difficulties, we ensure speedy ‘catch-up’ sessions in Year 2 to help them be well-prepared for Y3. This catch-up also continues if necessary throughout Key Stage 2.

 

Supporting your child at home 

Please follow the link below for information and videos from Little Wandle to help support your child at home.

https://www.littlewandlelettersandsounds.org.uk/resources/for-parents/