Reading

Reading at OLST

Developing key reading skills through high-quality teaching is the key priority for our children. Furthermore, in EYFS, texts of all genres are part of the continuous provision provided. In both EYFS / KS1, staff will often use storybooks as a stimulus for our weekly ‘Wonderful Writing’ sessions which are run alongside the RWI lessons the children have. At KS2, studying whole texts in lessons – Novel Study - develops children’s love of reading by giving them the opportunity to read and listen to texts and authors they might not have chosen to read for themselves. It also provides opportunities for them to encounter a wide variety of genres and build understanding of the link between reading and writing.

Teachers carefully craft writing tasks based upon the novel being studied, as well as seeking other opportunities for writing. We have daily guided reading comprehension sessions to ensure that children read age-related texts and answer V.I.P.E.R.S (Vocabulary, Inference, Predict, Explain, Retrieve and Summarise / Sequence) as our method to explicitly teach each skill. These whole class or group reading comprehension sessions are used as a powerful tool to allow all children to make progress in reading and provide regular and supportive opportunities for children to encounter engaging texts that will resonate with their interests and capture their imagination.