At Sarum St Paul’s, we understand the importance of reading and its pivotal part of the curriculum. We believe that learning to read and reading for pleasure exposes children to the world around them and stimulates their imagination and creativity. As a school we work with the Ramsbury English Hub to ensure that the children are provided with a high quality Phonics and Early Reading curriculum. 

Intent

We follow the systematic, synthetic Unlocking Letters and Sounds programme, which was validated by the DfE in December 2021. The systematic teaching of phonics and early reading is prioritised throughout Foundation Stage and Key Stage 1. Staff are dedicated to enabling our pupils to become lifelong readers. We acknowledge the key role that phonics plays in supporting children with their early development of reading and that they need to be taught the key skills in segmenting and blending as this will equip them with the skills to read and become fluent readers. We also value and encourage our pupils to read for pleasure and recognise that this starts with the foundations of acquiring letter sounds, segmenting and blending skills.

Implementation

At Sarum St Paul’s we implement:

• A consistent, systematic high quality, whole school approach to teaching phonics which begins almost immediately as children enter Reception and is carried through until at least the point where children can read almost all words fluently. The Unlocking Letters and Sounds programme (2021) is used in its entirety in Reception, Year 1 and Year 2 whilst those children who continue to require phonics support will follow elements of the programme.
• A consistent delivery of the programme, ensuring that all staff follow the same structure: revisit, teach, practise, apply and revise.
• Daily, morning lessons to ensure phonics teaching is prioritised following the Unlocking Letters and Sounds progression (this document can be found on our school website).
• Teaching whole class in Reception, Year 1 and Year 2. In other year groups, phonics is sometimes taught in ability groups where appropriate to ensure teaching is targeted so every child achieves at an appropriate pace.
• Ongoing formative assessment to ensure every child ‘keeps up’ with the phonics provision.
• Keep up sessions offering immediate additional practice for those children who are identified as not keeping up with their peers. Identified children will take part in regular, short 1:1 interventions or if appropriate in small groups following the programmes interventions.
• Fully decodable reading books that are matched to the individual child’s current phonic knowledge.
• Reading sessions weekly in small groups. Children read and re-read a carefully selected text where they focus on: accuracy, automaticity (rapid recall of whole known words), prosody (reading with expression), understanding, word meaning and retrieving key information.
• Support for parents and carers on how to support their child with phonics at home.
• Regular staff training to develop subject knowledge, confidence and ensure phonics teaching and learning is consistent across Reception, Key Stage 1 and 2 (where necessary).
• The monitoring of teaching and learning to ensure phonics is of high quality and consistent across the school.

We ensure close monitoring of those children who are not ‘keeping up’ through:

• Daily targeted 1:1 intervention to support the lowest 20%.
• Summative assessments (each half term).
• Phonics screening check practice (including retakes for those who did not pass in Year 2 and Year 3).
• Data analysis (each half term).
• Pupil progress meetings (each term).

Impact

At Sarum St Paul’s, the impact will be seen through:

• Internal monitoring including learning walks, lesson observations, pupil conferencing and 1:1 reading. This will ensure teaching, learning and assessment is of high quality and consistent across the school.
• Pupils commenting and portraying a love for reading during pupil conferencing.
• External monitoring of phonics and early reading with the Ramsbury English Hub. This provides support and feedback to ensure that our delivery and assessment of the Unlocking Letters and Sounds programme is of high quality.
• Submitting data on a half termly basis to the Ramsbury English Hub. This allows class teachers to analyse class data to review the attainment and progress of each individual child and identify those who require additional support.
• Continuous, effective support for children who are not keeping up with their peers.
• Phonics lead monitoring tasks that are undertaken on a fortnightly basis.
• Year 1 phonics screening check and Y2 phonics screening rechecks.
• Results from statutory tests.