Reading
“Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” – Psalm 119:105
At St Hilda’s, we believe that reading opens the way to learning, understanding, and imagination, guiding children much like the Word guides our lives. Just as this verse speaks of light showing the path, developing strong reading skills illuminates the world for our pupils, helping them explore ideas, stories, and knowledge with confidence and joy.
St Hilda's is a reading school.
At St Hilda’s, learning to read is one of the most important skills a child will ever develop. Reading underpins all areas of the curriculum and is a vital life skill, so we place it at the heart of everything we do.
We teach reading through a clear, systematic approach, beginning with early phonics and developing into fluent, confident reading with strong understanding. Our aim is for every child to be able to read easily, accurately and with enjoyment.
We promote a love of reading by exposing pupils to a wide range of high-quality texts. Through this, children develop culturally, emotionally, intellectually, socially and spiritually, while also building a rich vocabulary and a secure understanding of language.
Pupils are encouraged to read widely and often, both in school and at home, for pleasure and for learning. By the time they leave St Hilda’s, we want all children to be enthusiastic, capable readers who are well prepared for the next stage of their education and beyond.
Choosing Suitable Books & Reading Schemes Used
When children begin in Reception, they are first provided with wordless books. These support children in developing key early reading behaviours, such as handling books with care, holding them correctly and turning pages. Wordless books also encourage children to explore storytelling by using illustrations to describe settings, events and characters, as well as to make predictions about what might happen next.
As children develop these early skills, they progress to books with words. These are carefully matched to each child’s phonic knowledge and follow the same sequence as our phonics programme, Supersonic Phonic Friends. For example, in Reception, the first reading books children take home include the initial Phase 2 sounds (s, a, t, p, i, n). Each book is closely aligned with the sounds already taught in class, allowing children to practise and consolidate their learning with confidence.
Our reading books are drawn from a range of high-quality, fully decodable schemes that align with our phonics programme, ensuring a consistent and structured approach as children develop into fluent, independent readers.
Further details of how we teach reading across school can be found in our policy below.
Reading at Home
At St Hilda’s, home reading plays a vital role in consolidating children’s progress and strengthening the partnership between school and parents/carers. We aim to foster a lifelong love of reading by giving children regular opportunities to read at home and develop positive reading habits.
Children are encouraged to choose books that interest them within an appropriate level, helping them to develop preferences for particular authors, genres and styles, and to read for pleasure as well as for learning.
In Reception, Year 1 and Year 2, children bring home two books: a fully decodable reading book that is closely matched to their phonics knowledge (or a familiar book to build fluency), and a library book to share and enjoy. In Key Stage 2, children also take home two books: a reading book matched to their current ability and a library book chosen for enjoyment.
We ask that children read at home at least three times each week, and that this is recorded in their reading record. Regular reading practice is key to developing fluency, confidence and understanding.
For additional support, parents and carers can access helpful guidance and resources from BookTrust using the links below.
Guided Reading & Talk in Reception
Children in Reception take part in at least one focused guided reading & talk session each week. During this session, a small group of children will share a book together. There is a strong phonic focus in Reception with the class teacher modelling blending skills previously taught in phonics sessions. A list of high frequency words taken from the text will also be shared with the children on flashcards so they can spot them when reading. During the introduction, any tricky vocabulary or interesting words from the text will be shared so that children have a clear understanding of the meaning and can see the words in context. Our reading policy also details how reading is taught across school.
Whole Class reading
At St Hilda’s, we teach Whole Class Reading across Years 1 to 6 to help all children develop strong comprehension skills, a rich vocabulary, and a love of reading. Using Schofield and Sims Complete Comprehension, children work on the same text over a three-day cycle: on the first day, they focus on key vocabulary and understanding the text; on the second day, a specific comprehension skill, such as inference, retrieval, prediction, or sequencing, is introduced and modelled before children practise independently; and on the third day, children consolidate their learning by answering a mix of questions from all content domains. Fortnightly, this is replaced with an independent comprehension task using an unseen text, giving children the opportunity to apply their skills to new material. This structured approach ensures children read confidently, understand what they read, and develop the skills to tackle a wide range of texts with enjoyment
As reading is one of the most important skills that we can teach our children, the impact of our curriculum needs to go beyond the results of statutory assessments.
Through the consistent, systematic teaching of our synthetic phonics programme (Supersonic Phonic Friends), our children in EYFS and KS1 will learn to decode fluently and accurately, ensuring they are ready to meet the demands of the KS2 curriculum.
Through reading a range of texts, our children will develop culturally, emotionally, intellectually, socially and spiritually. They will develop their love of literature through widespread reading for enjoyment as we foster a positive ‘reading for pleasure’ culture. Our children will be able to read easily, fluently and with a good understanding. They will acquire a wide vocabulary, an understanding of grammar and be able to apply their skills, knowledge and experience to a wide range of texts through the Key Stage 2 curriculum.
As our children transition to high school, we want them to be fluent, confident and able readers who can access a range of texts for pleasure and enjoyment, as well as use their reading skills to unlock learning in all areas of the curriculum.
In addition to this, we aim that:
This will be assessed and monitored through: