Early reading

At Court Farm School, we believe that all our children can become fluent readers and writers. This is why we teach reading through Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised, which is a systematic and synthetic phonics programme. We start teaching phonics in Nursery/Reception and follow the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised progression, which ensures children build on their growing knowledge of the alphabetic code, mastering phonics to read and spell as they move through school.

 As a result, all our children are able to tackle any unfamiliar words as they read. At Court Farm School, we also model the application of the alphabetic code through phonics in shared reading and writing, both inside and outside of the phonics lesson and across the curriculum. We have a strong focus on language development for our children because we know that speaking and listening are crucial skills for reading and writing in all subjects.

 Foundations in Nursery

We provide a balance of child-led and adult-led experiences for all children that meet the curriculum expectations for ‘Communication and language’ and ‘Literacy’. These include: sharing high-quality stories and poems, learning a range of nursery rhymes and action rhymes, providing activities that develop focused listening and attention, oral blending and attention to high-quality language. We ensure Nursery children are well prepared to begin learning grapheme-phoneme correspondences (GPCs) and blending in Reception.

 Phonics Sessions

We teach phonics for 30 minutes a day. In Reception, we build from 10-minute lessons, with additional daily oral blending games, to the full-length lesson as quickly as possible. Each Friday, we review the week’s teaching to help children become fluent readers. Children make a strong start in Reception: teaching begins in Week 2 of the Autumn term. We follow the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised expectattions of progress. Children in Reception are taught to read and spell words using Phase 2 and 3 GPCs, and words with adjacent consonants (Phase 4) with fluency and accuracy. Children in Year 1 review Phase 3 and 4 and are taught to read and spell words using Phase 5 GPCs with fluency and accuracy.

Keep Up / Rapid Catch Up / SEND Programme

Any child who needs additional practice has daily Keep-up or Rapid Catch Up intervention, taught by a fully trained adult. These interventions are delivered one-to-one or in small groups and use the same procedures, resources and mantras as the main phonics session., However, it may be taught in smaller steps with more repetition, so that every child secures their learning. We timetable these interventions daily for any child in Year 2 and KS2 who is not fully fluent at reading or has not passed the Phonics Screening Check. These children urgently need to catch up, so the gap between themselves and their peers does not widen. We then assess their phonic knowledge every 3 weeks to ensure progress and identify next steps. For children who have a need that severely affects their cognitive development, they will access our SEND programme. This will give them the opportunity to learn to read at a pace that is suitable for them. 

Reading Sessions

We teach children to read through reading practice sessions three times a week. These are taught by a fully trained adult to small groups of approximately six children use books matched to the children’s secure phonic knowledge using the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised assessments and book matching grids on pages 11–20 of Application of phonics to reading are monitored by the class teacher, who rotates and works with each group on a regular basis. Each reading practice session has a clear focus, so that the demands of the session do not overload the children’s working memory. The reading practice sessions have been designed to focus on three key reading skills: Decoding, Prosody & Comprehension. 

Home reading

The decodable reading practice book is taken home to ensure success is shared with the family. Reading for pleasure books also go home for parents to share and read to children.