“Show me a family of readers, and I will show you the people who move the world.” – Napoleon Bonaparte
  
At Fitzwilliam Primary School we place Reading firmly at the core of our curriculum. We intend to expose our pupils to high-quality books on a daily basis, with children reading them and listening to them being read, so that the they enjoy the wonder of books and foster a genuine love of reading.
Reading is prioritised from the point that children enter our Nursery all through school up until Year 6 and we follow the Early Years Framework and National Curriculum to ensure that our children leave school as fluent readers.
We have curated our reading spine to ensure the texts we use challenge our readers in an ever progressive model.
We follow the Read Write Inc. Phonics scheme to teach our pupils how to decode and teach language comprehension through our book-led English curriculum and whole-class and guided reading lessons.  Pupils accessing Read Write Inc. Phonics teaching have a take home book which is specifically matched to their reading / phonics attainment to help them develop their accuracy when decoding and fluency of reading. When pupils no longer need to access Read Write Inc. they choose reading books from our banded reading scheme before becoming ‘free readers’.
The banded reading scheme books, as well as the books children have access to when they become ‘free readers’ and within their classrooms provide a wealth of fiction, non-fiction and poetry books to ensure that children are exposed to books of all genres, a range of authors, classic texts and the very latest titles. Due to the ongoing financial commitment of the school and the Trust to Reading, we are able to refresh the books available to the children on a regular basis which contributes to developing the love of reading we strive for.
When selecting books to use within class or to purchase as new texts, teachers and leaders try to ensure a wide range of books that challenge stereotypes are amongst the titles chosen as well as ensuring that there is representation across our reading curriculum in school.
We intend to encourage all pupils to read widely across fiction, non-fiction and poetry to develop their knowledge of themselves and the world in which they live, to establish an appreciation and love of reading, to gain knowledge across the curriculum and develop their comprehension skills. It is our intention to ensure that, by the end of their primary education, all pupils are able to read fluently, and with confidence, in any subject in their forthcoming secondary education.
Each lesson starts with a recap and review of previously learnt sounds and words. The new learning is introduced in small steps with staff modelling pronunciation, blending for reading and segmenting for spelling. Children are guided through the whole session with opportunities to apply the learning independently. The programme follows a logical plan that builds up children’s phonic knowledge in a sequential manner at a good pace so that children achieve age-appropriate reading skills. Children are regularly assessed which allows for flexibility in reading groups, ensuring pupils are in the right place at the right time for their learning. Pupils identified as the bottom 20% of readers are identified swiftly and receive 1:1 daily intervention to help them to make accelerated progress.
Each week, teachers deliver reading lessons aimed at either whole class or small groups. These lessons are primarily focussed upon fluency practice with the goal of building on the foundations for reading provided by Read Write Inc and developing the fluency of our pupils further to aid their comprehension. Overtime, the focus will proportionately change from fluency practice to the development of comprehension skills as the children become more fluent.
Our newly-improved school Library is timetabled so that every class have at least one opportunity a week to access a wider choice of books to read for pleasure. The Library can be used for lessons and story times for pupils as well as providing an area for pupils to go and read if they prefer to choose to do so at playtimes and lunchtimes.
All classes in school have a daily story time timetabled. The classroom staff will read these stories, which are pre-planned and selected purposefully, further exposing children the wonder of books and the rich language and diverse content that can be found within them. These books are chosen to expose children to a wider range of texts and to foster a love of reading.
