At Sandfield Close Primary School, we pride ourselves with our teaching of reading.

All classes run a 'teach read' session whereby the teacher teaches reading to a small group of children whilst other children develop their independent reading skills-mastering comprehension, or have stories read to them and participate in verbal comprehension.

Teachers teach children how to read using phonics as the main system for decoding words. Our schools uses the 'Letters and Sounds' approach to teach phonics across the whole of KS1 and Reception, where children are taught precise phonics related to their assessed level within the 6 phonic phases.

Alongside children mastering learning to read, our teachers also focus on teaching children to read to learn, developing their comprehension of the text. Objectives for developing comprehension are taken from the new National Curriculum expectations per year group which can be found on our site. Teachers share many strategies with children to help them develop their understanding of the text and provide comprehension support through the use of MARVEL - I.R.S.  (independent reading skills). MARVEL was designed in school to support comprehension through an independent written response which engages our children to be super heroes of reading.

We have a vast range of books within school that are categorised in terms of difficulty and designated to year groups to support development from Reception to Y6.

Your child will bring home 2 teaching reading books to read each week; one book is appropriate to their reading ability and another is a challenge to stretch their skills. We value the support of parents with reading at home and ask that parents hear their child read everyday, for at least 30 minutes and support children's development through questioning of the text read. We have a range of question stems that you can ask your child and your child will bring home a bookmark containing these. We also encourage parents to visit the library with your child to broaden further the range of books they choose to read.

Reading is such a critical part of developing learning at Sandfield Close, without it our children would not be able to access the rest of the curriculum. We read in all areas of the curriculum and encourage children to transfer skills taught in 'teach read' sessions.

We strongly believe that every child should leave Sandfield Close Primary School being able to read so they are secondary school ready.

Reading