Our Curriculum
Reading & Phonics
Reading
Creating a strong reading culture here at Oldfield is so important to us. We are passionate about fostering a love of reading with our children so they become fluent and confident readers as they grow up. We have recently overhauled our reading scheme and invested in new books, from Nursery to Year 6.
We use quality scheme to ensure children are offered a wide choice when learning to read. We have also heavily invested in new books to promote reading for pleasure. We simply want all our children to have a life-long love of reading. Please see the main English page for how reading is embedded into our curriculum. The reading is underpinned by clear vocabulary teaching, so children develop a wider ranging lexis.
At Oldfield, Reading is prioritised to allow pupils to access the full curriculum offer. It is key to our curriculum planning. Themes are based on high quality texts.
A rigorous and sequential approach to the reading curriculum develops pupils’ fluency, confidence and enjoyment in reading. At all stages, reading attainment is assessed and gaps are addressed. For early Reading, our books connect closely to the phonics knowledge pupils are taught when they are learning to read.
Phonics & Early Reading
We teach 'Synthetic Phonics' using 'Little Wandle'. Synthetic Phonics is a way of teaching reading and spelling. Children are taught to read letters or groups of letters by saying the sounds (phonemes) that they represent. Children then start to read words by saying the phonemes together to make a word. They also learn how to spell words using their phonic knowledge.
The children are introduced to synthetic phonics in our EYFS/1 and children progress through the phases during Reception and Key Stage 1 (Year 1 & 2). We use a wide range of teaching techniques and resources in our daily phonics lessons and aim to make lessons purposeful and progressive.
Children will also learn to read common exception words. These are words which don't quite follow the spelling or phonics rules that children are taught in years 1 and 2 and need to be practiced until they are instantly recognisable. We try to think of different memorable ways that we can remember these words! Below is our progression document.
Useful Reading Links
"We love going to school"
'Pupils enjoy their lessons. They take pride in their work. They make sure it reflects adults’ high expectations. ' Ofsted 2023
