At Sproatley Endowed CE Academy, our ambition is to nurture and develop confident and thoughtful learners who approach reading and writing with enthusiasm. We aspire to weave literacy through all areas of the curriculum, ensuring that children are aware of the relevance of these skills in life. This includes oral and communication skills, the foundation of which are laid in EYFS. We aim to prepare our children for their future by giving them the fluency of speaking, reading and writing skills necessary to succeed.

Reading is at the heart of learning at Sproatley Endowed CE Academy; teaching and the environment is carefully planned to promote a love of reading and an understanding of its relevance in the wider world. Staff work to provide a wide range of learning opportunities to ensure that children develop both their word recognition and decoding skills in order to leave our school as fluent readers, as well as an appropriate level of reading comprehension. A strong emphasis is placed on Phonics in Nursery, Reception and Key Stage One, which develops firm foundations in order to become more fluent readers. The use of whole class and small group reading establishes and develops comprehension skills, to enable children to confidently understand a range of texts and be able to apply this to the wider curriculum. Vocabulary is explored as a key element of texts and children broaden their application of new vocabulary within their writing. Through dialogic talk, children are able to discuss, question and analyse ideas and texts which allows them to grow into critical readers. By promoting an enjoyment and respect for reading, we are providing our children with the skills required to continue their future development.

Early reading is taught through Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised - see our phonics page for more information. Children are taught phonics daily and develop fluency, prosody and comprehension through repeated reads and regular reading groups. Children also enjoys listening to and discussing whole class reading books, helping them develop a love for reading from an early age.

In Key Stage 2, children read widely, encountering a rich range of fiction, non-fiction, poetry and other texts. Children continue to build their fluency through reading aloud as choral reading, echo reading and reading with partners and adults. Though whole class reading, children are explicitly taught how to construct meaning from the text, drawing on background knowledge, making inferences, exploring new vocabulary and discussing the texts to develop and explore ideas further.