WE LOVE READING
AT WILLOW PARK SCHOOL

We aim for our children to develop a life-long love of reading.

Adults at Willow Park talk extensively with children about the world around them and the books (stories and non-fiction) we read with them. We also enjoy rhymes, poems and songs together.

Daily Phonics lessons for children take place to help them acquire the necessary phonological knowledge and awareness to enable them to read and write.

As the children develop their confidence, they begin to be able to decode words in books and gradually begin to transcribe and compose in writing.

Skilled word reading will be taught later, involving both the speedy working out of the pronunciation of unfamiliar printed words (decoding) and the speedy recognition of familiar printed words. Writing involves transcription (spelling and handwriting) and composition (articulating ideas and structuring them in speech, before writing).

Most of the children at Willow Park School are at Phase 1 and 2 phonics:

Phase 1: This is split into 7 aspects, which focus on hearing and talking about environmental sounds and letter sounds.
Phase 2: Learning 19 letters of the alphabet, along with the first 5 ‘tricky words and using them to read and spell simple words and captions.

Many of our pupils remain at these very early stages of this learning but the aim is still high. This can appear to be a lofty and somewhat ambitious aim when pupils join us in Reception and for some pupils, they may not reach such heights. However, we believe strongly in their limitless potential to:

read well, fluently and with good understanding
enjoy reading for both pleasure and information
widen their vocabulary, and understanding of grammar
write clearly for a range of contexts, purposes and audiences
use discussion in order to learn; they should be able to explain clearly their understanding and ideas
be competent in the arts of speaking and listening