At Windhill21, we ensure that reading is prioritised. This skill allows pupils to access the full curriculum offer as they move through school. Our aim is that all children gain phonics knowledge and language comprehension which is necessary to read fluently. We follow the highly effective Read Write Inc phonics programme, which has been well established at Windhill21 over many years.

Nursery

In Nursery, children initially have experience, exposure and enjoyment of sound awareness. Once this has been established, the children are taught single letter sounds and how to blend through the introduction of Read Write Inc.

Reception, Year 1 and Year 2

All children are taught a Read Write Inc phonics lesson everyday where they are introduced to the speed sounds. They will be taught how to say, read and write the sounds, then how to blend the sounds to read words. This includes learning complex sounds and alternate spelling patterns as they progress through the programme.

The Year 1 phonics screening check is a short assessment to confirm whether individual children have learnt phonic decoding to an appropriate standard. It will identify those pupils who need extra support to improve their reading skills. They will then be able to retake the check in Year 2.

Beyond Read Write Inc

Only when a child has completed the Read Write Inc programme, will they move onto Whole Class Reading.

Whole-Class Reading

At Windhill21, we teach whole class reading from Year 2 following the CUSP curriculum. CUSP designs its reading curriculum to be aspirational and ambitious for all. CUSP has a principle focus on comprehension, fluency and vocabulary; teaching children the skills and strategies they need, not only to access the reading curriculum, but so they can also apply these skills in a range of contexts to access the whole primary curriculum, and onwards. This is achieved through daily lessons taking in a diverse range of literature (see our literature spine), including whole novels, picture books, poetry and specifically written extracts so that children are exposed to a wide range of different texts. CUSP has selected these so that all children are exposed to a range of high-quality literature that ‘gives every child a mirror in which to see themselves and offers a window to children to see a world beyond their own’. This complements how Windhill21 are 'empowering young people to take on the world.'

This is how many books and words our students have read so far this academic year:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We highly recommend these recommended readings lists grouped by school year.  Click the image to be taken to the website:

Please see below for details of all the ways you can interact with these systems:

 

Logins are needed - They will be in your child's home school diary. If you have lost these please see your child's class teacher for replacements.

The school BookFinder login code is: DS983027