Intent

At Manor Farm Junior School, we believe that literacy and communication are key life skills. Through the reading curriculum,  children will be supported in developing skills and knowledge that will empower them both through their time at school and in later life and enable them to communicate effectively, confidently and creatively through spoken and written language. 

We provide a wide range of rich and meaningful  opportunities to become fluent and critical readers, develop empathy and an understanding of society beyond the home and school setting, improve well-being and equip children with the skills to become lifelong learners. We believe that reading is key to developing the ability to understand the experiences of others thus, developing children’s language, social acceptance and cultural awareness. The curriculum we deliver through reading is authentic to and reflects our school’s vision and values.

Through our reading curriculum, we offer broad and rich reading experiences which provide children with engaging and purposeful learning opportunities to empower them to take ownership of their reading. We strive to introduce all children to a wide range of children’s literature and to explore ways in which reading can broaden their experience of life and give them a sense of what is possible. 

At  Manor Farm Junior School the use of high quality books within the reading curriculum is at the heart of our approach to engage and support children. Core texts are mapped out from Year 3 to Year 6 providing the opportunity for cross curricular links and a breadth of high quality children’s literature. A conscious effort is made to reflect the realities and experiences of our children as well as reflect the realities of the diverse wider community. We ensure there is a positive representation of gender, race, age, culture and religion in book choices. We ensure that our core books selection represents a full range of literature in terms of genre and text type - from non-fiction to poetry to picture books to  contemporary fiction - and have teachers who read widely and are knowledgeable about children’s literature.

Our whole class reading sessions are complimented by our reading scheme from Big Cat Collins.  Every child in the school is assessed individually and placed onto the correct banding for them in order to practise their fluency.  The more fluent children are, the more text they can read and therefore their understanding and enjoyment of books improves.

We are committed to supporting children in becoming confident and articulate communicators and therefore ensure that purposeful opportunities for developing oracy skills are built into the curriculum. In order to develop our children as reflective readers and thinkers, book talk sessions are planned carefully with opportunities to share responses and opinions. We know that the more experience children have of talking about books in a structured way, the better they become at making explicit the meaning that a text holds for them - helping them, and the class as a whole, to reach a shared understanding of ideas and issues within the text. 

If you would like further information about reading at Manor Farm or how to help your child at home with their reading, please get in contact with your child's class teacher or our English Lead - Mrs Sam Michael.