Reading

At Delamere we are aspirational for our children and aim for ALL children to develop a love of books and stories. Wherever possible we also aim for children to learn how to decode and make sense of what they are reading in order to support further learning across the curriculum.

The One Education Reading Award is a Reading Quality Standard for schools and settings. It is the only Reading Quality Mark that supports schools with the development of their entire Reading curriculum.

Schools have one calendar year to complete the award, using the criteria to guide their development of Reading. Throughout the process, schools gather evidence to demonstrate the quality of their Reading provision.

In September 2023 we were delighted to be awarded the Silver award for our efforts throughout the last couple of years building on our success of the Bronze Award that we achieved last year. The Silver award recognises our commitment to the reading curriculum, environment and attitudes around school as we use our refurbished school library consistently, embedded our validated Phonics programme – Essential Letters and Sound, enhanced our pupil Book Club to gain new members, and utilised our research-informed Headsprout intervention to assist with word reading.

We are now continuing our development towards the Gold award – watch this space for updates!

“It has been a pleasure to work with Delamere on the One Education Reading Award for Special Schools and Alternative Provision Settings. Their expertise has been invaluable in helping us to refine our criteria for the award, making sure it supports every child to become a reader. We’re thrilled that Delamere have been accredited with the bronze award and we look forward to working with them as they continue to develop, working on the silver award this academic year.”

Laura Lodge

Literacy Team Leader 

2022

The award focuses on three distinct areas of reading;

  • Decoding (Phonics)
  • Reading for Understanding (Comprehension)
  • Reading for Enjoyment

Each one of these areas is essential if children are to become successful readers.

Phonics

Phonics is the decoding and blending of sounds to make and read words. This is the skill that many children need to unpick new words and sentences. Not all children at Delamere learn to read this way as some are sight readers and learn words through repetition, but it is offered to all children across school. We ensure that all children at Delamere access a session of Phonics/sound awareness each day. This is categorised as pre-formal phonics (the old Phase 1 Letters and Sounds) or formal phonics (the old phases 2-6 oh letters and sounds. Children are assessed during their transition to school and placed in a group for phonics working at their level. Adults work with children to complete listening activities and games in Phase 1 based around the 7 aspects listed in our policy below, or more specific grapheme objectives around the specific sound, for example writing the letter in sand or glitter or find the letter in a tray of magnetic letters.

Our phonics Scheme is Essential Letters and Sounds and we use a combination of phonetically matched books for children at each level or reading books for children not accessing formal phonics.

More information and how we teach phonics can be found in our Reading Policy at the bottom of the page. 

Comprehension

Comprehension is the part of reading where children gain understanding from the text or pictures. This can take many different forms and works on skills such as sequencing, retelling, finding named objects and answering questions. Further along in the school, children make predictions and suggest alternative endings to stories and texts. Each child is on a personalised journey with comprehension that will utilise their preferred communication style. For example, a child may be naming objects in a story using a Snap Core device whilst another child may be signing to retell the story.

Enjoyment

Enjoyment in reading is a key part of the Delamere education offer. All classes have a half hour slot of reading for pleasure each day and children are given opportunity to read familiar books in places such as the library, classroom reading areas and outside. During this time, children may read the same story multiple times and other children may be listening to an adult read a sensory story. During these sessions, we are focussed on providing a love of reading as we know that it unlocks curiosity and a wonder about the world.

Each child will bring home a book that is one level below their current reading level. This is to encourage reading for pleasure and an enjoyable experience for families to read at home together. Your child does not have to read the book – it may be that you read the book aloud and they wander over sporadically or that they play whilst you are reading. The important part is that there is book time at home to encourage children to develop an interest.

Reading for Pleasure Parents Session

Delamere School Irlam Road Flixton M41 6AP
T: 0161 747 5893 E: delamere.admin@trafford.gov.uk
Ofsted Outstanding Provider
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