Reading at Holbeton Primary School

“You can find magic wherever you look. Sit back and relax, all you need is a book” – Dr Seuss

We aim to develop a love of reading in all our children. We provide children with the reading skills they need to read a broad range of texts. By the end of Key Stage One, our children will already be successful, fluent decoders through the delivery of consistent high quality, systematic synthetic phonics teaching from EYFS until the end of KS1. They understand that they use their phonics knowledge as the first tool when tackling new words in reading and writing. They will also have a growing understanding of text meaning which will be further developed during Key Stage 2. Children will leave Holbeton as competent readers, who can recommend books to their peers, have a thirst for reading a wide range of high-quality texts across the genres, participate in discussions about books and have an established love of reading for life.

At Holbeton we are passionate about reading, and this lies at the heart of our curriculum. We are dedicated to enabling our pupils to become lifelong readers and we believe embedding a love of reading in school and at home is key for academic success. Reading for pleasure is a form of play that allows us to experience other worlds and roles in our imagination. For children, reading for pleasure is reading that goes beyond a teacher’s reading expectations and is done to fuel their own curiosity and enjoyment.

We know that sometimes the biggest challenge is not simply getting your child to read at home, but to enjoy reading too! At Holbeton, we have embedded strategies across the school which ensure that we can best support all our pupils to develop a lifelong love of reading.

Class Reads

Time to read aloud is found every day. Whether reading a story book, non-fiction text or poetry, it’s a wonderful opportunity for staff to offer a model for independent reading and to demonstrate their own enthusiasm for books.