Our vision
At Westbury Park School, we celebrate reading and recognise its importance as a key part of early childhood development. We value effort and success in reading, celebrate the way imaginations bring reading to life and encourage making reading a part of our daily life and learning.
Reading is the key to unlocking learning as children grow and, at Westbury Park, we encourage children to engage in books, story telling and performance and foster a love of reading that grows as children move through the school. Reading for pleasure is such a huge part of our school and, when children find that favourite author or treasured story, it enables them to connect with story telling in a personal and wonderful way. We strive to encourage children to find a passion for reading that goes beyond the four walls of the classroom.
Our aim is that all children at Westbury Park School are
-able to read fluently, both aloud and in their head, comprehend, predict and summarise at an age appropriate level;
-inspired to enjoy a love of reading and are able to choose reading material that excites them.
.jpg)
How we use children's literature
NO OUTSIDERS
We are a No Outsiders school. We immerse children in some incredible texts through our use of No Outsiders within class and key stage assemblies. Children are encouraged to discuss the issues that arise within the stories and work together to respond to the text through discussion, role play and sharing the texts as a group. Click here for more information.
.jpg)
WRITING LESSONS
Engaging literature forms the foundation of all our writing lessons from Reception to Year 6: whether it is the beautiful story of Star in a Jar or the darkly brilliant fairy tale of Hansel & Gretel, children are immersed into texts before being introduced to new genres and pieces of writing. We follow the structure: Immerse, Analyse, Plan, Write giving children the opportunity to really enjoy and appreciate the book before having the chance to write and express their ideas.
.jpg)
CLASS BOOKS
Every class has a class book that is read to them by their teacher purely for enjoyment. You can spot what each class is reading right now by looking at their classroom door!These books are chosen by the class teacher, sometimes in conjunction with the children and sometimes using inspiration from lessons in the curriculum. Children are encouraged to listen, enjoy and truly get lost in the world of the story.
READING LESSONS
We teach the skills for comprehension through the use of high quality texts. We draw on exciting stories, thoughtful poems and interesting non fiction extracts and base our comprehension lessons on these. Each lesson follows are clear structure: Read, Model, Practice, Apply giving children opportunities to engage in new texts and learn from the adults modelling how to interpret questions. Partner and class discussion play a vital role in these lessons. Every class then has a copy of the full text used to add to their class library for independent enjoyment.
.jpg)
USEFUL INFORMATION FOR PARENTS
We have created handouts to explain to parents how reading works in each year group at Westbury Park and how you can help!
QUESTIONS TO ASK YOUR CHILD WHEN READING
We have created hand outs to support parents when you are reading together with your child. These give you prompts to aid with comprehension. We want you to enjoy the time you spend reading together so please do focus on reading for pleasure- these are just aid memoires!