1. Reading Together
This presentation is designed to be used at a parents’ meeting with a specific focus on reading. The slides cover:
Why reading is important
What are the key reading skills we need to teach?
What happens in school?
What can parents do to support reading development

2. Effective schools see parents’ involvement as fundamental
to raising standards.
HMCI Report
Reading for purpose and pleasure
Charles Desforges – Emeritus Professor of Educational Research at the University of Exeter identifies 4 main factors in raising children’s achievement:
Making them think and about how they think
The flow of challenging work
Time spent on task
Involvement of parents
We all know that where partnerships between school and parents are strong children will achieve.
Those children whose parents support in learning to read are more likely to do well at school.
Those schools who share information and ideas with parents are more likely to raise standards.
This meeting is an opportunity to share information about what reading is like in school and some tips about getting the best out of reading opportunities at home.

3. Reading is a basic life skill
Reading is a basic life skill. It is a cornerstone for a child's success in school and indeed throughout life. Without the ability to read well, opportunities for personal fulfilment and job success inevitably will be lost.
Becoming a Nation of Readers: The Report of the Commission on Reading
We live in a society where the written word is an essential means of communication. We are going to get along more successfully in the 21st century if we can access information through developing reading skills, knowing how to interpret and filter information.
After language and communication skills, reading is the gateway to learning. Research shows a link to the development of IQ.
Statistics show that where children leave primary school as confident and skilled readers they achieve better academically later in their school careers.
It is therefore crucila that every child is given the opportunity to maximise their potential throughout the primary years.
It is important to ensure that all children reach their potential as this helps them in future life and increases their life chances.

4. The more things you will know The more you learn
‘The more you read
The more things you will know
The more you learn
The more places you will go.’
Dr Seuss
Or to put it more simply…
Reading opens up the imagination and allows you to enter otherwise inaccessible worlds.
Education is all about life chances and life choices.

5. We want our pupils to become confident and effective readers
In today’s information rich society being a confident effective reader is so important.
Your children as adults will be faced with more reading than ever before.
To ensure that children are prepared for society’s demands we need to know what a good reader does?
Could ask parents to think about whether they consider themselves to be good readers and ask them to come up with some examples of good reading behaviour e.g. reading for pleasure; following instructions; finding information, recognising that some texts are trying to persuade; deciding whether what they are reading is true (newspapers, web pages, adverts etc).
Talk about your reading experience, what was the last thing you read that you enjoyed what have you read today. How did you use it?
From the discussion draw out key points that when adults read for enjoyment they have choice in what they read. Otherwise, they are reading for a purpose – to find something out.
Need to help children learn to make choices and see purpose of reading.

6. Enjoyment Enjoyment is a condition for effective learning in any area.
We spend a lot of energy encouraging children to enjoy books, enjoy reading.
Reading will be so much easier if the experience is enjoyable as well as informative.
Some children will enjoy reading for information, others will enjoy the experience of being taken to other worlds of fiction. There is no one recipe for enjoyment.

7. Learning to read decoding familiarity choice reading behaviour
Reading is like a set of building blocks.
Familiarity:
Young children love the security of familiar books, learn to predict by knowing what comes next, learn vocabulary by revisiting loved stories. Even as developed readers we often enjoy reading the same author, same newspaper, watching familiar programmes, etc.
Choice:
The beginnings of the development of critical awareness. Promotes a feeling of ownership, empowerment – choosing is what real readers do…
Response:
Developing opinions, likes/dislikes, interpreting ideas, relating own experience to what has been read
Reading behaviour:
Holding a book the right way up, right way round. Using ‘reader talk’/ expression/story language. Improvising dialogue. Being given a hymn book in assembly even though you can’t read…sets expectations.
Decoding – need to explore what we mean by this in more detail because a lot of emphasis is put on this in the early years of reading. So the next few slides deal with explaining phonics and other decoding strategies that children will be taught in school.
decoding
Response
& understanding

8. Rose Review Interim Report
Phonics
It is widely agreed that phonic work is an essential part, although not the whole picture, of what it takes to become a fluent reader and skilled writer and should be set within a broad, rich language curriculum.
Phonic work is an essential skill in learning to read and write and although not sufficient on its own, phonics has always been seen as first and foremost in the strategies used for teaching of reading.
The debate over recent years has been about about how it is taught, not whether it is taught. Although if you have been reading what has been written in the press you might think that this whole idea of phonics e.g c a t matching letters with sounds, has been ignored by schools. This is certainly not the case– schools have been teaching phonics for years…… . We are now looking at the most effective ways.
Mrs. Perks is going to talk to you about the programme of phonics we teach at school using Read, Write, Inc.
Rose Review Interim Report

9. Grammatical awareness
Other aspects of decoding
Word recognition
Context
Other reading strategies that children are taught in school include:
Word recognition. Reading becomes more fluent when children recognise some words or parts of words without having to use phonics e.g. recognising ‘and’ will make reading ‘grand’ much easier. As children have more experience of seeing familiar, everyday words they will use this strategy more confidently.
Context. Understanding the context of a book will help children to make sense of text. We automatically use pictures to help us make sense of what we read.
Grammatical awareness. Reading the sentence through to the end can sometimes help to decode the difficult word at the beginning of the sentence.
Emphasise that all these strategies will support successful decoding but that it is essential that phonics is the first strategy and developing that early phonic knowledge is crucial.
Grammatical awareness

10. Developing Readers hard words fatter books in your head long words
If children are able to read as in apply various decoding skills they are well on the way to fluency but that is not the whole picture. Very often children aspire to reading longer harder books because they see this as what good readers do. We need to look in depth at what good readers do and what being a good reader means – children haven’t cracked it by the time they are in Year3
Activity Using ‘Owl Babies’ demonstrate how many other skills we use when we are reading. Talk about inference and deduction – ‘reading between the lines’ , making sense of the story by trying to make connections that the author does not necessarily tell us about.
Asking questions: How do the owl babies feel? Who is the most sensible one? How do you know? Where do you think mummy has gone? How might she feel when she is away?
Prediction: What will the end of the story be ?
Making connections with own experience: When do you feel frightened?
How do you feel when you are left alone/ mummy goes somewhere?
These are typical of the kinds of questions we can ask that will help to develop more understanding of what the story is about. Could also use non-fiction examples e.g. news reports, adverts – what do you think about this? How effective is it?
Also use other texts e.g. introduction of a longer text e.g. Northern Lights, Iron man. Talk about how as fluent readers we are automatically making pictures in our minds, asking questions, thinking about how we can link to other stories, experience.
quickly
small print
no pictures

11. How are these characters feeling? What makes you think that?
Why do you think the lady is sitting away from the table?
We’re going to use this picture from an Anthony Browne book – to illustrate inference and deduction. His books are excellent for exploring layers of meaning in pictures. Look at this picture – what can you find? What can you see? What is the writer telling you and how is he doing it?
Picture is an illustration from Hansel and Gretel – now you know that, does it make you ‘read’ the picture differently?
Pictures in books can lend themselves to developing skills of inference and deduction from the very beginnings of reading.
Picture books link with the idea of visual literacy (the ability to interpret and make meaning from information presented in the form of an image. Visual literacy is based on the idea that pictures can be ‘read’ and that meaning can be communicated through a process of reading.)
Picture books are therefore not just something that children only need to support their reading in the early stages of reading.
Are they rich or poor? How do you know?

12. Reading in School Shared Reading Guided Reading Individual Reading
Reading in other subjects
Independent Reading
Reading in the Community
So what happens in school?
Most lessons will involve some reading or development of some reading skill.
Children will read in many different situations. Our small class sizes throughout the Primary Department ensure that teachers have time to hear the children read individually and frequently – and whilst doing so can explicitly teach and develop reading with your child.
Sometimes your child will share reading sessions, using the same text to enable them to talk about it amongst themselves – again this is an opportunity for the teaching of reading to take place.
Children like to have ownership over the books they read and our book banding supports children having a choice of texts at an independent level to enable them to practise and consolidate reading skills and enjoy books at home.

13. Children need a variety of reading experiences
Information Books
Adventure Stories
Poetry
Comics
Traditional stories
Plays
Breadth of reading material is important to develop children’s reading experiences. If they are only reading story books linked to a scheme, or one particular genre, then they have limited opportunities to develop those strategies that they need to become fluent and confident readers.

14. Don’t forget the web!

15. What can we read at home? Newspapers Magazines TV Listings
Instructions
Leaflets
Books
Packaging
Messages
Signs and Captions
A few ideas.
Keep up to date with what children are reading at school, in literacy and in other curriculum areas.
The reading book that children bring home is just small part - opportunity to practise skills learned in school but other opportunities to practise which are real and relevant.
Give value to the reading that your child values – they’re a bit young perhaps at the moment but things like text messaging, computer games, onscreen texts, etc.
Where possible try to give purpose to reading. Even something as simple as reading cereal packets – looking at the pictures etc – to make a choice empowers your child as a developing reader.

16. How can we help our children?
Understand the reading process
Value reading to the end of primary years and beyond
Be a good role model
Recognise and support our children’s interests and desires
Making time for our children to read
Be a good role model. Read lots yourself - be seen reading!
Talk about what you are reading.
Look for reading opportunities in everyday life.
Read to your child.
Be willing to share different books and texts.
Remember what busy lives our children lead – after school activities, telly, computer games etc – important to take time to relax with a book – otherwise, especially as we all know how important it is for children to get enough sleep as well – reading is so easily squeezed out.

17. Let your child see that reading is important in your life
Enjoy it!
A good 10 minutes reading is better than a difficult half hour
Be positive!
Reinforce from previous slide.
Children are influenced by what you think and believe in - they pick up things that are said and unsaid both at home and at school
Is yours a reading home?
Basket of books
Books for car journeys
Children’s bookcase
Recipe books/ ‘How to’ books
Attitude!

18. Reading Together child teacher parent Your Child
and
Literacy
Your Child and Literacy
Home/school partnership
The important part all of the above play in the home –school partnership.
Your support is invaluable e.g. homework, reading, talking about school work etc. Your children benefit so much from your involvement.
Please continue to talk and share with teachers e.g. homework queries, current curriculum focus, concerns, share what children may do at home.
We see your children as individuals; strengths/weaknesses/interests/learning styles/preferences/needs.
We want your child to feel happy and secure in their school/classroom. We need to work together.
teacher
Parent
Teacher
parent

19. Happy Reading!