English

Phonics and Early  Reading

At KPI we believe that being able to read and write are vital life skills that open the door to all other learning. We passionately believe in helping children to develop not only the technical skills of reading and writing, but also fostering a love for reading and books.

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Our teaching of reading and spelling within the school is based on the Sounds-Write programme. Sounds-Write is a linguistic phonics approach (speech to print) and a systematic synthetic phonics programme and is validated by the Department for Education. Sounds-Write is a highly structured, cumulative, multi-sensory approach to teaching reading and spelling across the whole school. 

Students are taught the 'Initial Code' in the first year of school and cover the 'Extended Code' and how to read Polysyllabic Words during the next two years. 

Phonics is taught for at least 30 minutes daily in the first three years of school and Sounds-Write is used for teaching spelling in the years beyond this, for children who attend Kiveton Park Meadows Junior School. 

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Parents and carers are encouraged to take the free course for parents and carers so they can support their children more effectively, and should be made aware of the Sounds-Write app. 

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Formal teaching of letter-sound correspondences starts when children start in Reception and continues until a child is a confident and competent reader and speller. In our nursery, the focus is on developing phonological awareness and children are not taught letter-sound correspondences.