We believe that a high quality, English curriculum develops a children’s love of reading.

During their time at St Scholastica's,  we strive and encourage pupils to be avid readers: children who read fluently and widely and are able to express preferences and opinions about the texts that they read. 

We want them to read for pleasure, having had access to a wide range of text types, genres and authors in order for them to make informed opinions about their favourites.

We aim to expose our children daily to a wide range of rich, ambitious vocabulary so that they able to decipher new words and then apply them when speaking both informally and formally and when writing.

Our reading curriculum closely follows the aims of the National Curriculum for English 2014 to enable all children to:

• read easily, fluently and with good understanding
• develop the habit of reading widely and often, for both pleasure and information
• acquire a wide vocabulary, an understanding of grammar and knowledge of linguistic conventions for reading, writing and spoken language
• use discussion in order to learn; they should be able to elaborate and explain clearly their understanding and ideas

These aims are embedded across our reading lessons and the wider curriculum.

At St Scholastica’s Catholic Primary School we use the RWI scheme to teach phonics in Early Years and KS1. Read Write Inc (RWI) is a phonics complete literacy programme which helps children learn to read fluently and at speed so they can focus on developing their skills in comprehension, vocabulary and spelling.  

Destination Reader

In KS2 Reading is taught through Destination Reader is a reading programme developed by Hackney Education that is extremely successful in ensuring that all children learn the key skills of a competent reader whilst also being exposed to a wide range of literature that will inspire them to read more.  These daily lessons across Key Stage 2 last approximately 45 minutes. You can download a map below which shows you the 'Core' texts that each class will study.  In addition to this, students work in small groups to read books which are matched to their current level.  Every term they complete an Accelerated Reader assessment which allows staff to pick up any children who would benefit from additional tutoring.