Reading at Cleaswell Hill School 

Children become readers from the moment they learn to love books and stories from an early age. At Cleaswell Hill, we promote a love of reading and actively encourage this across school daily. Reading is shared or independent depending on the ages and need of the pupil. 

The aims of our reading curriculum are broad and reflective of the wide range of needs shown by pupils across all pathways in school. 

We aim to: 

• Encourage children to become enthusiastic and reflective readers with an interest in books and to read with enjoyment; 

• Help pupils become confident, independent readers, where appropriate, through a focus on phonics, word, sentence and text-level knowledge at a suitable level; 

• Develop positive, enthusiastic and reflective readers, through contact with challenging and substantial texts where applicable; 

• Become familiar with key stories and participate in discussion, explaining their understanding of what is read using visual and auditory support where necessary; 

• Encourage the use of wider cultural reading throughout the school and reading for pleasure to promote higher quality discussion and comprehension, where appropriate, alongside a love of reading; 

• To promote and enable literacy development through individual learning programmes. 

• To have an interest in words, symbols and their meanings and a growing vocabulary where appropriate. 

• To develop the use of sight reading to increase a child’s familiarity with the high frequency words or symbols they will often encounter without having to decode, segment and blend, so that they can build independence in functional reading. 

 

Launchpad for Literacy 

The Launchpad for Literacy is an approach to literacy readiness. It also gives practitioners a tool to clarify what children can do and identify developmental skill gaps by bridging the gap between spoken language and literacy through focussing on incremental sequences of skills (that may not be at the child’s chronological age.)  This enables staff to close any gaps in developmental understanding, whilst avoiding cycles of repeating what a child cannot do and then facilitating interventions and teaching at the correct stages of development and understanding for the individual. It gives teachers and staff a deeper knowledge of improving phonics and longer-term literacy outcomes for both reading and writing personalised to each child. 

Engagement Pathway 

For students with complex learning difficulties and disabilities (CLDD), curriculum delivery is guided by their Engagement Profile, Personal Learning Intention Map (PLIM), and Individual Development Assessment Framework (IDAF), which incorporates Social Communication, Emotional Regulation and Transactional Support (SCERTS), the Engagement Model and the Pre-Key Stage Standards. This curriculum is delivered alongside integrated therapies, including speech and language therapy and occupational therapy, ensuring that the language and content are matched to each student’s level of understanding. Additional approaches—such as Intensive Interaction, Attention Autism, TACPAC, and the Curiosity Approach— help to develop early communication skills and the ability to attend, both of which are a prerequisite for learning. The use of real objects, symbols, photographs and symbols accompanied by text, support understanding and engagement in purposeful activity. Pupils following the engagement curriculum do not access subject specific learning and this is reflected in their individual engagement profiles.  

Appropriate methods of expression and ICT based systems are used for those students who have difficulty with specific aspects of the curriculum, such as reading. Classrooms are equipped with materials that reflect students’ interests and their enjoyment of familiar texts, helping to promote engagement and motivation. Visual supports—including objects of reference (OoR), Picture Exchange Communication Systeme (PECS) and communication books/boards—are embedded throughout the curriculum to ensure optimised levels of communication and interaction wherever possible. Symbolic reading is used wherever appropriate to develop functional community awareness and access. Some pupils may also acquire a bank of common sight words. 

Core Word Programme 

The Core Word Programme is an approach that supports children with complex needs to develop communication and early reading skills through a small set of high frequency, functional words. These “core words” (such as go, stop, want, more, help, and like) can be used across a wide range of activities and environments, giving children a powerful and meaningful foundation for language and literacy. Rather than relying on long lists of nouns or isolated vocabulary, the programme focuses on modelling these words throughout the day—both verbally and through AAC—so children learn how to use them to request, reject, comment, and interact. Children are encouraged to initiate, make choices, and take turns, with refusals recognised as valid communication.  

Core words are taught through engaging, motivating sessions such as Attention Autism, Play Skills, ICT activities, and sensory exploration, as well as being embedded throughout daily routines to support generalisation. Through repetition, predictable routines, and natural opportunities to communicate, children begin to recognise, use, and eventually read these core words, building a strong foundation for symbolic understanding, functional literacy, and confident communication across home, school, and the wider community. 

Phonics 

Essential Letters and Sounds 

Essential Letters and Sounds (ELS) is our chosen Phonics programme. The aim of ELS is 

‘Getting all children to read well, quickly’. It teaches children to read by identifying the phonemes (the smallest unit of sound) and graphemes (the written version of the sound) within words and using these to read words. 

Children begin learning Phonics when teachers feel that they show signs of being ready. To aid this we deliver ELS Foundation Stage. It is designed to help children build their vocabulary, language, and listening skills. It supports all learners in developing their Phase 1 skills with a clear, step-by-step approach. ELS Foundation Stage readies pupils as they begin their Early Reading journey.  

Phonics is explicitly taught during a dedicated slot on the timetable. Children are given the knowledge and the skills to then apply this independently. 

Throughout the day, children will use their growing Phonics knowledge to support them in other areas of the curriculum and will have many opportunities to practise their reading. This includes reading 1:1 with a member of staff, with a partner during paired reading and as a class. 

Children continue Phonics lessons through the school to ensure all children become confident, fluent readers. 

We follow the ELS progression and sequence. This allows our children to practise their existing phonic knowledge whilst building their understanding of the ‘code’ of our language GPCs (Grapheme Phoneme Correspondence). As a result, our children can tackle any unfamiliar words that they might discover. 

Children experience the joy of books and language whilst rapidly acquiring the skills they need to become fluent independent readers and writers. ELS teaches relevant, useful and ambitious vocabulary to support each child’s journey to becoming fluent and independent readers. 

We begin by teaching the single letter sounds before moving to diagraphs ‘sh’ (two letters spelling one sound), trigraphs ‘igh’ (three letters spelling one sound) and quadgraphs ‘eigh’ (four letters spelling one sound). 

We teach children to: 

• Decode (read) by identifying each sound within a word and blending them together to read fluently 

• Encode (write) by segmenting each sound to write words accurately. 

 

The structure of ELS lessons allows children to know what is coming next, what they need to do, and how to achieve success. This makes it easier for children to learn the GPCs we are teaching (the alphabetic code) and how to apply this when reading. 

ELS is designed on the principle that children should ‘keep up’ rather than ‘catch up’. Since interventions are delivered within the lesson by the teacher, any child who is struggling with the new knowledge can be immediately targeted with appropriate support. Where further support is required, 1:1 and small group interventions are used where needed. These interventions are short, specific and effective. 

 

Multisensory approach 

Some pupils have cognitive, sensory, physical, language or developmental needs that mean the linear structure and pace of the school’s SSP is not appropriate. These pupils benefit from a bespoke, multisensory approach that enables them to explore sound, pattern, print and communication at a developmentally appropriate level. The school’s approach to this is delivering high-quality, multisensory phonics instruction for some pupils on the core pathway who are unable to access the school’s Systematic Synthetic Phonics (SSP) programme due to their individual learning needs. This is supporting their engagement in sessions and giving opportunities for multisensory learning (visual, auditory, tactile, kinaesthetic) which strengthens memory, supports engagement, and enables access for diverse learners. 

 

Beyond Phonics 

Once pupils are secure in their phonic knowledge, they will begin to read a greater range of texts, such as; non-fiction, poetry and a range of fiction, including Shakespeare. Those working within the Key Stage 2 and 3 curriculum develop reading fluency. As children grow in independence the books become more complex in terms of content, vocabulary and sentence structure. 

Pupils are encouraged to talk about what they are reading, share their ideas, voice their own opinions and develop informed responses to texts. The skills of Speaking and Listening and the ability to respond, voice thoughts and opinions is vitally important for our pupils. 

Pupils in the 14-19 area of learning will begin an appropriate qualification or accreditation in English that is linked to their prior progress and learning level. This will then support them in their future pathway goals. 

Cleaswell teaches spelling using ELS Essential Spelling. This aids the important transition from phonics to spelling. The resources follow the format and structure of the ELS phonics teaching programme. The programme comprises of:  

• Structured spelling lessons  

• Follows the format and structure of the ELS phonics teaching programme  

• Covers the requirements of the National Curriculum at Year 2  

• Three teaching sessions per week  

 

When children have completed the ELS spelling programme, they progress onto the Essential spelling and word knowledge programme which contains all the spelling content for year 3-6 of the National curriculum.  

  

 

Cultural Reading Spine 

We have introduced a cultural reading spine across the school to enrich the curriculum further by exposing pupils to a diverse range of voices, histories, and perspectives. It supports us to build cultural capital, broaden understanding of the world, and foster empathy by ensuring children encounter stories beyond their own lived experiences. The cultural reading spine is designed to support progression in reading, strengthen vocabulary, and create shared texts that unify learning within phases. It is built into long term literacy planning to support its fluent use and ultimately, it contributes to a more inclusive, engaging, and culturally aware school community. 

 

Assessment  

To meet the needs of a range of pupils with complex needs, there are several assessment systems in place to monitor and analyse pupil progress from their individual starting points with regards to reading. These are: IDAF, Core word programme assessment tracker, Launching into, National Curriculum, qualification tracker and phonics tracker. 

Assessment data is used to inform future planning and to indicate necessary interventions for those pupils who may not have made expected progress. The progress of pupils with complex learning difficulties and disabilities is tracked through bespoke frameworks and individualised PLIM targets linked to their EHCP and focuses on individual communication and interaction, enhanced by personalised motivators and a love of books. 

For pupils who are identified as being able to access formal literacy learning, they are grouped into classes within phase according to their ability and starting point. Work is ongoing to give children exposure to concepts and content in line with their proposed qualification route to ensure they are fully prepared. 

 

Parental Involvement 

Support from parents is vital in ensuring consistency of learning within literacy. Parents are informed of the English group their child is in, the level they are working at and the support that they receive. Children will receive home learning as agreed with parents and when appropriate. Progress is reviewed regularly and parents are informed of any major changes to progress as well as being given updates to targets through the PLIMs being sent home and through the annual EHCP review process. 

Supporting Reading at Home: 

• Children who are accessing a phonics group will only read books that are entirely decodable, this means that they should be able to read these books as they already know the code contained within the book. Children beyond phonics are provided with reading books which are at the correct level and interest for the child. 

• We only use pure sounds when decoding words (no ‘uh’ after the sound) 

• We want children to practise reading their book 4 times across the week working on these skills: 

 

Decode – sounding out and blending to read the word. 

Fluency – reading words with less obvious decoding. 

Expression – using intonation and expression to bring the text to life! 

We must use pure sounds when we are pronouncing the sounds and supporting children in reading words. If we mispronounce these sounds, we will make reading harder for our children. Please watch the videos below for how to accurately pronounce these sounds: 

 

https://vimeo.com/753929025/5eaa45c0aa

https://vimeo.com/753931102/b9a2f8194f

https://vimeo.com/753933192/43104a30e0

https://home.oxfordowl.co.uk/reading/reading-schemes-oxford-levels/essential-letters-and-sounds/?fbclid=IwAR0XQsezraqQYfjxLeeM3lQ90MeQBGc1Z2_DIBDbYaw9WRXTvLELYHusggs

 

More support for parents and carers can be found here:

https://home.oxfordowl.co.uk/reading/reading-schemes-oxford-levels/essential-letters-and-sounds/