Guided Reading with Mrs Carroll, Mr Rowlands and Mrs Galloway

At Rougemont, we have recently rejuvented reading lessons, by encouraging our pupils to read 'real' books, with exciting plots, themes, characters and vocabulary. Our newly purchased books  have chapters and substance to them, thus engaging both those pupils who are still struggling to enjoy reading books and those who are confident readers, unable to thrive on simple, repetitive story structures and the characters within them.

At the start of year four, all pupils are grouped, according to their reading ability. These groups are created, using pupils from across the year group, to enhance the reading experience of our pupils and also to improve their inter-personal skills.

Pupils participate in hour-long guided reading sessions twice a week and are allocated to a member of staff, for half a term. At the end of each half term, teachers are rotated, bringing diversity to reading sessions and the pupils may also be moved from group to group, depending on how they are coping with the set texts and associated homeworks.

Reading Journals and Homeworks

Pupils are given a reading journal at the start of year 4, which is key to maintaining communication between home and school.  At the front of this journal, you will find a log of chapters read and work set.  You will need to look at these pages, to check your child is completing reading homework correctly.

Your child will be asked to complete set work at the back of the journal, thus creating a log of all work set. Pupils enter year 4 having been introduced to this system in year 3, although there may be subtle changes to note.

As always, reading homework should take the set 30 minutes to complete.  Reading teachers will ensure that the homework is appropriately gauged, in order that it takes this long. Wherever possible, reference to the text should be made. For example, if they are asked to complete a character profile of the main character, they could annotate with labels, using page references, to demonstrate their use of text.  Presentation is also extremely important.

Reading Advice

Our main aim, is to create an enthusiastic approach to reading.  We want our year 4 pupils to enjoy reading and for them to thrive on books, stories and information. 

Try following these guidelines, to encouarge enthusiasm towards reading books.

·           Make reading time a regular, daily activity.

·           Allow them time to read independently, but gauge their understanding by flicking through the text yourself and asking them questions about the story, what will happen next etc.

·           Re-read the story with them, to outline areas of focus and correct where necessary.

·           If a word is unknown, rely on their phonetic knowledge to sound it out.  Ask them to break the word up into small chunks, by covering up the rest of the word, like this... acc-ord-ing  (according)

·           If you can't sound the word out phonetically, tell them it, but make them focus on the unusual spelling pattern and ensure you re-visit the word during this reading time and again over the next couple of days.

·           Check their ability to 'read between the lines' by asking questions about how the characters feel, where feelings are not explicitly stated.  For example, if a character has lost a favourite object, can your child tell you how they know the character is sad about it?

·           When your child reads to you, ensure they realise the importance of using expression when reading to others.  Try reading a page using no expression and test their understanding afterwards.

·           Make it fun by asking them to act out the story for Gran or another supportive family member.

·           Encouarge your child to read anything and everything.  If they want to read a car manual, or a comic, let them.

·           Ask them about the differences between fiction and non-fiction.  Why do they prefer one genre to another?  Could this help you to choose a book which will engage them more?

·           Make links to the importance of being able to read, by asking them to check labels on food, or to check cinema opening times, the weather forecast in the newspaper and so on.