A reader lives a thousand lives. Reading is more than an essential life skill; it allows us to travel to different worlds and see those worlds through the eyes of others. In order to thrive personally and academically, it is essential that we as educators empower children to become strong, enthusiastic readers. To this end, we have carefully curated the texts that we study to ensure that children are exposed to a wide variety of authors, genres, experiences and backgrounds. St. Mary's is a book-rich environment. Every class has its own library so that every child has access to a wide variety of high-quality texts to provide them with an appropriate level of challenge.

Reading at St. Mary's is a top priority. We follow the National Curriculum reading programme of study. The reading curriculum is ambitious in the range of skills and techniques delivered. As soon as children enter Foundation Stage, they begin learning sounds and begin to blend through the Read, Write Inc. phonics scheme. This gets children off to a flying start. 

Phonics enjoys a high profile at St Mary's. It is taught using Read Write Inc. which is a structured and systematic approach teaching grapheme-phoneme correspondence (sounds) and how to read words by blending sounds.

Early readers' comprehension skills are developed through reading a wide variety of books with the children. High quality texts are read every day to develop language acquisition, linked to their growing phonic knowledge, and story comprehension. As a result, children are better equipped to develop their comprehension skills, phonic knowledge and increase their vocabulary.

We have carefully selected high quality texts by a range of authors. Reading skills are taught explicitly to give children every opportunity to engage with their reading on a deep and meaningful level. In this way, children gain a deep understanding of texts studied and have multiple opportunities to use and refine essential reading skills. 

Year on year, reading skills are not merely repeated, but built upon to ensure that children become competent, confident and enthusiastic readers. 

We are lucky enough to have a book vending machine to encourage children to read widely and often. When children complete a reading challenge, they earn a token and can visit our vending machine. Here they can choose a new book to keep. Our aim is to get as many books into the hands of our young people as possible!

It is crucial that every child leaves St Mary's secondary ready and being able to read fluently is key to this. Reading is the gateway to the curriculum and so we ensure that all children are supported to keep up and catch up with the reading curriculum. We have a range of programmes to accelerate progress in reading where necessary. 

In Early Years and Key Stage 1, children will have 1:1 phonics interventions to support them in meeting age related expectations. 

For children in Key Stage 2 who require support to be able to read fluently, we use the Fresh Start programme.

Finally, reciprocal reading is a reading intervention for children who can read fluently but struggle to make meaning from the words that they have read. Reciprocal reading focusses on four key skills which aid comprehension: questionning, summarising, clarifying and predicting. Practising these four core skills enables struggling readers to zero-in on essential reading skills to accelerate their abilities in a structured, supportive and enjoyable atmosphere. 

At St. Mary's we believe that poetry offers an invaluable opportunity for our children to engage with a wide range of human feelings and experience. Termly, each class shares a poem taken from the Centre for Literacy in Primary Education. The poem is analysed for features and content to ensure secure comprehension. Using this newly gained comprehension of an unfamiliar (and sometimes non-standard) text, the children prepare a performance for their poem.  Children tell us that they enjoy these sessions and look forward to them. Nerves are, of course, natural. Reluctant performers are set their own targets and are not expected to perform to a large group.

Drama is far more than acting. At St Mary's, children develop a love of reading and literature through drama activities. It helps them to develop a whole range of skills such as empathy, expression, fluency and listening. It is also character building and helps them to see themselves in a different light, with a confidence that they may not realise they had. 

There are many opportunities for drama within lessons at St Mary's. Year 6 also take part in 'A Play in a Day' twice a year. This involves the children working together to develop characters, storylines and performance ideas for a play which they perform at the end of the day. It is the process rather than the final piece which is important, however the end results are usually inspiring and often very funny!

Other opportunities for performances come in the form of poetry recitals, Christmas nativities, Easter plays and the Year 6 summer production. 

We encourage our children to develop these talents and interests through our after school 'Musical Theatre' club.