At Ryders Green, we strive to give every child, every opportunity, at their one chance in Primary School.

Phonics and Reading Schemes at Ryders Green

At Ryders Green we strive to ensure all our pupils are confident and happy readers. We follow the Read Write Inc in school with daily phonics sessions taking place in Early Years and Key Stage 1. All pupils will have books to share at home with their families.

Within nursery, our children take home books to enjoy with a grown up. They are encouraged to share the story together, discuss the pictures and consider what might happen next.

Our Reception children enjoy their daily Read, Write, Inc Phonics session with their teacher. To help support their reading further the children have access to a wide range of books. As they are introduced to the set one sounds, they enjoy an activity to take home and further practice the sound they have been introduced to in class. On completion of the set one sounds we begin introducing our ‘Sound Blending’ books to the children. The books are taken home for the children to enjoy with their parents, and a guide on how to use them is shared. You will also be invited into school to take part in a Phonic Workshop. This is a great introduction to the reading journey your child is now on! As the children progress, they will move through the sound blending books and then on to ditty books. They will have the chance to develop their knowledge and practice their phonics skills along the way.

For our children in Year 1 and Year 2, they continue to enjoy their daily Read, Write, Inc session with their teacher. They will also bring home a book matched to their phonic teaching in school. Parents will be invited to our phonic workshops.

For more information scan these QR codes with your phone camera:

Alongside their phonic books, children also have access to a wider range of books for them to read and enjoy. They will receive a banded book that they can enjoy at home with a grown up to help develop their reading comprehension skills and practice try out their phonics skills. We also provide the children with school library books to enjoy.

Writing assessment at Ryders Green

At Ryders Green we use Curriculum Mapping documents in order to ensure coverage of the National Curriculum objectives.

To ensure our writing assessments are accurate across the school, we have allocated staff moderating sessions, where we sit as a staff and quality assure each other’s assessments.

We are also taking part in ‘No More Marking’ which enable staff to take part in comparative judgements for schools. Take a look at the demo here to find out more! The assessment and comparative judgements are another way we moderate the writing that takes place at our school.

Alongside this, we also take place in Local Authority moderation where we moderate approximately 10% of the class teacher’s assessments which are then used for future moderation.

Reading assessment at Ryders Green

At Ryders Green we believe in good quality assessment. This ensures that all children are monitored accurately and any relevant interventions can take place. In order to make this possible, we use two different assessment strategies: PM Benchmarking and PiRA reading assessments. This supplements our use of the Bug Club reading tests.

The PiRA reading assessments are small, termly reading tests give standardised results and age related scores that enable us to track pupil progress term by term. Benefits of the tests include:

• Full coverage of the new National Curriculum – supporting a whole-school approach from spring term in Reception to the end of Year 6.
• A diagnostic profile for each pupil – including a Standardised Score, Reading Age and Hodder Scale Score, based on the termly performance of over 10,000 pupils nationally.
• Helps monitor small increments of progress – offering a reliable basis for predicting future progress and supporting planning.
• Supports the identification of strengths and weaknesses – informing teaching and highlighting areas where children may need more support.
• Simple and quick to administer and mark – taking just 30 to 40 minutes to assess a whole class.
• As the standards in reading have increased with the introduction of The New National Curriculum, it is important that children are being assessed at these new standards. PiRA assessment has taken account of this change and now includes questions of increased difficulty and new questions types to provide familiarity with the SATs-style questions

These assessments mean that our children are exposed to and prepared for the expectations in the Reading SATs tests and we provide children lower than year 6, with these experiences.

In order to further quality assure our reading assessments across the school, we also use PM Benchmarking which has been recommended to us by the Local Authority.

Benchmark Kits are an essential resource to accurately track and assess pupils’ reading progress across the whole school, ensuring consistent and accurate levelling in reading. It is a highly supportive reading programme for teachers, and gives reassurance that every child can succeed, as well as also giving teachers the ability to accurately measure reading progress and meet National Curriculum and Ofsted requirements. Any child that falls 6 months below their age-related expectation based on the PiRA test is Benchmarked, in order to provide an accurate assessment of what the child can do, so that relevant and timely interventions can be put in to place.

This all takes place alongside half termly staff moderation sessions where we sit down as a staff and quality assure our judgements with each other.

English as an Additional Language

For further information regarding English as an Additional Language, please speak to Miss Edmondson to find out more about our ‘Flash Academy’ approach used in school. 

Other Opportunities

Children have a range of learning apps they can access at home to further develop their knowledge and understanding in English. All children have access to ‘Bug Club’ for further reading opportunities, ‘Spelling Shed’ for weekly spelling practice in Years 1-6 and then ‘Century Tech’ for English homework in KS2. For more information please see here.