English

Learning to Read and Reading to Learn.

At Darwen St James’, we believe that learning to read, understanding what is read, and reading for pleasure unlocks everything else a child needs to learn. Reading is a life skill and the ultimate key to your child's future.

Our reading journey is broken down into two clear stages: learning to read (mastering the sounds and letters) and reading to learn (using reading to discover new knowledge, explore different worlds, and build a deep understanding). Guided by our Christian values, we use the Ready Steady Read programme across Years 2 to 6 to transition children from decoding letters to becoming deep, independent readers.

The Early Reading Journey

In the early stages of school, our absolute priority is teaching children how to crack the reading code through daily phonics sessions. For detailed information on how we teach letters and sounds in Nursery, Reception, and Year 1, please visit our dedicated Early Reading and Phonics page.

Most children will master these basic phonics skills by the end of Year 1. To make sure no one is left behind, we have specially trained staff who continue to support older children higher up the school with phonics if they need it, ensuring they can access reading work that is perfectly appropriate for their exact needs.

Whole Class Reading: Ready Steady Read (Years 2 to 6)

Once children have mastered the basics of phonics and are able to decode words fluently, they move fully into our Ready Steady Read programme. This whole-class approach ensures that every child, regardless of their starting point, gets to experience and enjoy challenging, high-quality literature with the support of their teacher and peers.

The Year 2 Transition

The main focus when entering Year 2 is to develop reading fluency so that children can read smoothly and with expression. Through Ready Steady Read, our teachers use lots of modelled reading (where the teacher shows how a skilled reader sounds), shared reading, and choral reading (where the class reads together out loud).

We know that every class is different. Some cohorts of Year 2 will be ready to move onto whole-class Ready Steady Read sessions in the Autumn Term, but other cohorts will need to continue with smaller guided reading groups until the Summer Term. We adapt and change our approach in this year group depending on what is best for the children at that exact time.

Becoming Deeper Readers (Years 3 to 6)

Through the Ready Steady Read programme, our older children explore high-quality, vocabulary-rich books, poetry, and non-fiction texts together as a whole class. Instead of just reading the words on the page, the children are taught how to dive deeper into the text.

Ready Steady Read helps our pupils to:

Explore New Vocabulary: Finding and understanding brilliant new words to grow their own spoken and written vocabulary.

Retrieve Information: Locating key facts and information quickly within a text.

Read Between the Lines: Using clues from the book to understand how a character feels, why something happened, or what might happen next.

Talk About Books: Participating in rich, purposeful class discussions to build confidence, comprehension, and spoken language skills.

By using Ready Steady Read, we give our children the comprehension and vocabulary skills they need to not only succeed in school, but to develop a genuine, lifelong love for reading.

For all the latest Phonics and Early Reading curriculum news, please click here.

The subject lead for phonics and early reading at Darwen St James is Miss Sears.

Phonics is one of the most important building blocks when learning how to read. It is the simple matching of written letters (graphemes) to sounds (phonemes). These are then blended together to read words and, later on, captions and sentences.

To give our children the absolute best start, we use Bug Club Phonics as our school synthetic phonics scheme. This validated programme enables us to create able, confident readers and writers from the very beginning of their school journey.

Foundations in Nursery: Phase 1 Phonics

Before children begin learning letters, they must develop their listening and speaking skills. In our Nursery, we place a massive focus on Phase 1 phonics.

Through lots of active play, music, and storytelling, children explore:

• Environmental and instrumental sounds

• Body percussion like clapping and stamping

• Rhythm, rhyme, and alliteration

• Oral blending (hearing that d-o-g makes dog)

This crucial work builds the listening skills and speech foundations children need before they move on to reading letters in Reception.

Why We Use Bug Club Phonics

Bug Club Phonics provides a structured, inclusive approach that meets the rigorous standards of the national Reading Framework.

Our programme ensures:

• A solid foundation for all: It uses a systematic approach proven to give the best foundation in reading for all children, regardless of background.

• Fully decodable books: The scheme provides 180 fiction and non-fiction readers. This means children only read books containing the exact sounds they have already been taught, building instant success and reading confidence.

• Inclusive teaching: Keeping children together for daily sessions fosters a sense of belonging and allows us to support children who may need a slower pace without separating them from their peers.

• Engaging resources: Videos of well-known characters are weaved into lessons and appear in the books, successfully linking the home environment with school.

• Frequent and detailed assessment: We use regular check-ins and fun educational games to track progress closely, meaning we spot immediately if a child needs extra help to keep up.

Daily Phonics and Catch-Up Support

Children at Darwen St James' have daily phonics lessons, which last for 20 to 30 minutes in Reception and Year 1.

We aim for all children to keep up from the start. However, if any child falls behind, targeted support is put in place immediately. This phonics teaching continues into Key Stage 2 as part of our rigorous catch-up programme, utilising whole-class direct teaching or intervention groups to ensure every child becomes a fluent reader.

Information for Parents

Our reading books are perfectly matched to our phonics scheme and are allocated to children for online reading. Rather than taking physical books home, your child can log in online to access vibrant stories that link directly to their current phonics level. This allows them to successfully practise, complete interactive rewards, and consolidate their learning at home with you.

 

Phonics Progression 

                        

Information for Parents about our Phonics Scheme

Here is an information video about Bug Club Phonics

Our new scheme is now linked to our reading books so your child will access stories that our linked to their current phonics level. This will help them to practise and consolidate their learning. 

Click on the phonics sound board below to hear the correct pronunciation of the phonemes.

             

Becoming Confident and Accurate Spellers.

At Darwen St James’, we understand that confident spelling is a key building block for effective communication and successful writing. To support our goal of improving writing outcomes across the school, we use Ready Steady Spell from Year 2 to Year 6. 

This programme moves children away from simply memorising lists of words for a Friday test. Instead, it teaches them how the English language works, empowering them with the tools and strategies they need to spell words accurately and independently within their everyday writing. 

How Ready Steady Spell Works

Ready Steady Spell is a progressive, structured programme that breaks spelling down into manageable, interactive steps. It reduces the pressure on children by using a consistent routine so that they can focus fully on learning new spelling rules. 

Our spelling lessons follow a clear sequence to help children remember what they have learned:

Introduce: Children meet a new spelling rule, pattern, or word group for the first time. 

Reinforce: They actively practise the rule through fun, multi-sensory techniques, visual strategies, and catchy rule rhymes. 

Embed: Children learn how to apply these rules directly into their independent writing, moving the knowledge into their long-term memory. 

Moving Beyond Phonics

In Nursery, Reception, and Year 1, children learn to spell using their phonics skills, writing down the sounds they can hear. From Year 2 onwards, Ready Steady Spell helps them build on this foundation. 

Children are taught to look deeper at words by exploring word families, roots, prefixes, and suffixes, as well as learning the statutory words required by the National Curriculum. By investigating how words are constructed, they build the confidence to use a wider, more ambitious vocabulary in their writing pieces. 

Supporting Every Speller

We know that spelling can be tricky for some children. Ready Steady Spell includes built-in review sessions and targeted catch-up support to ensure that no child falls behind and that everyone can keep up with their year-group expectations. By teaching spelling as an active, problem-solving skill, we give every child the confidence to write with clarity and pride.

                   

At Darwen St James’, we know that neat, comfortable, and fluent handwriting is essential for improving writing outcomes. If a child has to struggle to physically form letters, it takes away the mental energy they need for spelling, vocabulary, and creative thinking. To address this, we follow the Letter-join handwriting scheme, but with a massive, renewed emphasis on the physical foundations required for successful writing.

Our structured approach ensures that children build the physical strength, coordination, and control they need before they even pick up a pencil, moving smoothly from early movements to beautifully joined script.

The Physical Foundations in Early Years

In line with the national Reading and Writing Framework, our handwriting journey begins long before children write on paper. We place a huge emphasis on physical development in Nursery and Reception because strong bodies make strong writers.

We focus daily on two key areas:

Gross Motor Skills: Children take part in large-scale movements like climbing, balancing, throwing, and making big patterns in the air or in sand. This builds the core, shoulder, and arm strength needed to sit correctly and stabilise their bodies for writing.

Fine Motor Skills: We provide daily activities to strengthen little fingers and hands. Using playdough, tweezers, threading, and cutting helps children develop the dexterity and grip required to hold a pencil comfortably and correctly.

Letter Formation and the Letter-join Scheme

As children move through the Early Years and into Key Stage 1, we use the Letter-join scheme to teach clear and accurate letter formation. Children are taught exactly where a letter starts, which direction the pencil should go, and where it finishes.

We ensure that children master the correct size and orientation of individual letters first. Writing is kept unjoined at this stage until letter shapes are deeply embedded and legible.

Progressing to Joined Writing

Once children are forming their letters clearly, accurately, and at the correct size, we begin to focus on making accurate joins using the Letter-join progression.

In Key Stage 2, the focus shifts to developing stamina, speed, and consistency. We teach children how to maintain neat, legible handwriting across all of their subjects. By ensuring handwriting becomes an automatic habit, we free up our children's minds to focus entirely on the quality, creativity, and accuracy of their writing.

                                                                          

We’re a Voice 21 Oracy School.

We are part of a network of over a thousand Voice 21 Oracy Schools across the UK who are transforming teaching and learning through talk.

Oracy is the ability to articulate ideas, develop understanding and engage with others through spoken language. In Voice 21 Oracy Schools students learn the oracy skills they need to succeed in school and in life.

Why oracy matters?

By teaching pupils to become effective speakers and listeners we empower them to better understand themselves, each other and the world around them.

We actively invest teaching time into creating "talk rich" classrooms, valuing every single student voice, boosting confidence and preparing our students for their futures.

• Speaking and listening skills are critical foundations for reading and writing.
• Students with better oral language skills are more likely to achieve the highest grades in GCSE Maths and English.
• Young people with good communication skills are less likely to have mental health difficulties.

As a Voice 21 Oracy School we put oracy at the heart of our teaching and learning across all subject areas enabling students to develop and deepen their knowledge and understanding through talk in the classroom.

In Voice 21 Oracy Schools:

• 89% of students agree/strongly agree that speaking and listening has helped them make progress with their school work.
• 77% of teachers said that oracy had boosted attainment.
• 96% of teachers said that oracy is an essential part of teaching and learning.

Find out more about oracy and Voice 21 here

About Voice 21

Voice 21 is the UK’s oracy education charity. It works with schools to transform the learning and life chances of young people through talk so that all children can use their voice for success in school and in life. Since its launch in 2015 it has worked with over 1200 schools and 10,000 teachers across the UK, reaching more than 290,000 students through its work.

Oracy is the ability to articulate ideas, develop understanding and engage with others through spoken language. In school, oracy is a powerful tool for learning; by teaching students to become more effective speakers and listeners we empower them to find their voice for success in school and life. It underpins young people’s progress and development: their literacy and numeracy, academic attainment, wellbeing, confidence and future prospects in further or higher education and employment.