
Edith Cavell
Academy & Nursery
Duckett Close, Norwich NR1 2LR - 01603 621927 - office@edithcavellacademy.co.uk
Reading at Edith Cavell
If you would like more information about the curriculum we run then please use the contact form and we will endeavour to answer your request as soon as possible.
Reading and stories sits at the very heart of our curriculum because our staff know that a child’s ability to read is one of the most important skills we can teach them.
We also LOVE reading to children or reading with children. It’s so important that children hear books read aloud at home and at school. Our ECAN bookshelf blog has recommendations of books as well as some recordings of teachers reading: Find it here! Also look out for our Reading Newsletters and the School Reading Challenges - and have fun reading!

Teaching Reading
At Cavell, we have adopted Bug Club Phonics. This provides the structure for our phonics provision; it is a ‘robust programme of high-quality phonic work to be taught systematically’.
We begin teaching phonics in Nursery and Reception; children are taught to recognise the distinct sounds (or phonemes) that go together to make up words. Children learn to read by sounding out the individual phonemes in a word and then blending them to read a whole word. Through our daily teaching children quickly gain confidence to tackle unfamiliar words. Alongside our teaching of phonics we also teach the children ‘tricky words’ - these are words that cannot be sounded out.

The Phases progress from early speaking and listening skills in Phase 1 to learning the sounds, blending and segmenting CVC and then more complex words with alternative graphemes and phonemes learnt in Phase 5 . Children start their systematic phonics on entry to the Reception class and are taught daily in whole class groups.
In Year 1 children take the National Phonics Screening Check in June. This involves working 1:1 with an adult (usually their class teacher) to sound out and blend a selection of real and ‘alien’ words. We run parent workshops to support parents in understanding what this entails and to look at samples of the test materials.
Reading
Once children have learnt the first 10 sounds, they will begin to bring home a reading book. Children will be given a book which closely matches their Phonic knowledge and can be used to help them consolidate their learning. In addition to this, the children also have access to a wide range of individual reading books through the online Bug Club. The use of phonetically decodable books encourages the use of phonics as the first approach to reading unknown words.
Alongside this, ‘Common Exception Words’ (CEW) are taught to speed up decoding.
Once children become more fluent readers we encourage them to expand their repertoire of books; teachers will recommend pupils to try specific genres or authors never giving up on those reluctant readers! We often tell any pupil that says they don’t like reading - “There is a book for everyone out there,” and we’ll make it our mission to help them find theirs!
If any parent is struggling with a reluctant reader at home, please speak to your child’s teacher, or our reading lead or any member of the leadership team. We are here to help!
Bug Club Login Page
To access Bug Club at home, click on this link activelearnprimary.co.uk
Useful Videos
All you need to know about phonics - Pearson
A closer look at games and videos