Reading at Portland
At Portland we do everything we can to help students read! This includes finding out gaps in students' reading abilities, helping them to achieve a higher reading age and develop a love of reading!
Differing Starting Points
As we support students from KS1 - KS4, we recognise that our students will have different experiences and starting points with reading. Many students will join Portland mid-way through a school year or Key Stage phase. We also understand that students will have mixed experiences with reading and may not have reached expected levels.
When joining Portland School for the first time, as part of our transition, we complete a series of bench-marking tests to identify student need. As well as developing a sophisticated understanding of student difficulties that are outlined in Education & Health Care Plans (EHCPs), we complete our own assessments of a student's reading abilities. This typically includes phonic assessments and NGRT tests to understand reading age and comprehension abilities.
To help students progress, we run both 1:1 interventions and have opportunities to develop reading skills as part of our curriculum model & timetable.
Phonics
Students in Key Stage 1 & Key Stage 2 are taught Phonics as part of a systematic plan to increase students' underlying knowledge of phonics. We utilise 'Read, Write, Inc' to support students in attempts to develop a structured understanding of the underlying rules of language.
In Key Stage 3, where reading gaps still exist. students we utilise 'Fresh Start' to provide students with a more age-appropriate reading scheme that recognises the ages of students with more mature reading topics.