At Hasmonean we prioritise the teaching of early reading. This has a high importance throughout Foundation Stage and Key Stage 1. We believe that our aims are achievable primarily through high quality, discrete phonics lessons. We follow a validated systematic synthetic phonics scheme called Bug Club. Phonics is taught daily from Nursery to Year 1. As children are learning, and once they have progressed there are frequent opportunities for applying phonics skills in reading and writing across the curriculum.

Throughout the school we consistently identify any children that are at risk of falling behind, and we are able to provide them with the necessary ‘keep-up’ support. We have
phonics intervention groups that run daily for Key Stage 1 and 2, as well as those for children with EAL.

To ensure we instil a love of reading across the school, every class has an age appropriate range of books for children to access throughout the day. Children in Reception and Key Stage 1 take home decodable books once a week that are matched to their phonics level. Additionally, these children have online log-ins to Bug Club so that they can access more decodable reading books and phonics games. This ensures that children can be further supported by parents/guardians and it provides them with another opportunity to practise and apply their phonic knowledge.

Children in Year 1 complete a phonics screening test in the summer term, and further information about this will be provided by the class teacher in due course.

For more information about phonics please watch this video: