At St Joseph’s Catholic Primary School, we actively encourage reading for pleasure and recognise it as a core part of every child’s education, regardless of their background or attainment. We make reading a key part of our curriculum and expose pupils to a wide range of texts in a variety of different situations. We take the view that extensive reading and exposure to a wide range of texts makes a vital contribution to every child’s educational achievement. Reading for pleasure aims to establish each child as a lifetime reader. Studies have emphasised the importance of reading for pleasure for both educational as well as personal development. They show that promoting reading can have a major impact on children, their future and their life chances. Sharing books with children is as important as it is joyful. Books can leave a lasting impression on young children’s imaginations. It is a key part of their language development and provides children with knowledge of the world around them. Reading for pleasure also provides pupils with the insights into the experiences of others and gives them the opportunity to delve into their own imaginations!

We aim to promote the concepts of reading for ‘fun’, ‘enjoyment’ and ‘pleasure’. Books are at the heart of our curriculum, we ensure that we include a range of books across the curriculum as well as the opportunity for sustained reading from a range of other self-chosen fiction and non-fiction texts from our classroom reading areas and school library. In addition, we use our classroom reading areas to promote our favourite texts as well as to encourage children to continue reading texts to support our curriculum.

Pupils have access to a wide range of texts. Pupils are given the opportunity to read a wide range of texts within the classroom and library, which ensures all pupil’s reading abilities are catered for. 

This includes:

• Fiction and non – fiction books
• Picture books, age appropriate
• Poetry
• Graphic Novels Displays of pupils work across the school, also provides opportunities for pupils to read.

Our Commitments and non-negotiables and resources that are available and promote reading:

• Every classroom within the school has a class library with a variety of texts including fiction, non-fiction, texts from different cultures and poetry.
• Pupil’s access the school library within lesson with their teacher, to research topics they are learning in class. The library is newly stocked, with a wide range of wonderful texts.
• Library lunchtime club, led by ‘library ambassadors,’ for KS1 and KS2.
• Audio books, with a selection of current titles.

To develop this further, we would like to provide pupils access to magazines, comics and newspapers.

The Adult’s Role, in reading for pleasure:

All adults hold the important role of fostering and developing a love of reading with every pupil.

This includes:

• Teachers reading aloud to pupils, within lessons, modelling decoding, chunking, expression and fluency. but explicitly a dedicated reading for pleasure slot is implemented across the school, in every class at 15:10 every day. Our aim is to create an effective reading aloud time is, which is a positive reading experience to engage pupils, therefore, model their enthusiasm for books and reading them.
• Teachers act as role models, therefore, model themselves as readers by discussing their own reading experiences with pupils. Teachers, who foster a love of reading, naturally pass this onto their pupils. When choosing books to read aloud, a balance is struck between following the students’ preferences and inviting them to try new types of books to expand their horizons and spark new interests.
• Pupil’s are encouraged to choose a reading for pleasure book weekly, or more often if they wish, from the class library, to take home and enjoy. It is discussed that sometimes, we might not like a particular book or genre, this okay, it can be changed.
• Each classroom has a reading corner, which is organised as a ‘mini-library,’ and focuses on the love of reading and the promotion of books. Reading corners, must be inviting and engaging with a good selection of books to cater for all pupil’s needs.

We have put together a list of books from Reception – Year 6, that we aim to expose children too, throughout the years whilst attending our school. It is not an extensive list, there are thousands of wonderful books to immerse children in and so many more authors publishing books frequently, but merely a tool to guide staff into suitable books for their class, covering a wide range of genres to include; pictures books (across all classes), traditional tales, including alternate versions, classic chapter books, novels, graphic novels. We have also chosen books with stories that promote the wider, diverse world to include; learning disabilities, speech and language difficulties, physical disabilities, hearing and vision impairments. Within this, there are also books that promote cultural diversity, family types and neurodiversity