Home Reading Resources

It’s Book Week and a great time to touch base about our home reading resources. The aim of our school reading program is to develop in students the knowledge, skills and strategies they need to become independent readers.

 Reading is important. Children learn about the importance of reading as they watch family members use reading and writing for everyday purposes including reading for pleasure, using a recipe, writing a birthday card or sharing a story with a child. Listening to your child read at home is also a good way of supporting your child’s reading. As part of our whole-school literacy program reading resources are available for home use. Students are monitored by their classroom teacher and are provided with home reader resources to best support the development of their level of reading proficiency.

A range of readers is available for home use.

• Each child has an envelope and a reading logbook.
• A logbook is included to record the date and the book title and return this to the classroom for redistribution.
• A staff member exchanges books daily through your child’s classroom.

The aim of our home reading program is not for children to read more difficult books as quickly as possible, but rather to enjoy reading and to practise some of the skills and strategies they are learning at school. Children may read a book more than once, in fact, it is recommended that a child read a book up to three times before moving on to develop fluency. 

Some of the books that children bring home as home readers may appear fairly easy to read. In class, children will read similar texts to develop specific skills and reading strategies. Home reading is aimed at enjoyment and practise. Students need knowledge, skills and strategies in the following areas:

• Oral language
• Phonological awareness
• Phonics
• Fluency
• Comprehension
• Vocabulary

Classroom teachers provide learning experiences throughout each year level to develop these skills. According to the level of reading proficiencies that are displayed by a student and the skills students are developing the most relevant home readers will be included. Students may find some texts easier than others and some more challenging. A more detailed description of the skills that are being learned by your child will be available with their home readers and by the classroom teacher.

Home reading resources are either levelled texts or decodable texts.

What are decodable texts?

Decodable text is a type of text that is used to support teaching explicit,  systematic phonics instruction. Decodable texts are sequenced to progressive to incorporate words that are consistent with the letter–sound relationships that are being taught to students. Without appropriate phonics instruction, many students will struggle with levelled readers.

Benefits of using decodable books:

• helps reinforce phonics patterns and letter-sound correspondences
• can be used as a guided reading tool for specific decoding skills, such as long vowels or ending sounds
• focuses on building word recognition through meaning – once children have learned to recognise most of the words in decodable texts, they are able to focus on comprehension of the text
• helps to fill in gaps for readers who lack confidence and motivation – decodable readers often do not have a wide range of difficult words, so students can read them successfully even if they are struggling with fluency
• strengthens orthographic memory & reading fluency

Below is an example of a decodable text.

What decodable texts are available at St Patrick’s?

Decodable Texts 1 - alphabet knowledge (introduced in Prep) to decode cvc words and high frequency words including the, I, my. eg My Cap

Decodable Texts 2 - common graphemes (introduced in Year 1) including igh, split digraphs, longer words with common suffixes (ed, ing) and more high frequency words.

eg The Tricks of the Forest

Decodable Texts 3 - common and some less graphemes (introduced in Year 2) including air, ew and longer words with prefixes and suffixes.

Decodable Texts 4 - less common graphemes and morphology with longer texts. eg Big Numbers and chapter book texts from the RipRap series

Levelled Books

Levelled books can be read on different levels and include more difficult words, a variety of sentence patterns and interesting vocabulary. They are not controlled for phonics patterns and can contain a mix of easy and challenging words. They tend to be better for teaching comprehension and expanding vocabulary.

Benefits of using levelled books:

• gives children motivation and keeps them engaged by including stories that they find interesting and relatable
• challenges students with longer, more difficult text and provides practice in comprehension strategies such as inferring and summarizing
• can help build fluency through the repeated reading of the same book
• help to improve comprehension skills

Cons of using levelled books:

• may not provide enough repetition to teach phonics patterns
• can be too difficult for some struggling readers or those who need repeated practice with decoding words
• texts are uncontrolled for phonics patterns

Thank you for supporting your child’s literacy development. If you any clarification regarding our reading program please contact your classroom teacher or Mrs Badcock.