At Loughton School, we believe that reading is a gateway to new worlds that can expand our minds, our imagination and provide us with the building blocks to future success. We recognise the important role reading plays in children’s social and emotional development as well as the impact it can have on future attainment. According to research, spending just ten minutes a day reading increases children's general knowledge, vocabulary, fluency, and comprehension while also exposing them to almost 700,000 words annually.  Our reading curriculum has been designed to inspire children to become avid readers who can independently access a range of genres. By the time children leave our school, we hope that they will be fluent and confident readers. To get them there, we aim to give children the tools and strategies they will need to develop into confident and resilient readers who read for pleasure. 

Children are provided with many opportunities to access books whether it is the school library or book boxes in the classrooms. During whole class guided reading sessions, children are introduced to a wide range of both fiction and non-fiction books, which expands on prior understanding of texts and genres.  These texts are carefully selected to push children's thinking while also broadening their vocabulary.  To develop respect for others, we consciously promote a wide range of texts that reflect our school community. 

Each year group has termly specific reading challenges for the children to take part in. This encourages children to make links between their curriculums and encourages them to be diverse in their reading diet. Through these tasks, children are able to show their understanding of texts in creative ways. Copies of the reading challenges are available through each individual year group’s padlet page.