At St Catherine's, through our English curriculum we aim to give children the opportunity to explore a diverse range of texts in order to be self-aware and empathise with the experience of others in the wider community and beyond.  This helps further develop key values of understanding, compassion and integrity.  Our ultimate aim is that the children flourish into wonderful adults and embrace all the opportunities life offers them.  We encourage children to explore their creative potential, to reflect on their own and others' work and to respond to feedback with patience and courage.  Our children are willing to take risks and to learn through experiences of failure and they are supported to exercise imagination in their work.

In Foundation Stage and Key Stage 1, the children are learning phonics regularly to help them become fluent readers. It can be a tricky task to read all those different sounds and still understand the story. Children may need to re-read a story a number of times to help them with their comprehension. The BEST way of children showing their understanding of a story is to read it with expression.

At home, some things to help with their fluency:

If they get stuck on an unfamiliar word, encourage them to segment the word, look for sounds they recognise and blend those sounds.

Ensure they take notice of punctuation, stopping at full stops and change their tone for questions and exclamation marks.

Once they're confident with reading it correctly, then have a go at re-telling with great expression.

Below are 2 videos of children who are at the expected level for the end of Year 2.