Reading at School

Reading strategies used within lessons

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• Shared reading: The teacher reads aloud, modelling fluency and comprehension while students follow along in their own books using bookmarks, overlays or rulers.

• Choral reading: The teacher and students read aloud together. 

• Partner reading: Students read aloud in pairs, alternating paragraphs or pages. 

• Echo reading: Students echo back what the teacher reads, mimicking their pacing and inflection. 

• Shared reading: The teacher reads aloud while students follow along in their own books. 

• Paired reading: The teacher reads the first sentence or paragraph, then the student reads the next. 

• PALS: Strong and weak readers take turns reading, re-reading, and retelling. 

 

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Accelerated Reader

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Accelerated Reader is being used by all students to quiz on.  This helps to improve reading in students and has proven impact over time.  As part of this programme, students complete termly reading tests that enable us to give each pupil a reading age and a reading target, as well as advice on the range of books that are suitable for them. Students can also take regular quizzes during reading lessons and at lunchtimes on the books they have read. Throughout the year, students who pass reading quizzes are rewarded with certificates for reaching certain word milestones as below.

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Each time a quiz is passed at 80% or more, students’ word count is recorded.

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Bronze - 10,000                 Silver - 25,000 words                     Gold - 50,000                     Ruby - 100,000

Sapphire - 250,000          Emerald - 500,000 words              Amethyst - 750,000         Millionaire - 1,000,000 

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This recognises our students’ progress in reading. Success is also displayed on the library leaderboard with the highest milestone being a ‘Word Millionaire.

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Reading Trips

 

When the opportunity arises, we aim to get students out of school to see performances of books / plays they have covered in school. This may include trips to theatres in Stafford, Wolverhampton and Birmingham to see performances such as ‘An Inspector Calls’ or ‘Macbeth’, ‘Blood Brothers’,

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Book Fayre

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We provide opportunities for students to purchase their own books during the Scholastic book fayre visits. So far, SMHS has earned up to £150 worth of free books as a result of book fayre purchases.

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Book Challenges (click to see the latest Challenges!)

 

Yearly challenges to excite students to read widely and often.

• 100 books to read in secondary school (prizes for amount being read)

• Word Millionaire – linked to Accelerated Reader and MyOn

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Literary Calendar

 

Calendared events throughout the year to excite students about reading

• World Book Day

• Poetry Day

• Black History Month

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Library

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We value the importance of students reading in their own time. Stafford Manor High School has an excellent library with a wide range of fiction and non-fiction available to all students. New books are regularly purchased to ensure our students have access to the most up to date literature.  We also work closely with a number of local charities who donate books and funding to our school library.  Books4Home, Soroptimists and The Rotary Club

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Tutor Reads

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For years 7-9, two tutor periods a week and 10-11 one tutor period a week is given over to reading for pleasure. We have developed a bespoke reading canon that is designed to both challenge our students and also broaden their understanding of important local and global issues.​

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These are our current Tutor reads​​