Reading @ Coney Hill
Reading is an essential life skill for SO many reasons; for discovering new information and learning, opening up opportunities, opening up minds to great stories and adventures - escaping to somewhere new and exciting.
Research shows that children who read for pleasure will achieve more that those who don't, later in life. As a school, we are committed to ensuring that all children become indepedent, fluent readers during their time with us, through developing a culture of reading for pleasure, not only wherever you go around our school and throughout our curriculum, but also at home too.
Progression of Reading through school
Our structured approach to reading is carefully designed to ensure the best results for our children - Please see our "Teaching of Reading" document for more details of this.
As the children begin school in reception, and move through the infants, phonics remains a high priority and is taught daily through "Unlocking Letters and Sounds". Guided reading sessions focus on book talk, higher order reading skills and the development of vocabulary linked to the phonic phases, for the children in KS1. Children work through our fully decodable reading scheme and read frequently with an adult in school, ensuring that all children can blend when reading and are fluent. This carries on as an intervention into KS2 for those children who still need extra support.
As the children's reading progresses, we work on developing a pupil’s vocabulary and comprehension skills structured through whole class reading sessions called "Rocket Reading!" In these sessions, our children are exposed to a wide variety of text extracts, with range of interesting themes such as "Time Travel", "Awesome Men" and "Black History". They also spend dedicated time reading their carefully chosen class novels and work on comprehension "VIPERS" reading skills.
Reading and Phonics - Important documents and Letters
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Reading Newsletter - May 2026 | [pdf 3MB] |
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Reading Newsletter - February 2026 | [pdf 2MB] |
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Reading Newsletter - December 2025 | [pdf 1MB] |
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Reading Newsletter - October 2025 | [pdf 2MB] |
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StarBOOKs Parent Letter | [pdf 543KB] |
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Reading Newsletter - Summer 2 - July 2025 | [pdf 1MB] |
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Parent Carer Reading Survey Spring 2025 | [pdf 1MB] |
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Reading Newsletter - Spring 1 - January 2025 | [pdf 2MB] |
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Coney PREACH Reading Intent, Implementation and Impact 2023 | [pdf 433KB] |
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Coney Phonics intent and implementation | [pdf 498KB] |
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Phonics at Coney Hill - Unlocking Letters and Sounds. | [pdf 359KB] |
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Hiller Bedtime Bags letter | [pdf 154KB] |
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Recommended Reading Lists for Home | [pdf 1MB] |
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Wild About Reading
In order to foster a love of reading, we understand that we had to have engaging, exciting, relevant books being read in every classroom, every day, to every child. From this desire, our "Wild About Reading" boxes were created. These contain a selection of specially chosen books - the class novels from our Fiction reading Spine. See The Golden Thread of Reading for more information on these.
Every member of staff agrees on the importance of this ringed fenced, class novel time during the day - it is a most treasured time which we call "Book Club!" Sometimes the children are even hassling teachers to read on, read for longer or pick it up again later in the day, just to find out what happens next - the teachers often feel like this too!
The class novels have all been chosen for their high quality and high interest to a range of readers. The fact that the class teacher is reading it to the whole class, means that those children who find reading more difficult are whisked away and immersed in the stories between the pages, even if the text itself might be too tricky for them to access independently. It also means that the incredibly important fluency skills are being repeatedly modelled and demonstrated to all children. In KS2, we call them the 6P's - Pitch, Power, Pace, Puncutation, Pause and Passion.
One of the most special things about our "Wild About Reading" boxes, is that they have been purchased and added to by our school community via our "Reading Legacy" Amazon wish list. We were overwhelmed by people's generosity towards our school and the legacy it is creating is incredible - #ProudtobeaHiller
The impact has been huge – children asking parents to buy them the books or to use birthday money to buy the class novels too and racing to read ahead to find out what happens before their classmates do, as well as children finding new and different authors and seeking out other books by them too - just amazing!
How we celebrate Reading!
Introducing… StarBOOKS!
We’re excited to launch our new way of celebrating children’s reading efforts: StarBOOKS. Each term, class teams will nominate children who have truly impressed staff with their reading—whether through consistent reading at home, enthusiastic participation in class, or a growing love for books.
Those chosen will be invited to a special StarBOOKs celebration in school, where they’ll enjoy hot chocolate, a relaxed book chat, and a cosy book club-style treat with staff and friends. It’s our way of saying “well done” and encouraging even more reading joy!
We greatly appreciate everything you do at home to support your child’s reading. Whether it’s listening to them read, talking about books, or sharing a bedtime story, these moments are powerful and lasting.
Hiller Bedtime Bears
Research shows that children who enjoy reading, do better at school in all subjects. Reading with at home with your child can be fun and very rewarding. Our Hiller Bedtime bags are set up to help make reading a special, shared time.
There are bedtime bags in preschool and two bedtime bags in reception, year one and year 2! These are sent home each Friday with two children in each class, to be enjoyed. The bag includes: a few quality books to read, a teddy to cuddle, hot chocolate to drink and a diary to record what you have read and how you enjoyed it!
When it is your child's turn, please enjoy the bedtime bag for the week, and bring it back the following Friday. You can record in the diary what you have been up to and what you have read with the bedtime bear. If you would like, you can even email Mrs Clements or your teacher, pictures of you enjoying the bedtime bag and I can pop them on our school social media to share with our community!
Reading Rocks Assembly
Every week, we have our Reading Rocks assembly, which is an opportunity to explore our "Authors of the term", share brilliant books and grow our love of reading! We alternate the key stage going into the hall for assembly, with those staying in class to Drop Everything And Read (D.E.A.R) - what a mid morning treat for all!
Authors of the Term
Each term, we have two carefully chosen authors, selected by our Reading Champions - one for each key stage. We explore the books by each author, during our weekly reading assemblies and then challenge the children to find other books by these others and read even more! For Spring 2, our Reception and KS1 author is Michelle Robinson and in KS2, our author is Helen Rutter.
Reading Champions
We have been overwhelmed with children applying to be Reading Champions this year and are thrilled with our elected bunch!
Responsibilities include:
- Giving reading recommendations during Reading Rocks assemblies each week
- Promoting a love of reading across the school!
- Taking pride in the school library and class libraries - ensuring they are tidy, organised and appealing for all children.
- Devising and supporting reading fundraising activities
- Reading new releases and creating reviews and recommendations before the books become part of the library stock
- Helping to choose ‘Authors of the Term’ and support during Reading Rocks Assemblies
- Reading to other children across the school.
- Choosing recommended books and authors for individuals and whole classes
- Taking pride in their role by showcasing their ‘Reading Champion Badge’.
EYFS YouTube Channel
Have you seen our Hillers EYFS YouTube channel yet?
Our Early Years channel has stories read by our amazing staff and videos to help you support your child with developing their phonics understanding. If you Google “Hillers Early Years” on You Tube, you will find the link! Let us know your feedback and anything else you would like to see on there!
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You Tube Hiller Early Years |
Reading Cafés
Teaching our children to read and to develop a love of books is the best skill for life we can give our children at Coney Hill. As parents, carers and teachers, we are on this journey together, working to ensure this can happen in the best way possible.
As part of this, we are excited to hold our Reading Cafés for years Reception, Year 1, Year 2 and Year 3. This is a termly opportunity for parents/carers to start the school day with their child, sharing a story in the classroom, listening to their child read, learning how we create a positive, exciting reading environment in school and also an opportunity to see reading sessions in action and speak to staff more about how we teach children to read and grow in reading for pleasure.
School Community Book Swap!
In our entrance hall, by the school office, is our School Community Book Swap shop! We also have an outside book swap opposite the Nurture building. This is opportunity for our school family to take a book home to enjoy and return or donate books for others to read too!
Take what you need and have a read!
GSP Really Wild Reading Festival - the author Petr Horacek visited our school! He read some of his stories to the children and illustrated some of his famous characters! Thank you to the children and staff from the other schools who hosted authors and events and who also joined us!
Year 2 met the author of 'Monster! Hungry! Phone!', Sean Taylor, at the Really Wild Reading Festival in Gloucester.
