Literacy Development in the Early Years

Development Matters the EYFS Statutory Educational Programme states it is crucial for children to develop a life-long love of reading. Reading consists of two dimensions: language comprehension and word reading. Language comprehension (necessary for both reading and writing) starts from birth. It only develops when adults talk with children about the world around them and the books (stories and non-fiction) they read with them, and enjoy rhymes, poems and songs together. Skilled word reading, taught later, involves both the speedy working out of the pronunciation of unfamiliar printed words (decoding) and the speedy recognition of familiar printed words. Writing involves transcription (spelling and handwriting) and composition (articulating ideas and structuring them in speech, before writing).

The Early Learning Goal at the end of Reception for reading involves adults talking to children about the world around them to develop their language comprehension; and giving access to a wide range of reading materials (books, rhymes, poems and songs) to ignite their interest so that children develop a life long love of reading. Writing development involves supporting children to articulate ideas and structure them in speech, so that children understand the basics of composition before writing.

At Atherstone/Bedworth Heath Nursery School we believe that early literacy skills are essential building blocks for young children for future reading and academic success and are nurtured by having positive literacy-rich experiences in early childhood. We break Literacy Development down into two areas:

Reading development - Over time, young children learn to create and understand meanings from pictures, symbols, words and eventually print. They gradually develop early reading through their talk, internal speech, symbolic play and early writing. We teach early reading with a focus on environmental print, shared reading, pictures as symbols, reading for pleasure and phonological awareness.

Writing development - First, children need to learn to speak, build their vocabulary and develop the fine motor coordination they will need to manipulate a writing instrument. As they grow, they need to learn about the alphabet and to make connections between spoken and written words. We teach early writing through firstly providing motivation and purpose to write, understanding the process of intentional and exploratory mark-making, understanding the physical skills needed to write, creating meaningful marks and finally using phonic knowledge to write.

We also teach weekly phase 1 phonics sessions with a focus on Environmental Sounds, Alliteration, Rhyme, Initial sounds, Body Percussion, Syllables and Oral Blending and Segmenting. We use a combination of Letters and Sounds and Listen Up.

We carefully plan the children’s literacy development skills through identifying gaps in learning, age related milestones, Individual Education Plans and the children’s interests. Some of the ways in which we do this are:

We have a language rich environment filled with interest and awe such as curiosity cubes, interesting enhancements, cosy reading corners and fiction and non-fiction books.
We have a focus on providing rich vocabulary with pre-planned vocabulary we want to use with our children up on display and in our planning.
We teach Shared Reading sessions once a week which is carefully planned to consider vocabulary, book talk and pre-planned questions.
We also offer interventions if needed such as speech sounds groups and phonics booster groups.
We have a lending library for our families to access books to share with their children.