Roding Valley High School reads with retired residents

27 Nov Roding Valley High School reads with retired residents

Students at Roding Valley High School and elderly residents of local retirement home, Poets Place, have come together as part of the school’s new reading initiative, Reading with Residents; a project designed to support students with additional reading development, while also building important inter-generational relationships in the Loughton community.

Reading with Residents runs once a week for six weeks at a time, with a rotating student group schedule; in each session a student partners with their resident buddy to spend 20 minutes actively reading out loud and 20 minutes working together on word exercises and games.

Roma Lafferty, SENDCO and English teacher at Roding Valley High School, who set up the initiative, said: “As an English teacher I have always loved reading, and I am passionate about ensuring everyone can benefit from the joy of it. I saw an opportunity to join the dots between the two roles that I have at Roding Valley High School and it has been hugely beneficial to both the students and the residents – alongside supporting learning, it builds relationships with the local residents in the community, which is an important part of our students’ seven year journey with us.”

Roding Valley High School is committed to the development of reading skills throughout the school, which it supports through another reading initiative: ‘Drop Everything and Read’ (DEAR). The DEAR programme calls upon students to stop whatever they are doing and read for a short period of time throughout the school day.