English

Statement of Intent: 

At Our Lady’s, we aim to immerse our children in a literary world, giving them an appreciation and awareness of the rich and varied literary heritage that surrounds them. Every time a child picks up a pen or pencil to write, or a reading to share, we will encourage them to see themselves as a writer, a researcher, a poet or a speaker. At Our Lady’s we intend to develop a love for reading and writing within all of our children, enabling them to leave our school being able to confidently communicate their knowledge, ideas and emotions though their writing and discussion and them to understand the value of these skills and be empowered by them.  

We want children to acquire a wide and varied vocabulary, a habit of reading, a solid understanding of grammar and to be able to apply their phonics and spelling rule knowledge that they acquire through their time at primary school, to read and write effectively. Children will follow a clear progression pathway to enable them to write clearly, accurately and coherently, adapting their vocabulary or writing style depending on their audience. We intend to develop independent, confident and creative writers, who during their time at our school, build upon a range of skills and develop a stamina for writing. Children will be encouraged to take pride in their presentation or delivery, in part by developing their joined handwriting by the time they reach Upper Key Stage 2. The children at Our Lady’s will be challenged as writers, be encouraged to take risks, see mistakes as a journey to improvement and given opportunities to be creative with their writing. Throughout all of this, to recall and apply our values through our questioning, learning and responses. 

Dear young people, do not bury your talents, the gifts that God has given you! Do not be afraid to dream of great things! Pope Francis 

Writing 

Writing, in English lessons, are based around high-quality texts in every year group. All texts are mapped out progressing in the challenge of the texts, within and moving up year groups. The fiction texts are chosen to ensure a mixture of classics, contemporary and traditional stories, along with poetry and non-fiction texts and plenty of opportunities to practice the spoken English through performance, debate, discussion and presentations. 

All units of work follow a clearly planned sequence: - 

Reading                     (an exploration of the text type including comprehension, authors intent and                                           audience – including orally retelling) 

Skills                          (exploring, learning, practising and consolidating skills that are key to the text                                         type) 

Writing                       (Planning and drafting a text) 

Editing                       (Proofreading, assessing the effectiveness of, editing and improving the                                                   writing)      

A progressive writing composition and grammar routeway is followed to ensure clear skill progression in writing throughout the school that is built on year by year. Staff use effective modelling using the writer’s voice at all stages and provide a variety of resources to support every child to achieve their writing potential. 

As all aspects of English are an integral part of the curriculum, cross curricular writing and skills taught in the English lesson are transferred into all other subjects; this shows consolidation of skills and a deeper understanding of how and when to use specific grammar, punctuation and grammar objectives. 

Speaking and Listening

Children are given a variety of opportunities to listen: as a whole class, within a small group, to a partner and individually. They are encouraged to respond to a variety of questions adapting their answers to their listeners. Drama also plays an important part in development these skills. Visual Literacy is used to stimulate, motivate and engage pupils in talk.

Reading

Children are encouraged to become fluent and confident readers who show good understanding of the variety of texts they read. Our Literacy curriculum is text based for writing and therefore, with a reading to writing approach, the children are exposed to good quality texts daily. The texts studied in literacy, where appropriate will link to learning across the curriculum and the texts chosen increase in challenge as children move up the school. By reading together in literacy sessions all children are helped to access the texts. The teacher will also read to the children, so that they are provided with a good role model for reading aloud. EYFS and KS1 follow the Read Write Inc. Phonics program.

Group Reading

By using a collaborative approach we have ensured that every child is heard to read regularly. Each class is divided into groups. The teacher hears a group read from one book or part of a book for a twenty to thirty minute session. This enables the teacher to talk about the book with the children so that he or she can find out more about what each child understands and can pinpoint weaknesses that need addressing. Groups that are not reading will be involved in different reading activities which could be based on the book that they have read to the teacher or other reading. Reading journals have been introduced to encourage independence in KS2. The journals allow children to select their own reading activity while another group is working with the teacher.

Home Reading

Each child is given a reading book from our reading scheme until they reach upper KS2. These books are graded and contain fiction and non-fiction books suitable for individual needs. The children take these books home to read. It depends on the child's individual need how often a child is heard to read from these books in school. In upper KS2 children are also given books from well-known children's authors to read at home.