English
Reading
We teach reading in several ways. As children begin to become readers, the school introduces a daily 30 minute Guided Reading lesson, which reinforces phonic skills as well as introducing children to reading comprehension skills to help then read for meaning.
Comprehension is a key life skill as it focuses learning on a variety of skills that help our children use their own knowledge and experience to make sense of a text as well as to learn new vocabulary. We teach our pupils to identify the features and structure of different types of text, ask and answer relevant questions and most importantly; to enjoy reading and to develop a lifelong love of reading for pleasure. In addition, all class teachers have story time and children are read to.
All pupils have an age-appropriate home reading book (in EYFS/KS1 this is matched to their phonic ability) and in KS2 is matched to their ZPD or of their choice and a Reading Record Book for parents and carers to write their own comments when they have heard their child read at home. Daily reading at home is a very important part of our home school collaboration. Parent / carers comments provide valuable feedback to your child's class teacher about their understanding of what they are reading and their development in phonics.
We expect children to read on a daily basis at home for a minimum of 10-15 minutes building up to longer periods as they progress through the school and ask parents and carers to set aside dedicated time to do this. By practising and reinforcing the phonic learning by reading the Little Wandle phonic books children are able to secure their phonic knowledge to help them gain fluency in reading. It is also suggested that parents and carers read to children; for example, a bedtime story as this helps children develop that all important appreciation of books and expands their understanding of story structure and vocabulary as well as sending a clear message about the importance reading as an essential life skill to be enjoyed.
We foster a genuine love of reading through celebrations of daily readers, trips to the local library, dressing up for Book Day, to visits from real life authors; reading and books pervade the curriculum and our children most certainly do love to read!
Writing
The English National Curriculum stresses that writing is a process which begins with gathering ideas, planning, drafting work in rough, re-drafting and editing. We teach and encourage our pupils to be able to spot their own errors through guided writing, verbal feedback, marking and assessment. Self editing is essential to the progress and individual improvement.
Talk for Writing pedagogy underpins our approach to writing. We ensure the children have the vocabulary and skills and be able to write with confidence and enjoyment.
The National curriculum also emphasises the importance of writing for a real purpose and audience; encouraging children to think and behave as real writers from an early age. We achieve this by getting children to publish their work in many forms; book making, writing letters, making posters, leaflets, power points, to name a few. We also offer our children an array of audiences to write to, famous people, or people of stature, senior leaders, other classes, their peers, family members. If children can see the point of what they are writing and have their work read and responded to by a variety of audiences they are more motivated and understand why writing is such an important tool to enable them to express themselves and to communicate clearly and effectively in society at large.
Grammar and spelling
Although grammar and spelling are taught in context during the writing process outlined above, all classes from Year 3 upwards also have specific dedicated grammar and spelling sessions in addition to English lessons. These lessons teach explicit grammar and spelling rules and patterns and follow a targeted age related expectation.
Class teachers will send home a spelling lists for children to learn at home for a spelling test the following week. The spellings sent home follow key strategies that help your children learn a spelling pattern. In addition to this it is essential that children understand the meanings of these words and are able to use them in context, as vocabulary building is an important part of growing knowledge.
Handwriting
Handwriting is taught daily and links with the national curriculum, reinforcing phonics teaching and vocabulary building. We teach children a cursive (joined up) handwriting style.
Parents and carers can help their child develop correct letter formation and build their confidence by practicing upper and lower case letters and giving children opportunities to improve their speed, correct formation letter size and orientation of letters and joins at home by copying short pieces of text from a comic, magazine, newspaper, story book or poem, on lined paper.
Click here for details about the Penpals handwriting scheme
World Book Day- March
We thoroughly enjoy celebrating World Book day in March. Staff and pupils dress up as their favourite book character, we have a whole school assembly and pupils take part in specific book activities throughout the day. Pupils also have time to share a book with a class from a different year group.
