English
Subject Co-ordinator: Laura Cleminson
Overview
English is at the heart of the development of our curriculum at Woodhouse Primary Academy. By the time our children leave our school we want them to be assured and keen readers as well as confident communicators and writers.
The overarching aim for the Curriculum for English at Woodhouse Primary Academy is to promote high standards of language and literacy by providing pupils with a strong command of the spoken and written word, and to develop their love of literature through a wide range of opportunities to read for pleasure.
The Curriculum for English at Woodhouse Primary Academy aims to ensure that all pupils:
- read easily, fluently and with good comprehension;
- develop positive habits of reading a wide range of texts for both pleasure and for purpose;
- develop a broad and interesting vocabulary, an understanding of grammar and an understanding of dialectal conventions for reading, writing and spoken language;
- develop an appreciation for a culturally rich and varied range of literature
- write clearly, accurately and coherently showing ability to adapt their language and style in and for a range of contexts, purposes and audiences;
- develop oracy skills to be able to use discussion in order to learn and explain clearly their understanding and ideas;
- develop confidence in speaking and listening, making formal presentations and debating.
At Woodhouse Primary Academy our English Curriculum focuses on:
- Ensuring pupils acquire the knowledge, understanding and skills associated with Spoken Language.
- Ensuring pupils acquire the knowledge, understanding and skills associated with Reading, including: word reading, fluency and comprehension.
- Ensuring pupils acquire the knowledge, understanding and skills associated with Writing, including:
- Spelling
- Handwriting and presentation;
- Vocabulary and grammar;
- Punctuation;
- Composition.
Vision/Intent
At Woodhouse Primary Academy we are passionate about ensuring all children become confident and enthusiastic readers and writers. Our high-quality English curriculum underpins learning across all other subject areas and is the foundation for a life-long love of learning. We believe the English curriculum drives forward a strong motivation and desire for our pupils to have their voices heard and make a difference; our aim is to equip them with the necessary skills to do so effectively.
Oracy
Oracy is the ability to articulate ideas, develop understanding and engage with others through spoken language and listening. Each term we welcome children back to school following the school holiday with an oracy project based on a wordless book. We use sentence stems and activities are planned based on the four strands of oracy outlined in the Oracy Framework.
Reading
Reading is a skill that most of us take for granted, yet is one that is essential for being able to succeed in life. As a child grows up, being able to read well not only enables them to discover new facts and to learn at school, but also opens them up to a world of new ideas, stories and opportunities. As research shows, children who read for pleasure will achieve more than those that don’t in later life.
All our staff are committed to ensuring that all children become independent and fluent readers during their time at our school. We want our children to enjoy books as much as we do!
We have meticulously developed our reading spine to ensure that the books used in our classrooms are carefully sequenced and offer a range of genres and exposure to texts from different cultures. The texts chosen acknowledge the background and context of our school and expose our children to a range of themes related to protected characteristics, promote British Values and link to other national curriculum subjects allowing children to explore these themes through oracy, reading and writing.
At Woodhouse Primary Academy, we are passionate about books and this love of reading is shared with all pupils. We are proud of our beautiful library which has copies of all of our books on our reading spine as well as a wide range of high quality children’s literature which children are able to explore during weekly library sessions and at lunchtimes. Through our classroom libraries we ensure that children are offered new, exciting, language-rich, and age-appropriate books as well as copies of all books on our reading spine from previous year groups to help our children to make links between texts and gain confidence and fluency in storytelling.
Key authors are also identified for each year group and classes explore texts from this author during daily ‘storytime’ at the end of the day.
Reading in Key Stage One
In Key Stage One children are taught phonics using ‘Little Wandle’. Phonics & Reading – Woodhouse Primary Academy
Home reading books are phonics based and exactly match our phonics program, Little Wandle, to ensure books closely match phonics teaching and develop fluency and comprehension. Children take these home and parents are encouraged to support their children in reading these at least three times a week.
Children progress through the reading levels is closely tracked and once the reach the higher levels of the KS1 reading scheme they are moved onto the Reading Plus program.
Children are rewarded as they complete a certain number of ‘reads’ in their reading records at home to encourage and promote a love of reading beyond school.
Reading in Key Stage Two
In Key Stage Two children are given a log in to Reading Plus, an online reading development programme that teaches students the skills they need to read including fluency, vocabulary and comprehension. Children use the programme within dedicated ‘Reading Plus’ sessions three times a week in school and are encouraged to access the programme from home. Staff carefully track progress and provide intervention for children as the programme indicates. Reading Plus | Online Reading Programme | Reading Solutions
In addition, we use Reading Sets from Durham Learning Resources to provide high quality and engaging texts as home readers for key stage two children. Again, children are rewarded as they complete a certain number of ‘reads’ in their reading records at home.
Those children who require further with reading are able to access:
- Keep up and Catch up phonics sessions
- 1:1 Reading
- Little Wandle Revised Letters and Sounds SEND programme for children where appropriate
- In school interventions
- Referrals to outside agencies for support and assessment where appropriate
Children also use resources from ‘Grammarsaurus’ during whole class guided reading sessions three times a week to develop their reading skills using the Reading domain content.
Writing
At Woodhouse Primary Academy our writing curriculum is designed using a text-based approach to help pupils acquire the necessary knowledge of grammatical structures and text types in an engaging and accessible way. This also helps to provide pupils with the desire to write and apply their knowledge and skills. The texts are carefully selected on the basis of their literary merit and to ensure an appropriate level of challenge. They also relate to our school values and the wider curriculum for each year group.
We aim to develop pupils into confident, positive and enthusiastic writers, with the intention that they will be able to write independently with resilience. It is our ambition that pupils will be able to edit and evaluate their own writing to make it the best work it can be, applying a wide range of sophisticated vocabulary, spelling and grammar skills to do this effectively. It is important that our pupils develop an awareness of the audience, purpose and context, which will prepare them for their future.
Spelling
At Woodhouse Primary Academy we believe that children who can spell feel confident and are able to write with enjoyment. Therefore, we want our pupils to be equipped with the knowledge and range of strategies for learning spelling to be able to apply their strategies when spelling words in their independent writing. Spelling at [NAME OF SCHOOL] is taught using Pathways to Spell. We developed our systematic spelling delivery to complement the teaching of phonics in EYFS and key stage 1.
Pathways to Spell follows a mastery approach to the teaching of spelling. It is a programme designed to deliver the statutory content of the Primary National Curriculum for spelling in key stages 1 and 2. Through weekly teaching of spelling objectives and development of a whole school approach to word transcription, vocabulary development and proof-reading, the programme aims to:
- Ensure that pupils become confident and competent spellers
- Enthuse and fascinate pupils about words and language
- Develop pupils’ spoken language skills
- Promote collaborative learning in the classroom
- Develop an engaging spelling environment across the school
- Effectively reduce teacher workload with highly detailed, progressive and engaging planning for the delivery of spelling teaching
Structure and Learning Cycle
The Pathways to Spell programme is designed for whole class teaching of the Primary National Curriculum objectives for spelling from year 1 to year 6. It is a comprehensive and progressive programme with a clear, research-based teaching sequence. Each week combines consolidation of previously taught spelling patterns and rules in conjunction with new teaching with opportunities to reflect on learning. This will support pupils in the development of key metacognitive strategies.
Each half term, there will be 6 weeks of detailed planning with suggestions for additional sessions focused on pupils’ personal development of spelling strategies using personalised spelling lists. They are designed to be used for whole class teaching but sessions from previous year groups could be used as an intervention with smaller groups in addition to the whole class session.
Every year begins with consolidation of rules from previous year groups which pupils often find tricky or commonly misspell. Each term, there is a focus on common exception or word list words and homophones where appropriate. Each week consists of two spelling objectives: a review of a previously taught spelling pattern or rule and a mastery spelling focus – the key learning outcome for the week.
Handwriting
Handwriting is taught through Penpals for Handwriting, which is a complete handwriting scheme for 3–11 year olds that offers clear progression through five developmental stages. We also use the ‘Write from the Start’ programme to support handwriting for pupils who require further support.
