English

Here at SUN, we are passionate that each day every child is a motivated speaker, reader and writer. The development of English skills are embedded through our broad curriculum. We have fostered a love for reading and writing by having high quality texts as a driving force.

 

Our Writing Curriculum

 Writing at Sulhamstead and Ufton Nervet Primary School

The National Curriculum for Writing consists of:

• Transcription – spelling and handwriting
• Composition – articulating ideas and structuring them in speech and writing (this includes planning, drafting, writing, evaluating, proof-reading, editing and reading aloud their work)
• Vocabulary, grammar and punctuation

At SUN Primary School, we ensure that writing is purposeful. Children write with their audience in mind, constantly assessing their own word choices and style of language to ensure that they are engaging the reader in the appropriate manner for each genre of writing. Children are provided with a range of experiences to enable them to write for different purposes and audiences as specified in our long-term plan. We constantly provide opportunities for pupils to develop their grammar, vocabulary, and sentence structure and discussion skills through embedding them as part of the writing journey. For children to master these skills, teachers plan so that writing progressively builds upon children’s prior learning and individual starting points. Lessons are also planned to provide regular opportunities to revisit and apply writing skills to different contexts

We teach five writing lessons per week in all year groups. We focus upon developing children’s understanding and knowledge of grammar and vocabulary development to enable children to select and manipulate their choice of language as is appropriate for their purpose, audience and form. We specifically plan to expose children to a broad variety of rich vocabulary, through using high quality text choices, adult language modelling and language exploration from texts.

A typical learning journey in English may last between 2-4 weeks. Throughout the journey, children are aware of the purpose, audience and outcome of their writing and develop their vocabulary around this subject. Speaking and listening skills are threaded throughout. Once initial discussions, research and ideas have been formed alongside using skills, knowledge, understanding of grammar and punctuation to suit a variety of writing forms, children create a first draft. Editing time is a crucial part of the writing process, children edit their writing following effective feedback against the success criteria; children edit their writing for sense, style, impact and accuracy.

 

Reading and Writing across the curriculum

Children are exposed to high-quality reading and writing learning opportunities across the whole curriculum. Children are aware that high standards in reading and writing are maintained regardless of which ‘lesson’ they are in and that they should always be writing to the best of their ability. This includes both handwriting and composition and effect.

In the wider curriculum, we aim to make cross-curricular links with other subjects and use high-quality, challenging texts to deepen skills, knowledge and understanding with reading and writing across different forms and genres. We make natural connections between subjects to support understanding. For example, a geography unit on coastal erosion may fit well with an English unit on descriptive writing.

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 Writing Curriculum by Class and Cycle

 

Cross curricular Writing Opportunities

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Our Reading Curriculum

Reading encompasses two core strands:

• word reading (decoding)
• comprehension

Our reading curriculum is designed to develop children’s knowledge, skills and understanding in these strands.

Children’s reading is assessed by their class teacher to provide stage appropriate reading scheme books; children progress through the school’s reading scheme (Collins Big Cats). For children whose reading is behind, additional interventions, including phonics, and extra reading is put in place to enable them to catch up quickly.

Our school is well-stocked with a variety of genres from our reading scheme. Children are also encouraged to borrow a book of their choice from the library to broaden their experience and motivation in reading. Adults in school listen to children read frequently and class teachers are responsible for moving children up the stages informed by their comprehension and decoding ability.

Guided Reading occurs daily, from Year 2 (linked to Little Wandle), across the school. Class Teachers are responsible for choosing age appropriate, yet suitably challenging, texts for guided reading. The books selected across the key stage cover a range of themes and conventions, genres and forms. Every year group has a fiction and non-fiction focus per term usually linked to their topic.

A weekly guided reading structure will usually include the following:

A section of text for the week is shared with the class. It is then explored with the whole class and provides an opportunity for teachers to model reading aloud. Through this session children gain a deep understanding of the text by exploring word meaning and basic comprehension through rich dialogic talk. Children will ask questions about and complete I know, I wonder around the text.

All Year Groups:

These sessions will focus on developing a variety of skills:

• Exploring new words and vocabulary
• To write their own questions about the text
• Responding to an inference, retrieval or choice question

Within these sessions, the teacher models how to construct written responses to questions about the text. Metacognition is used to model how answers are found in the text and how to construct a written answer. Children are made aware of the different reading skills that they are using.

Children work independently to answer questions similar in style to the modelled responses of the teacher from the previous session. The teacher may choose to work with a particular group of children during this session.

Children also have opportunities to explore their own reading book and to develop further their love of reading.

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Ensuring Reading for Pleasure

‘Reading for pleasure is the single most important indicator of a child’s success.’ (OECD, 2002)

At Sulhamstead & Ufton Nervet CE Primary School, we place a high value on reading for pleasure and are committed to developing a strong, inclusive reading culture where every child can flourish.

• We read to children every day, carefully selecting high-quality texts that reflect our school community while also opening windows into different cultures, experiences and perspectives
• Every classroom has an inviting and well-resourced reading area designed to inspire a love of books and encourage independent choice
• In Early Years, children access reading areas daily through continuous provision, with books regularly refreshed to maintain interest and engagement
• From EYFS, pupils use reading records to share their reading journey, strengthening communication between home and school
• As pupils progress, they take increasing responsibility for recording and reflecting on their reading, including noting favourite authors and texts
• All classes have regular opportunities to visit and enjoy our school library
• As children progress in their reading, we have developed a 'Reading Passport' to guide children through their reading journey 'beyond the scheme'.

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Reading Curriculum by Class and Cycle

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What our pupils say...