Purpose of study
English has a pre-eminent place in education and in society. Through reading in particular, pupils have a chance to develop culturally, emotionally, intellectually, socially and spiritually. Literature, especially, plays a key role in such development. Reading also enables pupils both to acquire knowledge and to build on what they already know. All the skills of language are essential to participating fully as a member of society; pupils need to learn to speak, read and write fluently and confidently in order to thrive in life.
Phonics and early reading are especially vital in providing all children with the chance to become successful and fluent readers. It supports children in developing their core reading and writing skills.
When children leave KS1 at Norton St Nicholas they will:
When children leave Norton St Nicholas they will:
In Early Years and Year 1, the primary focus of our teaching of reading is to ensure all children are able to decode words so they can read fluently. This is done through:
In Years 2 through to Year 6, reading is taught as a whole-class group at least 3 times per week, rather than in smaller groups. This means all pupils are having a far greater amount of quality first teaching per week. We use the acronym VIPERS to structure the teaching of reading. Each strand focuses on a different reading skill that must be explicitly taught.
V - Vocabulary
I - Infer
P - Prediction
E - Explain
R - Retrieve
S – Sequence (KS1) or Summarise (KS2)
Purpose of study
To provide a high-quality education that will teach pupils to write and communicate fluently. We recognise that literature plays a key role in the development of children culturally, emotionally, intellectually, socially and spiritually. All the skills of language are essential to participating fully as a member of society; pupils, therefore, who do not learn to speak, read and write fluently and confidently are effectively disenfranchised. We will develop pupils’ writing in all subjects to support their acquisition of knowledge.
The programmes of study for writing at key stages 1 and 2 are constructed similarly to those for reading:
§ transcription (spelling and handwriting)
§ composition (articulating ideas and structuring them in speech and writing).
Our teaching will develop pupils’ competence in these two dimensions. This will require pupils being taught to plan, revise and evaluate their writing; these aspects are planned into our units of work. Writing down ideas fluently depends on effective transcription: that is, on spelling quickly and accurately through knowing the relationship between sounds and letters (phonics) and understanding the morphology (word structure) and orthography (spelling structure) of words. Effective composition involves forming, articulating and communicating ideas, and then organising them coherently for a reader. This requires clarity, awareness of the audience, purpose and context, and an increasingly wide knowledge of vocabulary and grammar. Writing also depends on fluent, legible and, eventually, speedy handwriting. The writing the pupils do will include narratives, explanations, descriptions, comparisons, summaries and evaluations.
At Norton St Nicholas we will ensure that all pupils:
At Norton St Nicholas, English is taught four times a week. There is also cross-over with other subjects as links are explicitly made by teachers every time pupils write. We also have short 10 minute daily sessions to practise or repeat learnt skills for grammar (‘5 a day SPAG’). The explicit teaching of spelling rules is taught three times a week for 20 minutes and again, reinforced within all lessons across the curriculum.
Teachers follow our English overview which sets out the coverage for their pupils. We use planning units designed by Herts for Learning, making adaptations to take into account the needs of each class. We recognise the importance of children having a very good understanding of what a sentence is so this is the focus of teaching throughout Key Stage 1 as a basis for more advanced sentence structures in Key Stage 2. Each year group’s grammar content is introduced alongside what has been covered previously.
We start each new term with a whole school ‘Explore and Engage’ unit from Hertfordshire. All year groups use the same text as a basis for their writing, providing an opportunity to promote and celebrate writing across the school. For Spelling, we use ‘Essential Spelling’ which provides a clear structure for the explicit teaching of rules and strategies.