Intent

At Treeton C of E Primary School we strive to deliver an engaging English curriculum that will foster a positive attitude to literacy as an interesting and exciting part of the curriculum. It is our intent that children at Treeton receive a high quality writing curriculum that develops confident writers, communicators and fluent readers who are able to effectively articulate their ideas and emotions in the wider world.

We have a rigorous and well organised English curriculum that provides many purposeful opportunities for reading, writing and discussion. Our curriculum closely follows the aims of the National Curriculum for English. These aims are embedded across our literacy lessons and the wider curriculum.

We endeavour to provide the means for children to develop a secure knowledge-base in literacy, which follows a clear pathway of progression, as they advance through the primary curriculum. Rigorous assessment and review will ensure that we are able to provide targeted support so that all children experience success in literacy; we believe that a secure basis in literacy skills is crucial to give our children the tools they need to participate fully as a member of society.

Implementation

Developing a love for reading is at the heart of our curriculum. Beginning with daily phonics using ‘Read Write Inc’, children begin to develop their reading, writing, listening and speaking skills. There are also countless opportunities for children to apply their learning in a range of contexts.

Each of our engaging and stimulating reading environments contain a wide range of text types and genres in order for all children to experience and learn from different structures, styles and formats of reading. Children across school work on the reading content domains and explore vocabulary, prediction, sequencing, making inferences and retrieving information (summarising and explaining for KS2) using VIPERS.

When planning literacy lessons, teachers make links to other areas of the curriculum to ensure that cross curricular links provide further context for learning. Teaching blocks focus on fiction, non-fiction or poetry, in line with the 2014 National Curriculum.

Lessons sequences themselves build progressively towards an extended piece of writing with spelling, punctuation and grammar skills, embedded within this sequence.

Assessment for Learning is embedded in literacy lessons and children are active in reviewing the successes in their work and identifying, with support from their teacher, target areas for development to ensure a continuous and individualised approach to improving their work.

Impact

The impact of the school’s curriculum can be seen in the books the children produce and the outcomes for all groups of pupils within the school.

The organisation of the English curriculum has realised a community of enthusiastic readers and writers who enjoy showcasing their developing literacy knowledge and skills. Children are confident in their reading and writing, and love to discuss and share their ideas. Outcomes of work in both literacy and foundation subject books evidence the high quality of work and the impact of varied and cross curricular writing opportunities. These enable children to write across a range of forms and adapt their writing successfully, considering the audience and purpose.