St Hugh's Catholic Primary School
English
'From the very beginning the Word was with God. The Word was the source of life and this life brought light to mankind.'
John 1:2-4
Phonics:
Early Reading and Phonics Policy
Early reading and phonics information
Information regarding the Phonics Screening Check - STA
Information regarding the Phonics Screening Check - Little Wandle
Reading:
How to support your child reading at home
Helpful Websites for Finding Books:
https://www.lovereading4kids.co.uk/
https://www.booksfortopics.com/
https://www.booktrust.org.uk/what-we-do/programmes-and-campaigns/bookstart/
Writing:
Please click here for our writing overview 2024-25
How to support your child with writing at home
Guidance on specific vocabulary, grammar and punctuation terminology
Introduction
At St. Hugh’s Catholic Primary School, we want every child to be happy and enthusiastic learners of English, and to be eager to achieve their very best in order to fulfil their God-given talents. We firmly believe that the recipe for success is high quality teaching in English, which is central to the life of our happy, caring school.
Intent
Our main aim is that children leave St. Hugh’s Catholic Primary School with a wide range of happy and rich memories in English, formed through interesting and exciting experiences. We want to enhance a child’s awareness of their own abilities and strengths as a learner thus ensuring that children see learning in English as an ongoing process, not a one-off event. We wish to inspire in our children a life-long love passion for reading, writing and oracy through a rich and broad English curriculum. We have developed our curriculum to inspire children’s curiosities and interests, to allow for progression throughout the school and to provide purposeful writing and discussions. It is our aim that all children value the importance of reading, writing and oracy in order to successfully access and excel in all other areas of the curriculum. To allow pupils to enrich their knowledge in English, opportunities are available for children to experience learning beyond the classroom. Children will increasingly use their prior knowledge to enhance their comprehension and writing skills, as well as their speaking and listening skills. We aim to grow a love of reading, writing, speaking and listening within our children and an appreciation of its educational, cultural and entertainment values.
Implementation
The curriculum hours in English are non-negotiable and are followed by all staff in the school. In addition to daily English lessons, there are 5 x 30-minute Key Skills sessions each week and daily guided reading sessions. Children in Key Stage 1 have dedicated lessons for the teaching of phonics and those on our Little Wandle intervention programme will receive further phonics sessions each week, in a small group.
Staff subject knowledge is very important, and all staff receive regular training in the teaching of English. This is followed up with coaching and mentoring as needed. Clear WALTs and success criteria in English lessons – adapted when appropriate - are used to guide the children to achieve their potential. This ensures work is demanding and matches the aims of the curriculum.
Every classroom has an English working wall which is used and updated regularly to aid teaching and provides opportunities for children to scaffold their learning. Each year group follows the same writing process so that pupils are familiar with the method of writing from the planning stage to their final piece of writing. Children are given opportunities to reflect upon their learning through editing, self-assessment and peer-marking, alongside teacher feedback. Children are exposed to high-quality model texts and teacher modelling of writing to scaffold and inspire their creativity. We use a range of stimulus to hook the children into their writing and to ensure all learners are catered for e.g. silent films, videos, pictures and books. Drama is a celebrated element of our English curriculum and children are encouraged to act out stories and plays, imagining how other characters feel, enabling them to develop empathy.
It is our aim that children choose to read for pleasure, not only for information. Children have many opportunities to read during their time at school: guided reading lessons, in English units which are centred around a book, reading visits with partner classes, class story time, one-to-one with adults, enrichment time and English key skills sessions. We encourage children to read at home as often as possible and work closely with our families to ensure this happens. Children take home banded books from our reading scheme and in Key Stage 2, children have access to a reading challenge to further expose them to wider texts.
Children are given opportunities to develop their oracy skills across the curriculum. They work in pairs and groups to encourage cooperative turn-taking and discussions, take part in debates in order to get their ideas and beliefs across constructively and present/share their work with their peers. During English lessons, children are given the opportunities to talk about their ideas before putting pen to paper and through this learn that the classrooms are spaces for collaboration, respect and development of skills.
Impact
Children become increasingly confident, resilient and independent in their learning. They experience a wide range of learning tasks in English and respond effectively to them, developing their knowledge and skills. Clear outcomes focus and guide all English development plans and drive improvement. Children of all abilities and backgrounds achieve well in English, consistently making progress in their learning journey; they finish KS2 equipped with numerous skills and the knowledge necessary to enable them to continue that journey successfully. Through wider reading in English, children develop a love for reading, expanding their minds and curiosity of the world in which we live. Children produce high-quality work that is influenced by their exposure to these texts and various stimuli. We grow a love of writing within our children and an appreciation of its
educational, cultural and entertainment values. At St Hugh’s, children learn the importance of listening attentively not only to any teacher or adult but also to their peers; they develop an understanding of the value of listening and the need to appreciate or considerately challenge views given. Children show respect for others when communicating, even when views differ.
Cultural Capital
The varied nature of English enables all the children at St. Hugh’s to develop the cultural capital they need to succeed in later life. The children are exposed to a variety of vocabulary, genres, characters and experiences - through listening, reading, discussion, debate and empathy. Our reading schemes and writing topics are carefully chosen to ensure that the children are exposed to the richest literary opportunities to help them acquire the cultural capital they need to succeed in life.
British Values
There are numerous opportunities for pupils to gain a greater understanding or awareness of love, respect, tolerance and justice through reading, writing and discussion. The children learn about their place in our rich, diverse world.