English

Our vision for English

At St. Paul's, we strive for all children to communicate with confidence and fluency to prepare them for lifelong learning. Pupils will achieve well and flourish in other areas of the curriculum with secure foundations in reading, writing, speaking and listening. 
 

Curriculum Intent:

To ensure that all areas of the school curriculum can be accessed through excellent foundations in English.
To develop a passion for stories as well as learning the skills to extract information from texts.

To provide opportunities for our pupils to develop writing across a range of genres.

Curriculum Implementation:

EYFS

• Foundations for Phonics (Nursery)
• Daily phonics in Reception (Little Wandle)
• Guided reading lessons - three per week (Reception)
• Little Wandle reading books matched to each child's phonics level for independent home reading (from week five of the first Autumn half-term) 
• Challenge books to take home and share with an adult
• Daily sharing of books in whole-class reading session
• Encouragement to talk about responses to stories and re-read favourites
• Daily recording of reading at home via link books
• Development of fine motor control to enable pen grip
• Writing activities offered during child-initiated learning

KS1

• Daily English lessons
• Daily phonics (Little Wandle)
• Guided reading lessons - three per week
• Little Wandle reading books matched to each child's phonics level for independent home reading 
• Challenge books to take home and share with an adult
• Daily sharing of class reading book
• Exploration of different writing genres
• Recording of reading at home via link books

KS2

• Daily English lessons
• Sustained writing across different genres
• Additional phonics intervention (Little Wandle's Rapid Catch-Up)
• Banded reading books chosen and sent home ('free-reader' often by Y5/6)
• Daily sharing of class reading book
• Whole class reading lessons
• Recording of reading at home via link books

Curriculum Impact:

By the end of the curriculum, our pupils will use a range of strategies for decoding words, and inferring the meaning of texts. Pupils will enjoy reading across different genres and will have a good knowledge of a range of authors. Pupils will have developed skills in written communication enabling them to write with purpose for an intended audience. Parents and carers will have a good understanding of how they can support their child's English at home. Pupils will be ready to access the curriculum in any subject in their forthcoming secondary education.