At Brenzett CEP School, we aim to develop pupils’ abilities within an integrated programme of speaking, listening, reading and writing.

Pupils will be given opportunities to develop the requirements of the National Curriculum for English within a broad and balanced range of activities, with opportunities to consolidate and reinforce taught literacy skills through their application in all subjects.

At Brenzett CEP School we aim to provide the most exciting and engaging literacy environment possible.  We want each pupil to develop a love of reading, a love of communicating and to be confident, articulate writers from an early age.

Please click on the link below to see our Intent, Implementation and Impact document for Writing and Speaking and Listening.

How you can support your child with English?

Research has demonstrated that parental engagement has a large and positive effect on children’s learning. Below are some ideas that you can use to support your child with English outside of school:

Reading

• Encourage to child to read regularly outside of school. Any time spent reading outside of school will make a difference to your child’s learning.
• Support your child by getting them into a routine when reading at home. For example, read as soon as they get home from school, read before they go to bed.
• Listen to your child read on a regular basis.
• Talk to your child about what they are reading and ask questions.
• Visit the library or a bookshop to find out what your child is inspired by.
• Look for books that your child is interested in, such as dinosaurs, history, cookery or sport books.
• Encourage your child to read the book before watching it as a film or on television.
• Make sure that books are accessible at home.
• For reluctant readers taking it in turns to read a book with someone at home helps to make it more interesting.
• Reading magazines, newspapers, articles online all help to develop your child’s reading skills.
• Talk to your child’s teacher.

Writing

• Encourage your child to write at home. For example shopping lists, short stories and Christmas, birthday and thank you cards.
• Encourage your child to keep a diary.
• Play games that involve writing.
• Practise spellings with your child. Come up with ways to remember how to spell words together.
• Read, read and read. Reading is vital to expose children to a wide range of vocabulary and enable children to develop ideas which they will use in their writing.

Implementation

Writing is an important part of our curriculum and is an integral part of all of our lessons. At Brenzett CEP Primary we teach writing through:

Ensuring writing is purposeful: Each writing unit is planned in accordance with the national curriculum objectives, whilst considering the purpose of writing. High-quality texts are the focus of our discrete English lessons. Where possible ICT will be used, to improve children’s communication skills and to give a different platform to present / perform their work. The use of Power of Reading strategies ensures a consistent and systematic approach to teaching the skills of writing across all cohorts. This also means that children know what to expect when they change classes. At the end of each writing sequence, children use what they have learnt to produce a ‘polished’ piece of writing that they have edited and redrafted into a finalised version.

A rigorous and consistent spelling approach is used: The school uses Spelling Frame to ensure progression against the National Curriculum from Year 1 through to Year 6.

Grammar and punctuation rules are taught both discretely and as part of English sequences of work to fit to the writing genre. In their medium-term planning, teachers carefully match the national curriculum objectives to writing genres, to ensure that new terminology being taught, can be applied in context. 

Vocabulary: children are taught new vocabulary to ensure that children’s vocabulary is continually improved, reviewed and an embedded part of their writing

Handwriting: As part of the RWI phonics programme, correct letter formation is taught and practiced each day. When children reach Year 1, they are taught to use cursive handwriting.