English

The school ensures that this area of the curriculum is soundly taught.  Skills relevant to literacy  cut across the whole curriculum and thus receive frequent practice.  Through thorough planning, exciting resources and excellent teaching, children are encouraged to find learning fun.  There is positive liaison between class teachers to provide continuity of work between classes.  Homework plays an important part in the school strategies to keep standards high in this area.

Reading

We place a high value on the acquisition of reading skills.  We have several reading schemes giving us a choice and range of books at each level of ability.  Reading is taught as part of the Literacy Hour and on an individual basis so children are encouraged to develop from the stage of reading awareness that they exhibit on entry to the school.

There are many skills required before a child learns to read and many factors which make for success or failure.  Teachers will be able to suggest more specific ways in which parents can help if this is needed and we have home or shared reading schemes where you can share with your child in the enjoyment of reading.  This will be explained on entry to school and by the teachers as the child progresses through school.

We aim to develop a deep interest and enjoyment in reading through teacher and parent encouragement and through making available a wide variety of texts.

From the pre-reading to the fluency stage, every child is encouraged to see reading as a worthwhile and enjoyable activity.  Sharing the following approaches:-

Reading to children:

Sharing the delight of all kinds of literature,

Shared reading:

Reading with the children, sometimes the adult will read the whole story, sometimes the child will join in and sometimes the child will read to the adult.  It must be a shared time of reading and telling about the story characters – for example, what might happen? etc.

Guided reading:

Reading silently for a given purpose and then discussion with others about what has been

discovered,

Independent reading:

Children read independently, at their own pace and for their own purposes.

Speaking and listening

We believe children should meet a range of situations and activities which are designed to develop their competence, precision and confidence in speaking and listening.  The development of oral skills will make children more aware of language, how it works and changes according to circumstances.

We aim to develop the children’s growing confidence and competence as speakers and listeners by developing accuracy and precision in describing experiences, expressing opinions and articulating their feelings.  The following are examples of how this can be seen in the daily life of the school:-

• Being able to ask and reply confidently and adequately to questions which become increasingly complex
• Being able to listen carefully to the instructions and ideas of others
• Demonstrating an increasing ability to evaluate and reflect on spoken language
• Being able to use language to suit different audiences and purposes
• Being able to work with other children to develop oral skills in a variety of situations in order that they may learn to express themselves accurately and fluently.

Writing and Spelling

Children begin writing simple sentences under their teacher’s guidance and, as their word knowledge develops, they learn to extend their written work, developing drafting skills, working with dictionaries and learning necessary grammatical rules.

Children learn to use writing for a variety of purposes:  factual, creative, descriptive, imaginative.  They learn to see writing as having a number of elements:  decision making, planning, drafting, presentation and evaluation.

Children are taught to write clearly and legibly, following a precise, defined policy for handwriting.

The school also has a policy for spelling.  Children are expected to learn to spell words which are sent home on a weekly basis.

The school is very proud of its Dewey coded library.  We believe children should be taught library skills and be helped to foster the habit of reading.  Every opportunity is presented to the boys and girls to enable this to take place and they have access to a wide range of fiction and non-fiction thus enhancing the library usage for both children and staff.