Bishop Tufnell CE (Aided) Primary School English

  English

INTENT

Our aim at Bishop Tufnell Primary School is to provide all pupils with opportunities that enable them to leave our school as confident, competent readers and writers. In order to achieve this, we provide children with extensive and exciting opportunities that foster and develop a lifelong love of learning.  It is important to note that we not only develop a real enjoyment of reading and writing in English lessons but in all subjects across the curriculum.

We aim:

• To ensure that all pupils are receiving a well-balanced, ambitious English curriculum.
• To ensure that each teacher is providing pupils with a consistent approach to English teaching.
• To ensure that all pupils are given the opportunity to extend their knowledge and skills, and communicate through spoken and written forms. Through developing their knowledge, skills and understanding in English, children learn to appreciate that communication in all forms contributes to their wider understanding of the world in which they live.
• To ensure that all pupils are exposed to different genres and authors through a curriculum that is broad and balanced, relevant and engaging.

Our English curriculum will ensure that all pupils become confident speakers, listeners, readers and writers, preparing them for life in the 21st century and beyond.

IMPLEMENTATION

Writing at Bishop Tufnell Primary School 

We explore and develop a variety of writing skills through learning journeys. Each journey is inspired by a high quality text, which immerses the children and captures their imagination.

Each learning journey will include: 

• The Process of: exploring genre/text, developing skills required, planning using Big Ideas Books, drafting, editing and proofread  and finally publishing
• Modelling of writing by the teacher
• Working walls that support each step of the writing journey

Writing is often supported by the use of dramatic techniques such as hot seating and freeze frames. These practical activities enable the children to take understand texts in greater depth.  To further this, we use our role-play areas and extensive outside spaces which are interactive and creative and can be found throughout the school.

Teachers ensure a range of genre and purposes are planned for and taught across each year, mapped out on termly overviews.

Teachers use a short-term weekly plan that includes the vocabulary to be taught, along with specific genre and grammatical features to be covered.

Phonics & Spellings at Bishop Tufnell Primary School 

We recognise the importance of teaching quality Phonics lessons.

At Bishop Tufnell CE Primary School, we believe that all our children can become fluent readers and writers. This is why we teach reading through Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised, which is a systematic and synthetic phonics programme. We start teaching phonics in Reception and follow the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised progression, which ensures children build on their growing knowledge of the alphabetic code, mastering phonics to read and spell as they move through school. 

In Key Stage Two, children participate in a variety of interactive and creative spelling tasks. In these sessions, the children will focus on their weekly spellings, which are tested every Friday. 

Please click here for our Phonics and Early Reading policy

Please click here for our spelling progression information

Reading at Bishop Tufnell Primary School 

Early Reading at Bishop Tufnell Primary School

At Bishop Tufnell Primary school we have designed our early reading curriculum with the intent that all children, regardless of background, will become a fluent, insightful readers. We have developed a curriculum that will instill in all children a love of reading that we hope will stay with them for life. We understand that children who are confident adept readers will be empowered to succeed in all other areas. We understand that parents and carers play a vital role in the development of early reading and in nurturing positive habits and attitudes towards reading. We welcome this and their contribution.

We will deliver an early reading program that comprises of;

• Direct, focused phonics which is taught every day in Reception and Key Stage 1
• Phonics will be taught progressively from Foundation to Y2 as an effective way of developing children’s reading and spelling skills. Sight-recognition of words will complement the teaching of phonics.
• Children will read from books with the sounds they know, while they are learning to read
• Teachers and teaching assistants provide extra practice through the day for specific children
• All children in Year 3 and above can read age-appropriate books

Teachers instil in children a love of literature: the best stories and poems

Reading is fundamental to all learning and is a key life skill and consequently it plays an important part in all areas of our curriculum.Our teachers and staff develop children’s reading skills through a combination of one-to-one, guided and independent reading.

• Every classroom has a welcoming book corner which children are encouraged to use daily.
• Each Key Stage has a widely stocked library, which the children visit regularly.
• In Key Stage Two, we follow the Accelerated reader programme. After reading a book, children are encouraged to take a quiz on it on a class computer. This quiz will assess how well they have understood what they have read and suggest the next book they might like to read.

We encourage all children to read at home as much as possible.

Please click here for our reading progression information

Please click here for our reading leaflet for parents

Reading at Bishop Tufnell Primary School 

IMPACT:

What we expect to see across the school:

• Children who enjoy reading for pleasure
• Children who are competent to engage with a range of texts across all subjects and for different purposes
• Children who are confident to talk about their own personal reading
• Children who share their enjoyment of books with others

Writing at Bishop Tufnell Primary School 

What we expect to see across the school:

• Children who are competent writers
• Children who can confidently select text types for a range of audiences.
• Children who are confident with grammatical structures to write successfully for impact, explaining their choices.
• Children who take a pride in their writing
• Children choosing to write to communicate their own thinking.
• Children using their reading experiences; author style and new vocabulary, in their writing