English
At Discovery Academy, we believe that children learn their best when they are showing the Academy values of Discovering, Inspiring, Caring, Improving and Achieving within our curriculum. We believe in aspiration for all so want to create a world where the sky is the limit for all of our pupils; building pathways for all and focusing on personal and academic success and eventually progress to successful employment.
Subject Intent: At Discovery Academy, we strive for children to become confident in speaking, listening, reading and writing. We aim to deliver an exciting, innovative English curriculum which enables and empowers children’s written and oral communication and creative.
At Discovery Academy we strive to give children opportunities to express their ideas in speech, to describe their own ideas, to make plans and to take part in discussions. Parallel to this, children learn to listen to others and to absorb what they hear. Children learn the conventions of conversation; taking turns, allowing others to speak, responding appropriately to what has been said and valuing the opinions of others.
At Discovery Academy children are encouraged to speak in a range of contexts and, as they grow older, adapt their style of speech appropriately. Speaking and listening permeates all areas of the curriculum. The children learn from early on, to plan their work, listen to the plans of others, recall and assess their work and to listen while others recall. It is only when speaking and listening skills have been developed that children can effectively work co-operatively and collaboratively.
At Discovery Academy we strive to teach all children to read and enjoy a variety of texts to enable them to become independent, critical, life-long readers and learners. Reading is a vital skill and this belief underpins the huge emphasis placed on the teaching of reading in the classroom.
At Discovery Academy we strive to develop children’s ability to write effectively in various forms according to purpose and audience. Children will be encouraged to develop as independent writers, learning over time to use conventional spelling, punctuation, grammatical organisation and handwriting.
At Discover Academy we strive to promote handwriting which develops from print to a joined style to an individual writing style which is neat and legible. Handwriting should demonstrate knowledge of lower and upper case letter formation, size and spacing. Children will be expected to take care with their presentation and take pride in their handwriting style.
Implementation: Our English lessons develop pupils’ spoken language, reading, writing and grammar and vocabulary. English is underpinned by our three curriculum drivers, and where possible links up with other areas of the curriculum. We teach our pupils to speak clearly using sentence stems, to convey their ideas fluently and confidently and to ask questions. Their vocabulary is developed systematically through using The Write stuff approach.
Our pupils are encouraged to read for pleasure and to read widely. We follow the DFE approved Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised SSP to deliver our daily phonics in EYFS and KS1. This phonic awareness helps the development of reading by segmenting and blending sounds. The children are given fully decodable books that match their phonic ability and will be heard reading individually and in groups. When the children are competent, fluent readers the children take part in whole class reading sessions which focus on their fluency, prosody and understanding. Year 1-6 also use Lexia Core 5 which is a programme on the IPAD/tablet that supports children in developing their reading. Children access Lexia in school at least once a week in KS2 and as part of their homework across KS1 and KS2. The children also take part in a weekly visits to the school library and daily class novel/story time to expose the children to high quality, diverse stories. Parents are given clear expectations about reading at home.
We develop writing skills so that our pupils have the stamina and ability to write at the age expected standard. To support children in moving towards independent writing we provide a wide range of activities including the use of film, drama and imagery, modelled, shared and guided writing, peer editing and discussion of ideas. We use some elements of The Write Stuff Approach by Jane Considine to encourage pupils to ‘chot’ their ideas down, share and exchange ideas in partners/groups, and to develop more sophisticated vocabulary. Grammar is taught within the English lessonsas part of The Write Stuff approach however where needed discrete grammar may betaught discretely. We provide opportunities for writing for purpose and we encourage pupils to see themselves as authors.
Spelling is taught discretely in daily lessons via SCODE which is a systematic, phonics based spelling scheme for Years 2-6. This allows spelling to be built upon the children’s prior knowledge in phonics by recognising the phonemes in the words and relating this to the various graphemes supporting the segmenting of words to spell.
Handwriting is modelled in English and Phonics lessons and also delivered in discrete lessons. In EYFS we focus on fine and gross motor skills and letter formation is taught using the formation pattern from the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised SSP. To support the teaching of discrete handwriting in Year 1 – 6, we follow the Letterjoin programme.
A range of extra activities are used to promote English within the school including a poet and author visits (virtual and in person), local library visits and book weeks linked to our houses that are named after authors – Onjali Rauf, Rachel Bright, Tom Palmer and Nadia Shireen.
Non-negotiables:
- Planning of daily Learning Challenge
- At least 4 English lessons per week
- 5 daily phonics lessons Nursery – Year 1
- 1 x individual readers session each week
- 1 x group guided reading a week
- 3 x whole class guided reading a week
- Class reading area
- Library time
- DEAR 1×15 mins
- Whole class end of day story time 3x a week
- English working wall
Impact: Formative Assessment: Children will be assessed daily against clear learning challenges. Feedback should be given in order to allow children to progress further. Any misconceptions which may have arisen may also be addressed in same-day interventions/pre-teach sessions. (see marking policy for further details).
Summative Assessment: Children will be assessed termly, in each year group each, on a test based upon the National Curriculum age-related expectation; this will also be used to inform future planning. Teachers will also assess their children against the statements based on the National Curriculum and how well the children are achieving within reading and writing. These judgements will regularly be moderated with peers and leaders in order to ensure their accuracy. Statutory assessments such as the Year 1 Phonics Screening Check and End of KS1 SATS assessment will also take place. In Phonics and Spelling, children will be baselined and assessed every half term to inform progress, groupings and future planning.
English Year 1 Curriculum Overview
English Year 2 Curriculum Overview
English Year 3 Curriculum Overview
English Year 4 Curriculum Overview