Writing:
Intent
At St. Augustine’s, we recognise that in order for our children to be able to write coherently and creatively, they first need to talk about, have read to them and themselves read quality, engaging texts that feed their imagination and curiosity. Our aim is to encourage children to be independent writers for a range of audiences and purposes, across different genres, using subject specific and ambitious vocabulary. Children will be taught to apply their writing skills across themes and subject matter that have been carefully developed around high-quality, challenging texts that match our ‘big question’ curriculum. We embed the teaching of phonics and then spelling, punctuation and grammar (SPaG) within our English teaching through high-quality modelled or guided writing, alongside specific SPaG/phonics sessions. We believe that, the physical process of writing is a key skill and seek to ensure children develop a neat, cursive style of handwriting which begins as soon as they reach Year 2. We are dedicated to ensuring that by the time our children leave us, they are competent and confident writers, ready for the next stage in their life.
Implementation
All members of our teaching team are well trained to deliver: high-quality phonics and SPaG sessions, modelled and guided writing sessions encompassed within our English lessons, alongside interventions/catch-up and challenge where necessary. They respond and adapt teaching to ensure children are stretched and challenged and to identify those children who may require additional support. Children in year groups 2, 3 and 4 are expected to use a cursive form of handwriting, appropriate for their age and starting point(s), and are supported in the classroom to enable them to do this.
Whilst following the National Curriculum, our teachers designed our curriculum to reflect the needs and interests of our children using a range of genres and high-quality texts. Teachers expertly share texts with the whole class in or to support understand and exposure to tier 2 vocabulary. A breadth and depth of writing skills are then developed through interesting, text-related tasks. The progression of writing skills has a clear pathway and teachers use these through a continuous cycle of planning, teaching and assessment to support the individual learning journeys of all children. The beauty of a small school family is that we are able to constantly evaluate each individual child’s learning and adjust planning and support accordingly.
Impact
Our bespoke and ambitious curriculum provides opportunities for children to access high-quality texts. Writing tasks develop the children’s understanding and enable them to apply knowledge, skills, subject-specific and ambitious vocabulary to produce confident and coherent pieces of writing appropriate for the children’s age group.
We know this is evident through the quality of work the children produce across the curriculum and the love and appreciation for writing they show when they talk about English at our school:
- Our historic KS1 SATs and End of Year 1 Phonic Screening statutory assessments all show that our children achieve above the national average.
- Our internal data demonstrates the personal progress children make throughout their time at St. Augustine’s and some outstanding progress from individual starting points.
- Children develop and apply a neat style of handwriting throughout all subject areas by the time the leave us.
- All children succeed and flourish in lessons because they have the appropriate support, scaffolds, resources and challenge.
- They apply the knowledge and understanding they have of different text genres and the features of these in their own independent writing.
- They use ambitious, tier 2 vocabulary, alongside subject-specific vocabulary in their writing that considers the audience and context.
- Children learn the skills required to edit and improve their own and peers’ work against the success criteria for a particular piece of writing. They then routinely have the opportunity to apply these skills writing across the curriculum.
- They simply love writing! The children ooze passion and excitement for writing and for continually striving to improve their work!
