Heathlands CE Primary School

Heathlands CE Primary School

English Policy
Date: / 30thJanuary 2018 / Review Date: / January 2021
Subject Leaders: / Emily Farrow (KS1) & Tanya Gibson (KS2) / Link Governor: / Harry Stone

The school follows the National Curriculum 2014 for English. This policy needs to be read alongside other school policies including:

Home learning policy
Curriculum policy
Early Years policy
Teaching and learning policy
SEND policy
Assessment policy
Equality scheme
SEND information report

Within the National Curriculum pupils develop at their own rates and according to their own individual abilities, so that every pupil achieves the skills relevant and appropriate to his/her age and ability.

The study of English develops pupil’s ability to listen, speak, read and write for a wide range of purposes and audiences, including the communication of their ideas, views and feelings. Pupils are enabled to express themselves creatively and imaginatively as they become enthusiastic and critical readers of stories, poetry and drama, as well as of non-fiction and media texts. Pupils gain an understanding of how language works by looking at its patterns, structures and origins through the cycle of read, explore, plan and create. Pupilsuse their knowledge, skills and understanding in speaking, listening, reading and writing across a range of different situations.

It is the foundation for all the learning that takes place in our school and its mastery empowers the learner and is essential for independent learning and most aspects of everyday life.

We wish to work closely with pupils and to hear their views and opinions as we acknowledge and support Article 12 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child that pupils should be encouraged to form and to express their views.

Aims

To enable children to use spoken and written language effectively in their learning, facilitating communication and self-expression.

To enable pupils to enjoy literature of all kinds and become appreciative and discriminating readers.

General Objectives

To ensure teaching and learning in school supports the development of speaking and listening, reading and writing skills in pupils, ensuring all pupils achieve their full potential according to their ages and abilities.

To ensure the school’s teaching staff is highly trained and consists of committed teachers who have the expertise to develop the potential of all pupils.

To ensure the school’s teaching staff follow the non-negotiables agreed for ‘Quality First Teaching’ of English

To provide a rich and varied curriculum that will stimulate and interest all pupils.

To ensure teaching styles and methods vary to suit pupils’ differing learning styles and abilities.

To provide resources for all pupils that will support effective learning and teaching.

To ensure leadership and management structures within the school support the implementation of these objectives.

Spoken Language

The National Curriculum states that pupils should be ‘taught to speak clearly and convey ideas confidently in Standard English’ (p10) They should:

Justify ideas with reasons
Ask questions to check understanding
Develop vocabulary and build knowledge
Negotiate
Evaluate and build on the ideas of others
Select the appropriate register for effective communication
Give well structured descriptions and explanations
Speculate, hypothesise and explore ideas
Organise their ideas prior to writing

Our objectives for spoken language are:

to encourage our pupils to speak clearly and confidently and articulate their views and opinions
to encourage pupils to listen with concentration, in order to identify the main points of what they have heard

to show pupils how to adapt their speech to a wide range of circumstances and demands

to teach pupils to express themselves orally in an appropriate way, matching their style and response to audience and purpose.

to teach pupils effective communication, both verbal and non-verbal, through a variety of drama activities

to listen and respond to literature, giving and receiving instructions.

Ways in which we support this include:

Activities which are planned to encourage full and active participation by all pupils, irrespective of ability
Pupils with specific speech and language and/or auditory problems will be identified and specialist help sought, where appropriate
Encouraging reading and talk about books
Public speaking competition
School Plays
Class debates
Assemblies/Acts of Worship
Events within the community
School Council
Talk partners
Drama / role play
PSHE and circle time
Multi-media presentations/information sharing

Reading

The National Curriculum states that pupils should be taught to read fluently, understand extended prose and be encouraged to read for pleasure. Reading is singled out as of extreme importance since through it ‘pupils have a chance to develop culturally, emotionally, intellectually, socially and spiritually’. Reading allows pupils to ‘acquire knowledge’ and to ‘build on what they already know’ .

Schools are expected to have library facilities and support and encourage reading at home.

The 2014 Curriculum divides reading skills into two dimensions:

Word reading/ decoding
Comprehension

We recognise that both these elements are essential to success and we support the acquisition of both sets of skills through various methods. We recognise that these areas are clearly linked to the other aspects of English learning: speaking and listening, writing, grammar, punctuation, spelling and vocabulary. We also understand that reading is a developmental process and part of life-long learning and we encourage and praise pupils at every stage of it.

2.1 Our objectives and provision for reading are:

Pupils learn to read easily and fluently through daily phonics (in Key Stage One and Early Years), regular reading to adults in school, guided reading sessions and incentives to read at home
Pupils develop skills in reading for understanding using our own in house colour banding approach. We have adapted this to meet the needs of our pupils.
Pupils are encouraged to read widely, through our use of differing class texts, library visits and high quality attractive books in classrooms.
Pupils are encouraged to read for pleasure using, guided reading time, listening to an adult read and the various methods outlined above.
Pupils also need to read to find information in all lessons and comprehension is assessed in a formal way every term within Key Stage 2.
Pupils are exposed to a range of texts from their English heritage during their school career
Key Stage Two pupils who are struggling with reading or making slow progress continue on Letters and Sounds. Alternatively pupils may receive intervention through a range of bespoke programmes including toe-by-toe.

Writing

The National Curriculum states that pupils should:

Develop the stamina and skills to write at length
Use accurate spelling and punctuation
Be grammatically correct
Write in a range of ways and purposes including narratives, explanations, descriptions, comparisons, summaries and evaluations
Write to support their understanding and consolidation of what they have heard or read

The 2014 Curriculum divides writing skills into two dimensions:

Transcription (spelling, handwriting and presentation)
Composition (articulating ideas in speech and writing)

3.1 Our objectives and connected provision:

We teach grammar as a separate lesson where necessary
We correct grammatical error orally or written as appropriate
We use high quality texts, modelling and shared/ collaborative writing to demonstrate good practice
We provide writing frames for support where appropriate
We use working walls/washing lines as a resource to support the development of writing throughout a unit
We provide opportunities for extended writing through fortnightly ‘Write Away’ sessions
We mark extended pieces of work in-depth and set next step targets
We use checklists for pupils to self-assess or peer assess, when appropriate so they can evaluate effectively
From Year 2 we encourage a consistent approach to joined up writing by using Nelson scheme on a regular basis as required
We use a range of approaches to teach new spellings including phonics and the scheme ‘Spelling Made Easy’
From Year 2 parents are encouraged to support their children to learn spellings where appropriate. Spelling rules are sent home each week
KS2, children are expected to learn spelling in line with National Curriculum expectations. These are sent home to learn and tested regularly within school.
We use drama and hot-seating to help pupils to think about other points of view
Support for pupils with learning and motor difficulties
Meetings with parents to help them support their child

Vocabulary Development

The National Curriculum makes clear that learning vocabulary is key to ‘learning and progress across the whole curriculum’ since it allows pupils to access a wider range of words when writing and for them to understand and comprehend texts efficiently.

Vocabulary teaching needs to be:

Active
Progressive/ systematic
Making links from known words
Develop understanding of shades of meaning
Include ‘instruction verbs’ used in examinations
Subject specific- accurate mathematical and scientific words

4.1 Our aims and connected provision:

We encourage our pupils to have a wide and growing vocabulary in a number of ways, these include:

Key words to take home and learn for our younger pupils
Spellings strategies and knowledge taught as part of the English lesson
Display of key words linked to topics and subjects
Using the correct vocabulary orally
In-depth word based lessons looking at patterns
Using dictionaries, thesaurus and similar programmes
Use a wide variety of texts to explore vocabulary choices and the effect they have
Carrying out systematic testing and providing feedback to pupils
Targeted one to one/ small group intervention, where appropriate

Planning and organisation

Curriculum planning is managed in three phases.These plans define what we teach, and ensure an appropriate balance and distribution of work across each term. The subject leaders are responsible for reviewing these plans.

Long Term Planning

This is based on the National Curriculum 2014 for English which details what is to be taught over the year and provides teaching guidelines and overall objectives for each year group for the whole year.

Medium Term Planning

This organises the teaching of English into genre blocks. The planning is more detailed and the objectives are more specific in nature. This planning is developed by the teachers, who respond to the needs of their pupils. It also ensures a balanced distribution of work is undertaken across each term.

Short Term Planning

This details the English curriculum over the week. Lessons are planned in detail and specific learning objectives are set. Individual targets are also set for each pupil through child friendly banding sheets.

The teachers collaborate on the planning of English to ensure parity in provision and to share expertise.

Role of the Pupils

The pupils are involved in surveys to ascertain their perceptions of their teaching and learning in English. Appropriate action is taken to address the outcomes.

Monitoring and Assessment

English provision is monitored by the EnglishCo-ordinators who have classroom release time once each half term to undertake this. They examine pupils’ work and monitor classroom practice. They also ensure all members of staff have appropriate training to enable them to deliver the curriculum to the expected standard of excellence. The EnglishCo-ordinators receive training to support them in their leadership role. The Co-ordinators meet regularly with the Head teacher to review English provision in the school.

Pupils are assessed at the end of Y2 and the end of Y6, by means of the National Curriculum Assessments. These are the summative “snapshot” assessments of their attainment at a specific time required by law.

Teachers assess pupils continuously on a less formal basis using banding in accordance with the abolishment of levelling. Pupils are assessed in reading and writing through ongoing formative assessment against the objectives set in the National Curriculum. The objectives are shared with pupils through child friendly target sheets where pupils and teachers collaborate to assess learning. These assessments inform the teacher of the pupil’s current achievements, and guide the teacher in planning the pupil’s future learning.

There is no legal requirement for pupils’ attainment to be measured until the end of a Key Stage. However, in Key Stage One and Two, all pupils are assessed according to their banding objectives progress in English at the end of each half term.

Special Educational Needs & Disability (SEND)

The 2014 Code of Practice for SEND states that:

All pupils should have access to a broad and balanced curriculum
Potential areas of difficulty should be identified and addressed at the outset
Lessons should be planned to address potential areas of difficulty and remove barriers to pupil achievement.

Our classroom practice ensures that most of these needs can be met within the classroom organisation through clear effective planning, differentiation and high quality teaching.

If apupilis identified with specific needs, support is provided firstly by the school’s internal organisational structure. Additional interventions and provision will be planned, delivered and reviewed in order to support the pupil’s needs.

Following this, external advice and support may be sought in order to ensure that each individual’s needs are catered for.

Effectiveness

We believe this policy will be effective only if we ensure consistency across the school by regular monitoring.

Headteacher: / J Hallum / Date: / 30thJanuary 2018
Chair of Governing Body: / J Saunders / Date: / 30thJanuary 2018