Writing

The impact of our English curriculum aims to ensure that pupils will leave SSMJ school:

  • reading and writing with confidence, fluency and understanding, using a range of independent strategies to take responsibility for their own learning including self-monitoring and correcting their own errors;
  • with an interest in words and their meanings; developing a growing vocabulary in relation to grammatical terminology;
  • understanding a range of text types, media types and genres;
  • able to write in a variety of styles and forms appropriate to the situation;
  • using their developing creativity, imagination, inventiveness and critical awareness;
  • having a suitable technical vocabulary to respectfully articulate their responses in any discussion.

Our vision for writing

Curriculum vision: For all pupils to strive for excellence and achieve high standards across all subjects ensuring the needs of all the pupils are met. Every child is encouraged to develop their skills as a writer so they are able to confidently communicate their knowledge, ideas and emotions through writing. We wish to enthuse our pupils to develop a love of both reading and writing so they are inspired to be successful readers and writers.

The writing progression map demonstrates the structure of the programme and the genres planned for which enthuses and ignites our children, developing them as individuals to ensure they make excellent progress from their starting points.

The intent of our writing curriculum is to:

  • enable our children to build on and acquire new substantive knowledge, be successful at the transcription aspects of writing – by progressively teaching all aspects of the writing curriculum: grammar, handwriting, spelling
  • develop the disciplinary knowledge of writing – how to be a writer and successfully compose and structure ideas – to edit, redraft, and craft writing for a range of purposes and audiences
  • follow the National Curriculum expectations for each year group – including aspects of formality and the control of standard English
  • deliver a curriculum accessible to all to enable children to know more and remember more, building upon their starting points
  • recognise that literature also plays a key role in supporting the children’s development – culturally, emotionally, socially and spiritually
  • make links across the curriculum – to write for different purposes and also to use writing to record and share ideas proficiently in all curriculum subjects

The writing curriculum is clearly sequenced to develop substantive knowledge. We want pupils to acquire a wide vocabulary; a solid understanding of grammar and be able to spell new words by effectively applying the spelling patterns and rules they learn throughout their time in primary school. We want them to write clearly, accurately and coherently, adapting their language and style in and for a range of contexts, purposes and audiences. We believe that all pupils should be encouraged to take pride in the presentation of their writing, in part by developing a good, joined, handwriting style by the time they move to secondary school. A clear, fluent and taught handwriting style is essential in developing early writing fluency.

The writing curriculum is clearly sequenced to develop disciplinary knowledge. We know that all good writers refine and edit their writing over time, so we want children to develop independence in being able to identify their own areas for improvement, and that of others, in all pieces of writing, editing their work effectively during and after the writing process.

We understand the importance of parents and carers in supporting their children to develop both grammar, spelling and composition skills, and so we want to encourage a home-school partnership which enables parents and carers to understand how to support the skills being taught in school.

What do we want children to be able to do by the end of Year 6?

We follow the National Curriculum expectations for writing and expect that our pupils will have met or exceeded the expected standards for Year 6 pupils.

We expect our children to develop substantive knowledge in writing (transcription and composition) progressively as they move through school. Phonics is taught systematically from Reception, and this supports the development of phonological skills within spelling, as well as recognising and spelling key words. There are clear expectations set out in the curriculum for each year group, and targets set across school. By Year 6 we also expect our children to be able to evaluate and edit text and apply substantive knowledge to effectively write for a range of purposes. This is built into our writing curriculum and targets for the children.

How will this support the children in lifelong learning?

It is essential that by the end of their time at SSMJ in Year 6, our pupils can write with confidence, and write for a range of writing purposes, to use their knowledge and skills in any subject in their secondary education. It is also essential for us that our children have developed the knowledge of a range of genres, to write for entertainment as well as for information, and through this use a wide vocabulary which they can apply to all subjects. In this, reading and writing are intrinsically linked.

Implementation

How is the curriculum for writing organised and how do we teach it?

There is a clear and progressive long-term writing curriculum starting in EYFS, up to Year 6. This covers all the substantive knowledge in the National Curriculum, whilst extending the expectations of when concepts are introduced to give the children opportunities to hear new vocabulary, see different grammatical features modelled and understand certain concepts earlier. This ensures there is a cohesive language used by all staff across school, but also that there is clear progression in modelling and teaching across all classes.

The curriculum is organised into purposes for writing – to ensure continuity of teaching new knowledge and reinforcement of learning objectives through a half term.

Teachers promote writing with reading, and look for ways to inspire and motivate pupils so that they see themselves as ‘writers’. Teachers establish the purpose and audience for writing and make teaching objectives explicit to pupils so they know why they are studying a particular text type, the kind of writing activities they need to undertake and what the expected outcome will be.

Impact

How do we review learning in writing?

Writing in our school is progressive and is planned to meet the needs of all children.

Assessments are carried out regularly to ensure children are consolidating and learning new knowledge and applying these to writing for a range of purposes and contexts..If children are keeping up with the curriculum, they are deemed to be making expected or more than expected progress.

Clear monitoring systems support evaluating writing, teaching and learning, outcomes, pupil and parent voice. These outcomes feed into action planning to continually evaluate and improve our teaching and learning in writing.

In addition, we measure the impact of our curriculum through the following methods:

  • Regular assessed pieces of writing (minimum of 2 a term)
  • Marking and feedback according to our policy
  • Moderation of writing across the MAC schools.
  • End of Key stage SATs results – Grammar and writing outcomes
  • Pupil conferencing about their writing
  • Lesson observations and feedback
  • CLL Team/SLT/Subject Lead book scrutiny and evaluating of progress
  • Monitoring the impact of Professional Development with staff
  • Governor Link visits and feedback, including meetings with Subject Lead

Organisation of the writing curriculum

Writing is split into two week cycles – the cycle follows a set structure which starts with emergence in a text type, talking about vocabulary and meaning, identification of the key features of the text type, skill lessons a shared/slow write, planning, writing and editing

The two week cycles focus on different purposes of writing to ensure that the children learn and build upon the skills necessary for each writing purpose

Coverage of writing purposes is mapped out in each year group and poetry has been included in all year groups

The cycle enables the children to learn, develop, practise and embed writing techniques, grammar and punctuation for each year group level

The framework includes all taught elements of speaking and listening, reading and writing – all of which are intrinsically linked:

  1. Using good reading models The first lesson of the cycle will involve getting to know the text through echo reading, discussion, role play, drama, speaking and listening.
    This then leads into a feature identification lesson, this may be a deconstruction of the text, a wagoll bingo, highlighting
  2. Skill lessons will have an element of teaching, moving into guided practice and independent application of the particular skill (explicitly taught elements of grammar, language and text structure)
  3. Slow write lessons involve the children maybe completing a shared write focusing on key sentence types and then independent application, this is a practice of the key elements that will be required in the final piece of writing
  4. Planning lesson – staff guide the children through the planning process, making them think about each section/paragraph of writing, thinking about vocabulary, openers, punctuation, connectives, sentence types
  5. Writing and editing lessons will involve the children writing a particular piece for the writing purpose, this is a showcase of the skills they have been practising during this cycle but also other cycles too. Children are given a success criterion of the elements that will be marked against, this includes a focus on the Brilliant Basics
  6. Extended write (final draft).