English

Reading, writing, speaking and listening are fundamental life skills. Through the English curriculum, our children develop the skills, knowledge and vocabulary to enable them to communicate effectively and creatively through both spoken and written language.  They will also leave our school having developed their love of literature, passion for words, confidence to perform and having written for a range of meaningful outcomes.

Reading

At The Olive School, Bolton, we believe that creating a culture of reading is vital to giving our children the best life chances.  We provide rich and meaningful opportunities to support our pupils to become fluent and critical readers.   Texts are chosen to develop empathy and an understanding of society beyond the home and school setting, improve wellbeing and equip children with the skills to become lifelong learners.  This is supported by the Star Readers initiative, designed to promote the joys and benefits of reading to all of our pupils (refer to Star Readers tab above).

Through our reading curriculum, we offer broad and rich reading experiences and have a balance of phonics, whole word and meaning-based approaches to teach children to read. This is supported by our use of the Read Write Inc phonics scheme in the Early Years and Key Stage 1.  Our pupils are grouped according to their ability and are streamed across the year groups and each group follows the group appropriately matched to their level of ability. Children are regularly assessed to ensure they are making the expected progress.  The expectation is that our pupils have mastered phonics by the end of year 1, but when needed, can continue beyond.  We also strive to introduce all children to a wide range of children’s literature and explore ways in which reading can broaden the experience of life and give a sense of what is possible.

Once pupils have mastered word reading, the development of comprehension skills becomes the principle focus.  In Key Stage 1, this initially centres on the basic retrieval of key information in texts, before moving onto developing the ability to read between the lines and draw simple inferences and conclusions from texts. In Key Stage 2, these central comprehension skills of retrieval and inference are then developed further through with the use of a broader range of more complex and sophisticated texts.  Additional comprehension skills such as comparing, summarising and predicting are also developed.

Pupils have access to the following reading opportunities to develop the skills of reading:

• RWI approach to the teaching of phonics
• One-to-one reading
• Shared reading in KS1
• Focussed comprehension activities
• Paired reading with peers
• Regular independent reading
• Home school reading supported by a books closely matched to pupils’ reading levels
• Regular visits to the school library
• Application of reading skills across the curriculum
• Engagement with the Star Readers initiative
• A range of non fiction literature                                                                                                         

Writing

Our vision is to build the essential knowledge and skills to equip pupils to serve the wider world so that they can express themselves fluently and creatively and essentially become effective communicators and confident writers. We fully adhere to the National Curriculum Programmes of Study, which state that all children should be able to ‘write clearly, accurately and coherently, adapting their language and style in and for a range of contexts, purposes and audiences’ by the time they leave Year 6. Competence in the two dimensions of transcription and composition are vital to achieving this.  We therefore want our children to be able to spell, write neatly and cursively, and obey the grammatical rules of writing, whilst also being able to effectively communicate for range of audiences and purposes. In short, we want our children to be confident, accurate and impactful writers.

The whole-school curriculum operates at three levels and addresses pupils’ academic, personal and social development. The three individual elements of learning provide a different component to the education of every pupil. Intellectual, personal and social maturity will be the goal of these structured layers of learning at the school. There are three guiding elements which are brought to life in the English curriculum:

• Educational excellence: teachers combine language and literature enabling pupils to read as writers and write as readers. No opportunity is lost for celebrating the joys of literature, finding out how language works and supporting pupils to craft and innovate their own ideas in writing.
• Character development: teachers use the reading of high-quality literature to give pupils a chance to develop culturally, emotionally, intellectually, socially and spiritually. They engender an appreciation of the aesthetic, experiential, emotional and knowledge-giving aspects of reading.
• Service to communities: teachers discover with pupils a plethora of written texts that explore a range of social issues. This is to create awareness of society, explore responsibilities and empower pupils to champion and improve society.

We will deliver an effective writing curriculum that:

• Teaches the required grammar and punctuation skills for each year group, both explicitly and in context.
• Provides a balanced curriculum of fiction, non-fiction and poetry genres.
• Ensures both transcription and composition elements of writing are taught alongside one another, identifying where emphasis should be placed in conjunction with efficient assessment practices.
• Encourages exploration of high-quality literature to support the acquisition of a wealth of vocabulary and linguistic skills, relevant for the intended purpose of writing, as well as a wider-world appreciation.
• Encourages revision and development of ideas to build authorial voice and effectiveness in writing. WAGOLLS, exposure to high-quality literature and rich discussion will facilitate this.
• Supports children in articulating ideas in order to craft coherent and well-structured writing that demonstrates the intent of the piece.
• Scaffolds and challenges children’s development in writing appropriately.
• Recognises the importance of oracy and oral rehearsal practices in the development of writing (see separate Spoken Language progression map).
• Develops children’s handwriting through a sequential and progressive school-wide approach.
• Develops children’s spelling through a sequential and progressive school-wide approach.

A broad range of exciting and high quality texts are used to support these sequences of learning, according to the following whole school long term plan for writing, please see below.

Spoken Language

Oracy is the ability to express oneself fluently and with grammatical accuracy in speech. It is the result of learning to talk and learning through talk. Being able to express yourself clearly, to communicate your thoughts and ideas, is integral to development. It is widely documented how poor oracy skills can impact upon learning and social development. In our schools, we are often faced with children entering education with a language deficit. It is essential that we teach and provide opportunities for spoken language. Good oracy skills support both academic progress and social and emotional skills. Developing children’s confidence and empowering them with a voice they can use to articulate themselves can have an immeasurable impact.

Resources

To view our Long Term Plan, click here

To view our English Writing Progression map, click here