St Joseph's Catholic Primary School
English Curriculum
At St Joseph’s, we are committed to developing wonderful young people, driven by the virtues that we teach and live by. With Christ at the centre of all we do, we will offer a school that allows children to succeed, develop friendships and come to know God and themselves. We believe that school should be a safe, exciting place - the best days of your life!
Our Mission
“Believing in God, ourselves and others”
Intent
At St Joseph’s we believe that all pupils should be able to confidently communicate their knowledge, ideas and emotions through their writing. 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.
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.
We believe 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 in all pieces of writing, editing their work effectively during and after the writing process.
Implementation
- The 5 phase planning sequence that we teach provides for continuity and progression matched closely to ARE and GD to enable children to demonstrate progress using authentic writing opportunities
- High-quality texts are used to immerse pupils in rich vocabulary and effective writing structures.
- These texts are supported by a consistent approach to teaching grammar to inspire pupils to make ambitious choices in their own writing
- Comprehension, text structure and grammar are taught in context
- Cross curricular writing is encouraged so skills are transferable
- Teachers give pupils sufficient practice in reading comprehension
- The text supports extended writing at the end of the unit
- Writing is moderated regularly - across school, schools and the trust.
Impact
- All pupils make sufficient progress to meet or exceed age-related expectations.
- Pupils are familiar with, can talk about, and enjoy responding to a wide range of stories, poems and non-fiction.
- Pupils are interested in their learning and demonstrate positive attitudes towards writing.
- Children take pride in producing work of high quality which is presented neatly.
- Children have a wide knowledge of how different authors write through the use of good quality texts