English Lead – Mrs Winmill
“Teach a child to read and keep that child reading and we will change everything – And I mean everything.” Jeanette Winterson
Intent
At Newton Hall Infant School it is our intention to provide a quality English curriculum that will develop children’s love of reading, writing and discussion. We believe that English is at the heart of all our curriculum areas. We want children to read confidently and believe that by developing a love of reading we will enrich their lives. Children’s writing is developed through school, with staff deploying a range of writing techniques across various genres as stated in the Book Spine. A systematic synthetic phonics programme – Unlocking Letters and Sounds is used throughout school and is then built upon with reading for pleasure, Guided Reading and Comprehension activities which ensures that children are challenged and resilient in reading increasingly complex texts.
Implementation
At Newton Hall Infant School our English long term plan/Book Spine ensures that there is progression throughout the school and that children are building upon knowledge learnt in previous years. Regular assessments and monitoring of phonics, reading and writing are used to identify children who are making slower rates of progress and interventions are focused around the skills needed to accelerate progress. At Newton Hall Infant School children in Early Years, Year 1 and where needed in Year 2 receive a daily phonics session. KS1 also have an hour English lesson within the morning session. Extra Phonics sessions occur where needed across Early Years and KS1. Year 2 across the week cover SPAG sessions as stand alone lessons and also within their English lessons. All children cover a broad and balanced English curriculum and end the day with a ‘Fantastic Five’ story to develop their love of reading.
Impact
By the end of Key Stage One most children:
Reading
- Can decode automatically and fluently, to accurately read aloud books that are consistent to their developing phonic and word knowledge.
- Develop pleasure in reading; children enjoy listening to, discussing and giving opinions on a range of stories and texts that are at a level beyond their own reading ability.
- Understand both the books they read independently and those they listen to.
- Discuss and clarify the meanings of words, linking new vocabulary to words they already know.
- Answer and ask questions about a text and make predictions based on what has been read.
Writing
- Spell words with increasing accuracy; segmenting spoken words into phonemes, selecting the most appropriate grapheme (letters that make that sound).
- Spell the 1st 200 common exception words correctly and words containing apostrophes.
- Spell longer words using suffixes such as ‘ment’, ‘ness’, ‘ful’, ‘less’, ‘ly’.
- Write for different purposes, including real events, re-reading what they have written to check for any errors in spelling, grammar and punctuation, and to ensure it makes sense.
English in the Early Years
In the Early Years at `Newton Hall Infant School we focus on the Communication, Language and Literacy development of our children. This spoken language underpins all other areas of learning. The quality of the conversations the children have with adults and peers throughout the day in a language-rich environment is crucial. By commenting on what children are interested in or doing, and echoing back what they say with new vocabulary added enables practitioners to build children’s language effectively.
Reading to the children each day and engaging them in stories, non-fiction, rhymes and poems gives the children the opportunity to thrive. Through conversation, story-telling and role play, where children share their ideas and with modelling from staff and questioning which invites them to elaborate, children become comfortable in using a range of vocabulary.
We believe it is crucial for children to develop a life-long love of reading, understanding language comprehension which develops when adults in the setting talk with the children about the world around them and the books they read with them as well as the rhymes and songs they share together.
Daily 30 minute Phonics lessons are taught in Early Years. We use Unlocking Letters and Sound.
Unlocking Letters and Sounds (ULS) is a DfE validated systematic synthetic phonics programme that largely follows the progression of the 2007 Letters and Sounds framework.
It offers everything schools need to deliver high quality phonics teaching from pre-school to the end of Autumn term in Year 2, making it simple for teachers to ensure that every child becomes a fluent and enthusiastic reader.All staff are trained in the teaching of Unlocking Letters and Sounds. Please see the Phonics section of our website for more information.
