Writing
Confident Writers
At Fairfield Park Lower School, we believe that oracy and writing go hand in hand. We ensure that children are given the opportunity to write from experience, to discuss and dramatise their ideas and to collaborate with others. We also believe that reading and writing are intrinsically linked and we aim to foster a love of reading, for a range of purposes and for pleasure, from a young age.
Writing Progression of Knowledge and Skills Yr Rec - Yr 4
The links between reading, writing and the spoken word form the foundation of our English curriculum; we ensure that high quality texts are utilised throughout the teaching of writing and that children have the opportunity to orally rehearse their compositions. We ensure that children have the opportunity to write for a range of purposes and that they understand the audience for whom they are writing. They learn about grammar, features of different text types and punctuation before planning their own independent compositions. Writing stamina is built through extended writing sessions across the curriculum and children are actively encouraged to evaluate and edit their own writing and the writing of their peers. We celebrate writing through Golden Good News assemblies and through regular communication with parents.
Our individual writing curriculum maps show the genres that children will meet and learn during each year group.
Storytelling Week
Read more about our Storytelling Week by clicking here.
Children’s handwriting during their time at Fairfield Park Lower School is developed from single letter formation to a consistently joined handwriting style through the use of the Penpals handwriting scheme. We encourage children to take pride in their presentation in books and we also give a specific focus on handwriting through a display in each of the classrooms in Year 1 to Year 4. Regularly during the half term, children have the opportunity to complete a handwriting challenge where improvements in the standard of presentation are celebrated and displayed.
Handwriting poster – "How to grip your pencil"
We teach spelling using a range of active and multisensory approaches. We recognise that children learn in different ways and our approach to teaching spelling follows this ethos. Children may practise spelling using our circuit equipment or other outside learning environments, they may use mnemonics to aid recall of the particular spelling patterns or they may use more traditional rote learning techniques. In regular taught sessions, they build their knowledge of word families, prefixes and suffixes, common exception words and spelling rules through these multisensory approaches. Words of the week are sent home to practise and the meanings of these are reinforced during English lessons. Teachers embed spelling in all lessons and accurate spelling and word choice is promoted across the curriculum.
As your child learns to read you might hear them talk about the 'common exception words' they are learning.
Common exception words are words in the English spelling code that work in an unusual or uncommon way. They are not words for which phonics 'doesn't work', but they may be exceptions to spelling rules, or words which use a particular combination of letters to represent sound patterns in a rare or unique way. Some exception words are used very frequently, which is why children are introduced to them very early on in their phonics learning.
In KS2, the National Curriculum sets out ‘statutory spelling words’ that children are expected to know. There is one set for Lower KS2 and another for Upper KS2. At Fairfield Park, we have separated the Lower KS2 statutory spelling list into two lists: one for Year 3 and one for Year 4.
The words that children are expected to be able to spell by the end of that year group can be found here:
Year 1 Common Exception Word list
Year 2 Common Exception Word list
Year 3 Statutory Spelling Word list
Year 4 Statutory Spelling Word list
Writing
Intent
At Fairfield Park, we believe that children should be equipped to express themselves using the power of the written word. We recognise that writing is intrinsically linked to reading and the spoken word; this relationship is acknowledged and built upon in teaching across the curriculum.
We ensure that children are given the opportunity to write from experience, to discuss and dramatise their ideas and to collaborate with others. Writing tasks will begin with a creative input, with opportunities for talk or to note ideas down in the first instance. This creative process is enhanced by the use of new technologies to allow children to create multimedia texts and to explore the world of film and digital media. Teachers will then model writing and share aspirational examples before allowing the children the space and time to write independently. As children progress through their writing journey, they are given increased ownership over editing their finished pieces and they are actively encouraged to make ambitious grammatical and linguistic choices. New terminology is introduced as an integral part of English lessons and the skills of transcription, grammatical and phonological awareness are planned for and taught discretely, as appropriate.
Implementation
The links between reading, writing and the spoken word form the foundation of our English curriculum; we ensure that high quality texts are utilised throughout the teaching of writing and that children have the opportunity to orally rehearse their compositions.
We ensure that children have the opportunity to write for a range of purposes and that they understand the audience for whom they are writing.
We model writing for a range of purposes, both by using published examples and by collaborating on shared pieces before moving onto independent writing.
We use Working Walls to illustrate our writing journey; we encourage children to use the examples and modelling displayed to scaffold and develop their own writing.
We ensure that children are given opportunities to evaluate and edit their own writing and the writing of their peers. We celebrate children revisiting their work and making more ambitious vocabulary choices, improving sentence structure and correcting minor errors.
We use the Penpals handwriting scheme to move children from single letter formation to a consistently joined handwriting style.
We celebrate writing through Golden Good News assemblies and through regular communication with parents. We place a specific focus on handwriting during half termly handwriting challenges where improvements in the standard of presentation are celebrated.
We ensure that school staff receive regular training in the teaching of spelling, punctuation, grammar and composition and that all members of our team are aware of curriculum expectations. Our training may include visits from external specialists, internal staff CPD, specific intervention training and peer observations
Impact
Children will be able to express themselves using the written word.
Children will be able to communicate with a range of audiences; adapting their writing to meet the needs of their readers.
Children will appreciate the work of their peers and that of published writers; both on paper and via digital media.
Children will build cultural capital and become educated, well rounded citizens.
Children will develop their vocabulary through an interest in words and their meanings.
Children will develop their technical vocabulary across a wide range of subjects. They will understand grammatical terminology and use this to discuss both published writing and their own independent work.
English
Learning Snapshot
Reading photos
