Spoken language is promoted throughout the sequence, particularly in at the beginning of the writing cycle, and this underpins the development of reading and writing. Pupils will hear and speak a variety of high-quality language that is vital for developing their vocabulary and grammar and their understanding for reading and writing. Developing pupils’ language capability is a foundation to our writing sequence, which reflects findings of the Education Endowment Foundation; speaking and listening are critical to extending pupils’ receptive and expressive vocabulary with opportunities to hear and confidently experiment with new words.
In Key stage 1 and Key Stage 2, pupils are engaged in the writing process daily. This consists of clearly chosen writing stages with specific outcomes and pedagogy. This always begins with a stimuli in the form of a quality text, clip or artefact, which captivates the pupil’s interest and focuses on developing oracy, reading skills and builds on conceptual knowledge. Often this phase will involve pupils extracting and clarifying vocabulary in the text being studied. This allows pupils to broaden their range of vocabulary, which will in turn be applied to their writing.
Moving on, in our writing sequence, pupils learn about specific genre features and develop their punctuation and grammatical understanding. Pupils are provided with opportunities to explore contextualised examples of the genre they will be writing for their final outcome. Pupils practice these in a context supporting readiness for their final written outcomes. Pupils now have the tools to independently write their own written compositions. This allows pupils to apply their learning to an extended piece of writing. Pupils are also focused on the importance of evaluating and editing their own and others’ writing.
Revisit and revise techniques are woven into the writing structure to ensure that previous learning continues to be applied and developed; this can include aspects such as previously taught grammar and punctuation, with an expectation that pupils continue to apply learning into ongoing work. This equips pupils to make literary choices to positively impact on their final piece. To enhance the revisit and revise pedagogies, every writing unit has carefully planned opportunities for incidental writes, whereby pupils can practice knowledge and skills previously learnt.
Texts are selected with thought. Consideration is given to developing cultural capital, complexity of themes, progression of vocabulary and sentence structures and how the text lends itself to supporting the final outcome. Our approach to teaching writing exposes pupils to a selection of stimuli, including, picture books, visual literacy, film and novels. Non-fiction texts ae also used to support the development and exposure to a variety of writing styles; some of these texts have also been chosen to support and enhance the learning of the wider curriculum.
At Audley Primary School, handwriting is taught from Reception through to Year 6. Expectations are high and pupils must always present their work with pride. In EYFS and Year 1, our Systematic Synthetic Phonics Programme supports spelling through the application of phonics. Key Stage 2 pupils are taught spellings, using the spelling rules outlined in the National Curriculum. These spelling rules have been sequenced and organised in a way that is progressive for pupils moving through Key Stage 2.
Writing is assessed regularly during the teaching sequence. Teachers assess pupils’ progress against National Curriculum statements. A formal judgement is made through teachers assessing a range of independent pieces of writing. These judgements are regularly moderated within school and across the wider Trust.
