English

Intent

Our English curriculum is designed to develop articulate, literate, and confident communicators who can read fluently, write effectively, and speak with clarity and purpose. We recognise that spoken language underpins the development of reading and writing, and we place oracy at the heart of our curriculum, drawing on the Oracy Framework to support children in developing their voice, vocabulary, and verbal reasoning.

Informed by research and guidance, our curriculum aims to:

• Build strong foundations in spoken language, phonics, reading, and writing from the earliest stages.
• Ensure all children, regardless of background, develop the language and literacy skills needed to access the full curriculum.
• Promote a love of reading and writing, alongside the confidence to express ideas clearly and thoughtfully through speech.
• Provide a coherently sequenced, inclusive curriculum that supports all learners, including those with SEND and EAL.

Implementation

Our curriculum is structured to ensure progression in oracy, reading, and writing, with each element reinforcing the others. Early Years Foundation Stage and National Curriculum expectations are mapped to meaningful contexts, real audiences, and purposeful writing outcomes that inspire and motivate children at every stage of their learning journey. 

Oracy

• We use the Oracy Framework to explicitly teach the physical, linguistic, cognitive, and social-emotional strands of spoken language.
• Children engage in structured talk opportunities daily, including opportunities such as storytelling, role-play, discussions, presentations, and exploratory talk.
• Oral rehearsal is embedded in teaching and learning, enabling children to clarify and organise their thoughts, ideas and opinions. This approach is also used to support children before writing.
• Oracy is used across the curriculum, enabling children to articulate their thinking and learning.

Reading

• We teach Systematic Synthetic Phonics (SSP) using the Little Wandle scheme, from the start of Reception, with fidelity and consistency.
• Children read fully decodable texts matched to their phonics knowledge, ensuring success and fluency.
• Reading instruction focuses on fluency, vocabulary development, prosody and comprehension, using high-quality texts and structured discussion.
• Reading for pleasure is promoted through a wide range of high-quality texts. These include stories and picture books that are inclusive and representative of our school community and the wider world, as well as those that are considered to be ‘classics’ that every child deserves to have heard and experienced. Daily story time, book corners, author studies, and reading events are some of the ways we promote a love of reading.

Writing

• Writing is taught through a carefully sequenced approach that builds transcriptional fluency and compositional confidence.
• In Year R and Key Stage 1, children develop writing through oral composition, sentence-level work, and transcriptional accuracy.
• In Key Stage 2, children are taught to plan, draft, revise, and edit their writing with increasing independence and sophistication.
• Editing and redrafting are explicitly modelled and practised, with children taught to reflect on the effectiveness of their writing in relation to purpose and audience.
• Teachers use shared and guided writing in all year groups to model aspects of the writing process, including how to improve vocabulary, sentence structure, and cohesion.
• Grammar, punctuation, and spelling are taught in context, with opportunities for independent application across subjects.

Environment and Pedagogy

• Classrooms are language-rich, with displays, working walls, and resources that support vocabulary and writing development.
• Teachers use adaptive teaching, formative assessment, and targeted interventions to ensure all children make progress.
• Staff receive ongoing CPD aligned with national frameworks and school priorities, including training in oracy, phonics and reading, and writing development.

Impact

The impact of our English curriculum is evident in:

• Confident communicators who can articulate their ideas clearly, listen actively, and engage in respectful dialogue.
• Fluent readers who enjoy reading and can access a wide range of texts for learning and pleasure.
• Skilled writers who can express themselves with clarity, creativity, and accuracy, and who understand how to edit and improve their work.
• High levels of engagement in English lessons and across the curriculum.
• Equity in achievement, with all pupils, including those with SEND and EAL, making strong progress from their starting points.

We continually evaluate our curriculum using up to date research and guidance to ensure it remains ambitious, inclusive, and evidence-informed, preparing children for the next stage of their education and beyond.

• English Curriculum
• Progression in Handwriting
• Progression in Phonics