Intent

 At Bierton we are passionate about all areas of English: a child’s ability to read, write and express themselves clearly and with a rich and complex vocabulary is priceless.

The Write Stuff helps to creates link between writing skills and their purpose and the impact they will have on the reading. Through the exploration of skills through a unit we provide the children with the skills to create their own pieces of independent writing. This way of teaching also interweaves our school vision: we aim high with our vocabulary choices and allow our ideas to sparkle and shine through our written word.

Implementation

•  Whole school long term overview used which maps out skill and genre progression
•  Five x 1 hour English slots over the week
•  Opportunities for writing across the curriculum
•  Fiction writing taught over 3- 4 weeks with an independent piece of writing at the end of the unit.
•  Opportunities for free writing sessions fortnightly.
•  Non-fiction taught over 2 - 3 weeks with an independent piece of writing at the end of the unit.
•  Live marking during lessons to help children to improve their writing and identify areas to improve

Impact

 The impact on our children is clear: progress, sustained learning and transferable skills.  Over the course of the year, children will have the opportunity to use a range of discussion, performance, writing and reading activities to develop their literary, linguistic and language skills.

They will have opportunities to develop their ability to:

• acquire a wide vocabulary, an understanding of grammar and knowledge of linguistic conventions for reading, writing and spoken language
• appreciate our rich and varied literary heritage
• write clearly, accurately and coherently, adapting their language and style in and for a range of contexts, purposes and audiences
• use discussion in order to learn; they should be able to elaborate and explain.

The teachers use formative and summative assessment to ensure children are making progress from their starting points. These assessments show the percentage of children at Age Related Expectations and Greater Depth Standard is above National Average. We monitor progress very closely to quickly and efficiently identify and support children not making progress.

As all aspects of English are an integral part of the curriculum, cross curricular writing standards have also improved and skills taught in the English lesson are transferred into other subjects; this shows consolidation of skills and a deeper understanding of how and when to use specific grammar, punctuation and grammar objectives.