Writing

INTENT

At Dropmore Infant School, we intend for pupils to leave school being able to express themselves fluently and creatively as writers. We want them to be excited to write and to be able to communicate effectively to a range of audiences and for a range of purposes. We want to develop their abilities to use language to think, explore, organise and communicate their ideas.

Dropmore believes that:

  • Writing is closely linked to speaking and reading; pupils will therefore draw upon their range of experiences and use them as models for writing
  • Talk is a necessary prerequisite for young pupils who need to put into words what they are thinking of writing
  • The process of planning, interaction, collaboration, mutual support and feedback helps a writer to move forward through the process of writing
  • An extensive range of purposes, genres, forms and audiences for writing need to be explored
  • The teacher plays a crucial role in the development of writing through modelling the writing process
  • Extended writing sessions also help develop writing and creativity

Our progressive long-term planning from Early Years to Year 2, enables children to learn the skills to help them on this journey by:

  • Teaching the required grammar and punctuation skills for each year group, both explicitly and in context.
  • Providing a balanced curriculum of fiction, non-fiction and poetry genres.
  • Encouraging exploration of high-quality literature and writing stimuli
  • Supporting children in articulating ideas in order to craft coherent and well-structured writing
  • Scaffolding and challenging children’s development in writing appropriately.
  • Recognising the importance of oracy and oral rehearsal practices in the development of writing
  • Develops children’s handwriting through a sequential and progressive school-wide approach

We have high ambitions for all pupils, including those with SEND, EAL and those from a disadvantaged background.

IMPLEMENTATION

We want all of our children to learn how to become purposeful, creative and independent writers. Therefore, at Dropmore, we have created a curriculum which follows a clear writing process focusing on a clear purpose and audience for writing.

Our curriculum ensures children are immersed in the writing journey. Stimuli for the writing topic can come from a cross curricular link, video clip or story book to provide variety. Experience days, lessons and activities give children a rich opportunity to explore the purpose of writing and allows children who have no previous experience the knowledge they need to then go on and write. Lessons are sequenced to allow children to explore an array of literature within their genre of study, share ideas for writing outcomes and develop the skills needed to write successfully. All children will be able to explore their taught skills through careful planning and drafting, before revising and editing their work against clear unit objectives.

The following terms are used to describe the phases each child will have experience of during their time at school.

  • Emergent writing - is used to describe the initial stages of writing where children are exploring mark making to communicate meaning.
  • Unaided writing - is used to describe writing completed independently, a ‘have a go’ piece. i.e. making a best guess at spellings the children do not know.
  • Supported or guided writing - is used to describe specific writing opportunities which have guidance and input from the teacher. In this phase the children will become increasingly independent as they use and apply the skills taught.

Through well planned writing experiences children are taught the two aspects of writing, ‘transcription’ (spelling and handwriting) and composition (articulating ideas and structuring them in speech and writing).

Our writing plans make cross-curricular links where possible and ensure that extended, purposeful writing opportunities are planned across the curriculum which will engage and encourage the children with their writing. For example, in Reception children build on first-hand experience from role play and everyday life to begin their writing journey; in Year 1, children create information texts linked to their learning of animals within Science. Through these well-structured units of work, the children are also directly taught grammar and punctuation. Each unit within KS1 lasts between 2-3 weeks to ensure in depth coverage of a genre. Towards the end of the unit the children use the skills they have been taught and apply these to their ‘big write’.

Teachers regularly model writing in shared sessions and we provide regular opportunities for children’s writing and ideas to be shared, displayed, published and celebrated across the school. Within the teaching of our curriculum we will:

  • Enable pupils to be taught in all subjects to express themselves correctly and appropriately
  • Enable pupils to communicate accurately, with understanding and enjoyment
  • Enable pupils to recognise the close relationship between spoken language, reading and writing
  • Provide pupils with learning opportunities which integrate spoken language, reading and writing activities
  • Provide real contexts for language learning in English and across the curriculum
  • Encourage pupils to have an interest in words, their meaning, and a growing vocabulary. This interest extends to the technical and specialist vocabulary of all subjects.
  • Develop the thinking skills of pupils to help them on the path to becoming reflective, independent learners
  • Provide opportunities for pupils to use ICT to facilitate and extend their learning in spoken language, reading and writing
  • Recognise the importance of having a consistent view of language learning across the wider curriculum

Curriculum overviews detail the cross curricular links and the order in which the units of work will be taught in each year group and the length of the unit.  The plans ensure an appropriate balance and distribution of work across each term.

Short term plans respond to the needs of the children and ensure that the unit aims are met.  Each unit provides a clear context for learning and a step by step approach following a clear writing process and teaching sequence. This ensures we are building the core skills required.  Children are given planned opportunities to apply these skills within a unit.  Adaptive teaching is clearly shown and ensures that all children make maximum progress and receive support where necessary. We have high ambitions for all pupils, including those with SEND, EAL and those from a disadvantaged background.

Spellings

Spelling is an integral part of the writing process. Pupils who spell with ease are able to concentrate on the content of their writing and write with increased fluency. While it is important to remember that spelling is not the most important aspect of writing, confidence in spelling often has a profound effect on the writer’s confidence.

In the Early Years and Key Stage 1 phonics is taught on a daily basis through the systematic synthetic phonics approved scheme ‘Lesley Clarke Phonics’. For spelling purposes, the emphasis is on the pupils’ ability to segment words into phonemes and then match the most likely letter or letters to each sound.  In Reception, our pupils learn to recognise letters, spell words by identifying sounds in them and representing the sounds with a letter(s). Pupils progress on to writing simple phrases and sentences that can be read by others.

In addition, pupils, when ready, will continue to learn how to spell a number of high frequency words and common irregular words enabling them to write fluently. They investigate and learn to use common spellings.  They identify reasons for misspellings in their own work and in KS1 are taught how to use a simple dictionary, a range of word banks and their knowledge of word families.  Children are taught the statutory words by the end of KS1 and practise how to apply them correctly and effectively to their writing.  

Handwriting:

The school has a handwriting policy centred on a cursive script. Physical development in Reception classes includes plenty of opportunity to develop eye-hand co-ordination and fine and gross muscle control which will enable each child to be a successful writer. The children gain a wide range of experiences in the Early Years in order to learn the correct letter shapes and formation. The children also practice fine motor skills and handwriting daily through initiatives such as ‘dough disco’ and ‘pen disco’ sessions.

 Examples of further activities include:

  • practising patterns in the sand tray
  • chalking in the playground
  • writing on whiteboards - individual and in the classroom
  • finger painting
  • ‘jedi’ writing
  • painting outside with large paintbrushes.

As the children move through the school they continue to build their handwriting skills and these become more refined. Each week the children have specific time allocated to developing these skills. The children focus on learning shape and letter patterns and letter families.

Once the letters are being formed in the correct direction, children are taught to join their letter using a cursive style. They also consider placement on the lines (e.g. hanging ascenders below the line) and differentiation between upper and lower case letters.

IMPACT

To measure the impact of our curriculum and evaluate our planning, we use pupils’ books to capture an insight into the effectiveness of our curriculum. Pupils’ work demonstrates the effectiveness of the curriculum where age-appropriate grammar knowledge and writing skills are developed over a sequence of lessons which lead towards pupils writing independent pieces.

In addition, we regularly collate pupil voice to ensure our curriculum meets the needs of the children. As a result, children are exposed to a varied menu of genres and write for a range of audiences and purposes, with high quality models derived from a range of texts used to inspire their own writing. Through pupil interview, children can articulate the resources they have access to in order to improve and establish themselves as authors in their own right.

Pupils’ gain cultural capital through the carefully crafted choice of texts used, the exposure to a range of genres, authors and novels allows for pupils to read often and widely and provide a stimulus and high-quality model to inspire pupils to have future aspirations as writers.

Examples of high-quality work derived as a result of the writing, grammar, punctuation and spelling are used on our displays and working walls as a learning showcase. This ensures pupils are proud of their work and strive to work towards achieving the same high standards. Impact in the curriculum can also be seen through termly summative assessments across school which enables pupils’ progress and attainment in the subject matter to be evaluated.

We regularly monitor and evaluate our curriculum through:

  • Teacher voice – staff meetings, questionnaires, CPD
  • Cultural capital – carefully selected choice of texts and immersion experiences
  • Subject Leader monitoring – work scrutiny, learning walks, planning checks
  • Governor monitoring – governor meetings, learning walks, attendance at events