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English
Phonics
We use the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised programme to teach phonics. The structured programme builds steadily on phonic learning, ensuring progression and consistency from the beginning of the Reception year through to the end of Key Stage 1.
Pictures and catchphrases help the children to recall the graphemes (letters) and their corresponding phoneme (sound), a learned mantra supports the correct formation of each letter shape and daily phonics lessons allow the children to practise blending to read and segmenting to write every day.
For those pupils who require further support as they transition to and continue through Key Stage Two, we use the same teaching resources and techniques in catch up lessons from the programme to consolidate learning.
More information can be found on the Little Wandle website.
How we teach Phonics
In Reception and Year 1, children follow the progression within the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised programme. Phonics is taught daily and there is a review session on a Friday.
Phonics starts in Reception in week 2, to ensure the children make a strong start. By the end of Reception, children will have been taught up to the end of phase 4. By the end of Year 1, children will have been taught up to the end of phase 5.
Reception lessons start at 10 minutes, with daily additional oral blending – increasing to up to 30 minutes as soon as possible. Year 1 lessons are up to 30 minutes long.
In Year 2 to Year 6 children who have not met the thresholds for phonic achievement will receive intervention. This may be as whole class, group or individual and follows Little Wandle guidance. Alongside the keep up and catch up intervention for Reception and Year 1, the Little Wandle Rapid Catch-up intervention can be used for children in Year 2 and above who need more support with mastering the phonic code and becoming fluent readers.
How we assess phonic knowledge
In daily phonics lessons, teachers use their assessment to target children who may need additional practise with the learning on the same day, as far as possible. If children are identified as in danger of falling behind, catch up sessions are put in place following the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised programme.
In Reception and Year 1, the children are assessed at the end of every half term using the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised assessments.
The children in Year 1 do the statutory Phonics Screening Check (PSC) in the summer term, which involves reading a set of words to assess how well they can decode.
Children who do not meet the standard of the PSC in Year 1 will have additional teaching and take this again in Year 2.
Children who need to consolidate their phonics skills beyond Year 2 will need catch up sessions and will be assessed to establish any gaps so that the lessons can be tailored to what is needed.
Reading
Reading Practice Sessions
Children in Reception begin to apply their phonics knowledge to reading by using fully decodable reading books in small group reading practice sessions as soon as they can blend sounds together to read words.
In Reception and Key Stage 1 we use sets of books that are matched to the Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised programme. There are up to 6 children in a group and each group will have up to 3 reading practice sessions a week. Some children will have additional daily reading. The lessons focus on first de-coding, then prosody and finally comprehension. Children then take the book home for further practice along with additional de-codeable home readers.
When children have met the end of Year 1 phonics standard and they can read phase 5 books fluently they will move onto our sets of levelled readers to build fluency and read more widely for pleasure and enjoyment.
Reading for fun
At Eastwick, we aim to develop a love for reading by prioritising reading for pleasure and enjoyment. Research shows that both frequent reading and reading for pleasure lead to higher achievement at school.
To encourage children to read for pleasure, we timetable a daily story time in every class. We have a school library and every classroom has a book corner with a wide selection of engaging fiction and non-fiction texts.
Supporting children with reading at home
Writing
When children leave Eastwick, we hope that they will be enthused, confident writers who:
- can discuss and evaluate how authors use language, including figurative language, considering the impact on the reader
- are able to write for a range of audiences and purposes using accurate grammatical features and a wide range of ambitious and effective vocabulary which draws on what they have read as models.
- have a passion for writing, encouraging them to wish to write in their own time
- understand the purpose of drafting, editing and publishing a piece of writing
Text Overview
This document linked below showcases the wide range of high-quality texts that each year group studies throughout the year to inspire our writing. We aim to explore, discuss and unpick the different genre texts and then recreate these using inspiration from various authors and styles of writing.
Talk for Writing
This document, linked below, provides further information about the Talk for Writing process and how each teaching stage is used to inspire and support the children’s development for writing. While the National Curriculum objectives for English underpin all of our teaching and learning, Talk for Writing is our engaging vehicle which takes our children on an inspiring journey, to learn and retain new curriculum content in a meaning and purposeful way.
Writing Key Documents
Spelling
No Nonsense Spelling
Aims
In Year 2 to Year 6, we use No Nonsense Spelling. This resource embraces knowledge of spelling conventions (patterns and rules), but integral to the teaching is the opportunity to promote the learning of spellings including National Curriculum statutory words, common exception words (where phonics does not work because it is spelt in an unusual or uncommon way) and words that children personally find difficult. It is often the case that children can spell words correctly in their weekly spelling test, but are unable to apply the correct spelling in writing. No Nonsense Spelling focuses on the application of spellings into writing.
Organisation
The programme is broken down into half-termly plans. The plans follow a model of six spelling sessions across two weeks, except in Year 2 where sessions are daily. Each lesson is approximately 10 to 15 minutes long, but lesson plans are flexible so that the teaching can reflect the extra time needed on a teaching point if required.
Tips for learning spellings at home
There is little evidence that the traditional practice of learning spelling lists at home and being tested on them is effective. However, there is a high expectation within the National Curriculum 2014 that pupils will learn many increasingly complex words.
Within the sessions a range of strategies for learning spellings are introduced and practised. This enables pupils to choose the strategies they find most effective for learning different words.
Each week the children (Y2-Y6) will bring home a list of spellings which they have been learning in school. We ask that the children learn the spellings using the different strategies detailed below as this enables the children to practise the spelling rules, understand the meaning of the words and apply them to writing.
Strategies for learning spellings
Throughout the week, children will practise these words to ensure that they have transferred from their short-term memory to their long-term memory, resulting in spelling fluency and accuracy when writing. There will be no formal weekly spelling tests, but an assessment at the end of a unit to identify any gaps in learning as a teaching point for the next unit.