English
When our children leave Wheldon we expect them to be avid readers, children who read fluently and widely and are able to express simple preferences and opinions about the texts that they read. We want them to read for pleasure, having had access to a wide range of text types, genres and authors in order for them to make informed opinions about their favourites. We want to produce children who write with confidence for a variety of purposes and audiences whilst developing their own individual flair. We want our children to be able to begin to write with grammatical accuracy and be able to apply spelling patterns they have learned correctly using a neat handwriting style. We aim to expose our children to a wide range of vocabulary so that they are able to decipher new words and then use them when speaking both informally and formally. We also aim for our children to apply all of these English skills to all areas of the curriculum.
Reading
The children learn to read using the Read, Write Inc. scheme of work. They learn individual sounds and then digraphs and trigraphs which they blend together to when reading words which have the sounds in which they have learned. They also learn to spell words using the sounds they know and sentences using these words. Children progress through the different stages until they become fluent readers and then they begin to think more carefully about what the story is about and show how well they have understood it.
Here is a link to more information about how we teach phonics and how you can help your child with their learning.
https://home.oxfordowl.co.uk/reading/reading-schemes-oxford-levels/read-write-inc-phonics-guide/
Writing
Our Nursery children are welcomed to Scribble Club, an immersion in the joy of scribbling and its role within co-play!
Scribble Club is aimed at 2,3 and 4 year olds and is an exploration of scribbling, a way of delighting in its process, and is a way to show children the massive joy of mark making within the hum and buzz of co-play.
Scribble Club explores how to add an extra layer of joy to the day through scribbling's powerful link to invention, magic and story
Drawing Club is a true adventure and perfect for our Reception children.
Drawing club is a time for children to choose to come and be creative with their imagination. After listening to a traditional tale, a well-known story or an animation from the past, the children are taken on an adventure with words, actions and descriptive drawings.
The children use their imagination to create a theme, object or character from the story and they use their stories as a conversation starter to talk about what their picture means to them.
They then choose a ‘code’ of numbers, letters or even words to bring magic into the drawing with their creative ideas!
In Key Stage One, we follow a Mastery approach to English through the programme ‘Pathways to Write.’
Units of work are delivered using rich, high quality texts and children in all year groups are given varied opportunities for writing. Skills are built up through repetition within the units, and children apply these skills in the writing activities provided.
Many opportunities for widening children’s vocabulary are given through the Pathways to Write approach and this builds on the extensive work we do in school to provide our children with a rich and varied vocabulary.
You will find the end of year expectations for writing, reading and spoken language for each of our year groups in the attached documents. Further details on the skills that your children are learning on a termly basis will be provided each half term on our class curriculum newsletters.
