English
Reading
Reading is one of life’s key skills and one of life’s greatest pleasures. At St Margaret’s, we recognise the importance of reading to pupils’ success at school and beyond. We want all of our pupils to leave St Margaret’s as confident and fluent readers, but we do not simply want to teach the mechanics of reading: we want every pupil to develop a life-long love of literature and reading.
To develop this love of reading, our curriculum allows every pupil access to a wide range of quality texts that showcase the rich variety of English literature, alongside the teaching of the phonics, fluency and comprehension skills that will allow them to read with confidence and understanding. Language is at the heart of our wider curriculum, and is a particular focus of our reading provision; we want the texts children read to be rich in varied, challenging language that will extend their vocabularies. We also want our pupils to understand more about the world around them through the knowledge they gain from reading, and choose texts linked with topics taught to extend our pupils’ understanding and knowledge of subject-specific vocabulary, and provide frequent opportunity to read outside of reading lessons.
Writing
Literacy and communication are key life skills. Through our English curriculum, we want our pupils to develop effective communication skills that will allow them to succeed at school and later on in life. We want our learners to appreciate literature and its rich variety, and so have based our English curriculum around quality texts.
Using high-quality texts as models, children write poetry, fiction and non-fiction texts with a clear audience and purpose. Using these quality texts as models allows children to encounter challenging vocabulary, and explore grammar and punctuation in meaningful contexts. Oracy also has a valued place in our writing curriculum: using discussion, role-play and debate allows our learners to enjoy experimenting with and using language to prepare them for writing.
English is at the heart of all children’s learning and has an essential role across the curriculum. Careful links are built into our curriculum to ensure that children’s English learning is relevant and meaningful – where possible, linking our writing and the topics we teach. We want all pupils to leave St Margaret’s with the skills they need to write effectively and creatively alongside an appreciation of literature and an enjoyment of writing.
Primary National Curriculum: English
Subject Overview for Years 1-6: English