English

At Coley Primary School we believe that English is a fundamental life skill that enables children to listen, speak, read and write for a range of purposes. We aim to deliver a high quality English curriculum where children enjoy English language and literature and are able to use the knowledge, understanding and skills they have acquired in a range of contexts.

We strive to give the children the best possible opportunities to express themselves clearly and creatively in both spoken and written form and become masters of language within a broad, balanced and exciting curriculum, preparing them for this ever-changing and developing world. Using a wide variety of high quality texts from a range of genres, a love of reading is promoted throughout the school. We want children to be enthusiastic, responsible and confident readers and to develop a lifelong love of reading. After all, the ability to read gives them access to the whole curriculum and beyond.

The needs of all children are considered carefully when planning and teaching English. We want all children to reach their full potential in English. Staff take into account the differing needs of children in their class, so lessons are inclusive. Where necessary, teachers plan, vary and adapt English lessons to meet the needs of all learners. We recognise that each child has its own starting point upon entry to every year group and progress is measured in line with these starting points to ensure every child can celebrate success.

Every effort is made to provide opportunities for children to consolidate and reinforce taught English skills in all curriculum areas by bringing topics to life and providing memorable experiences in order to further develop confidence and independence.

• We want to foster in our children the confidence, desire and ability to express their views and opinions both orally and in writing.
• We want our children to listen with confidence.
• We strive for all our children to learn how to read and write with fluency, understanding and confidence, developing a range of independent strategies and take responsibility for their own learning.
• We hope all our children develop a love of reading and read for enjoyment, reading widely and regularly both in school and at home.
• We hope that through their reading children develop culturally, socially, emotionally, intellectually, socially and spiritually.
• We want to develop our children’s ever-growing vocabulary, through an interest in words and their meanings.
• We try to ensure that our children experience a range of text/media types and genres, across a range of contexts, to develop their understanding.
• We want our children to learn to write in a variety of styles and be able to apply characteristic features of texts to their own writing.
• We want our children to develop their technical vocabulary with understanding of grammatical terminology and apply it in their own writing.
• We want our children to take pride in their work, and encourage and develop the accurate use of handwriting, spelling, punctuation and grammar.
• We want to equip our children with the skills to plan, draft and edit their own writing.