English

English at Lapworth

‘The value of English in the curriculum? What can I say? Without English, nothing. And without good English, nothing very well.’

Anne Fine, Author

In English, children develop their knowledge, understanding and skills in speaking, listening, reading and writing. This enables them to express themselves creatively and imaginatively and to communicate with others effectively; crucial skills for their future.

In speaking and listening activities, including drama, children are encouraged to discuss their experiences, convey their thoughts and ideas to others and to evaluate their activities using oracy activities underpinned by social and emotional, cognitive, linguistic and physical skills.

We aim for children to become confident, creative and enthusiastic learners in writing, with secure transcriptional writing secured before advancing to a range of different creative genres of writing. We encourage imagination in children's narrative writing and seek to develop their ability to convey meaning with increasing fluency, cohesion and accuracy.

Handwriting is taught standalone in infant school using the 'Letterjoin' cursive style. The children progress from basic pre-cursive letter formation to writing in a fluent, joined style.

In reading, we aim to foster a love of books and for children to become fluent, engaged readers. Children are expected to take their current reading book home and we ask parents to hear their children read at home and to record this in their reading diary, forming an important record of communication in their development in reading.

Children have daily independent reading opportunities from the Early Years through to Year 6, with specifically pitched reading books selected to ensure children can read by themselves to develop their fluency. In these sessions, teachers drop in and read with children on a 1:1 basis whilst others read individually. Children's comprehension skills from Key Stage 1 upwards are focused on in Comprehension sessions underpinned by the reading VIPERS: Vocabulary, Inference, Prediction, Explanation, Retrieval and Sequencing / Summarising.

Children are also encouraged to read for pleasure, having opportunities to share and enjoy a wide range of books, including poetry, stories, rhymes and non-fiction books, with daily shared story time opportunities in each class.

We have a well-stocked library which children visit regularly in order to borrow books for use at school and home. We engage children with reading both in school and at home through rewards, competitions and exciting reading themed events and activities.

See below for links to information and photographs of the fantastic reading that happens at Lapworth.

At Lapworth we love to read!

The younger children benefit from reading a range of phonics books which are explicitly matched to the children's phonic knowledge from our scheme, Supersonic Phonic Friends, used to develop the children's decoding, prosody and comprehension skills.

As a school we have adopted ‘Supersonic Phonics Friends’ to support us with the teaching of systematic synthetic phonics. This ensures a consistent approach across early years and Key Stage 1. Supersonic Phonic Friends is an enchanted adventure of phonics where along the way children will meet several friendly woodland characters who represent each literacy skill involved. Supported by the scheme's and rhyming captions and phrases, this approach will ensure children develop confidence and apply each skill to their own reading and writing.