English
~LEARNING TOGETHER: LEARNING TO BE TOGETHER ~
At Pye Bank Primary School, the curriculum supports and develops the pupils’ ambitions and aspirations and understanding of the community and the wider world in which they live. The curriculum is underpinned by enquiry based practice and is research led. Through our curriculum we aim to expose children to new experiences, including business and the world of work and research. Academic performance and the development of self (Spirituality, social, moral, physical and cultural development and mental wellbeing) are given equal importance with curriculum design. Our curriculum is designed with the key aim of supporting all children to reach their potential
Here at Pye Bank we place language at the very heart of our curriculum. We believe that all children should develop a love of reading and writing. We want them to develop the skills necessary to be able to express their thoughts and opinions, we want to inspire them and support the development of their imagination. Developing a broad vocabulary base and achieving at a high academic standard in English will enhance the life chances for our children.
At Pye Bank, we are committed to ensuring that our children become confident, enthusiastic and skilled readers, writers and communicators so that all children, other than those who are cognitively unable, leave Pye Bank working at or above age related expectations in English. We strive to ensure every child makes excellent progress and reaches their potential.
At the centre of our English Curriculum, is reading: we recognise it is a vital skill which can open up many exciting possibilities for children in their futures and empower them to follow their interests.
Our curriculum is fully aligned to the national curriculum
To find out more about our Reading Curriculum visit our Reading Page 
Writing at Pye Bank
Intent:
At Pye Bank CE Primary School, writing is an integral part of our curriculum and we provide opportunities across the curriculum for children to write for a range of purposes and audiences. We endeavour to ensure that our children write with grammatical accuracy and spell new words effectively by applying spelling patterns which have been taught so that our children can become confident, capable and skilled writers. Our writing curriculum is underpinned by our vocabulary and reading teaching, which inspires children to write imaginative pieces and creates writers who write with passion and purpose.
Implementation: To see our key documents please click the images below
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| SPAG Progression | Writing Sequence | Vocabulary Development | Genre Coverage | Writing Long Term Plans |
Early Writing:
Early writing is taught through mark making which then moves onto children learning the correct letter formations. Children begin by writing CVC words moving onto writing labels, lists, captions and short sentences where they have the opportunity to apply the letter formations and sounds they have been taught in Phonics. As we want children to see the value of writing and find enjoyment in it from an early age, we provide opportunities throughout our continuous provision for children to write independently. At Pye Bank, we recognise the importance of discussion and oral rehearsal in children’s understanding of the written word which is why throughout Foundation Stage and KS1 the “Talk for Writing” model is used to support the teaching of writing. Through this approach, children are exposed to a variety of genres and they have the opportunity to learn these off by heart which helps them to internalise some of the new vocabulary used and the language structures in that particular genre. This supports our children in becoming confident writers.
Years 1-6
As our English curriculum has been developed with reading at its heart, many of our writing outcomes in Years 1-6 link to the high-quality, age appropriate text we have been studying in book study lessons. This not only inspires our children but it also provides them with the opportunity to apply the vocabulary, which they have been learning linked to their book, directly to their writing.
Writing lessons are carefully planned and follow the National Curriculum and our ‘Pye Bank Sequence of Writing’ which ensures lessons are progressive and well sequenced. As we believe children need to see good models for their writing, we have ensured that throughout the writing sequence children have the opportunity to see good models of writing through modelled, shared and guided writes. Additionally as we want children to be reflective writers and know that writing is a process, we have provided opportunities for children to plan, write and edit their writing into our writing sequence. Children in Years 1-6 begin the writing sequence by deconstructing an age-related exemplar (WAGOLL) text to help them to understand the layout and grammatical features of a particular genre. At this point, the purpose and audience of the piece of writing is discussed. Children are taught grammar objectives, which are carefully mapped out across school by subject leaders, as part of the writing sequence. Finally, children have the opportunity to plan, write and edit their own piece of writing which enables them to see that writing is process and that writers and authors have to refine their work before reaching a final piece. This writing sequence is repeated every two weeks with a focus on a different genre of writing. All teachers have high expectations of what children can achieve in writing at Pye Bank and children rise to this challenge and are proud of the writing which they produce.
Spelling
As we are committed to ensuring that our children leave Year 6 with the ability to spell, in Years 1 and Foundation Stage children are taught phonically plausible strategies to spell words and they learn high frequency and common exception words. In Years 2-6, spelling is taught using the Read Write Inc Spelling programme 
