Writing

Writing intent.pdf

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Our Writing Curriculum

The writing curriculum is ambitious and designed to give all pupils, particularly disadvantaged pupils and including pupils with SEND, the knowledge and cultural capital they need to succeed in life. This is through exposing the children to ambitious vocabulary, themes and texts that they may not usually encounter in their home life.

As a school, we follow The Write Stuff model of teaching Writing lessons from Year 2 onwards. In Foundation Stage and Year 1, they use the Mighty Writer for their English lessons which has a strong focus on oral rehearsal, sequencing and picture–sentence matching to prepare children for chunked writing.

From Year 2 to Year 6, children follow the structure of The Write Stuff in their English lessons with a method called ‘sentence stacking’. Sentence stacking refers to the fact that sentences are grouped together to engage children with short, intensive moments of learning that they can apply immediately to their writing. Children learn to sentence stack, focusing on the style of the author and impact of words and sentences. The planning of these is based on the teacher’s assessment of the children’s learning needs. Every lesson has a dictated chunk, a modelled chunk and an independent chunk. Modelled and independent chunks are broken into three separate chunks: ·

Initiate section – a stimulus to capture the children’s imagination and set up a sentence.
Model section – the teacher close models a sentence that outlines clear writing features and techniques.
Enable section – the children write their sentence following the model and have the opportunity to 'deepen the moment' where they can explore the plot point further and demonstrate their own creative sentences using their previous learning.

Once children have followed their 'central character' through the story, they have the opportunity to plan and write independently using their previous learning to shape their creative stories. Children at Hucknall National are encouraged to see writing as a journey; re-drafting and editing are used before writing is published. Writing extends across the curriculum with children being given opportunities to write for a range of different purposes outside of the writing lesson.

All English-based activities are extended with opportunities for Greater Depth, where children can take writing in their own directions. This usually includes elements of the FANTASTICs which are used to ‘deepen the moment’. All children are encouraged to deepen their writing further, regardless of their ability.

Handwriting:

Handwriting is taught daily using the Read, Write Inc. handwriting scheme, Letter Village across EYFS, Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2.

Spelling, Punctuation and Grammar:

In EYFS and Key Stage 1, children are taught spelling through the Read Write Inc. scheme in their phonics sessions. In Key Stage 2, children who have not met the end of the Read Write Inc programme continue with phonics sessions. The other children have spelling sessions to learn about word families, the origins of words as well as spelling patterns.

Punctuation and Grammar is taught through the English writing lessons in Key Stage 1. In Key Stage 2, children are taught some discrete lessons for Punctuation and Grammar which is then reinforced in their writing lessons.