GFPS follows the National Curriculum 2014

English Curriculum Statement

“Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn." -Benjamin Franklin

We want our children to learn to read, to love to read and to write in a similar way to the authors they have studied. Pupils learn best when their curiosity is engaged. We use a text led approach to teach the skills of reading, writing and spoken language.   Learning is led through a series of ‘high value principles’ which underpin all English learning and are the skills our children need to be taught as a priority in order to become proficient in the English language.

• Each term, it is clearly set out what the majority of our pupils are expected to learn in reading, writing and vocabulary, grammar and punctuation. The acquisition of vocabulary is at the heart of all we teach our children, as closing the language gap is key to addressing the social disadvantage many of our children face. (“Vocabulary size is related to academic success and schooling is crucial for increasing the breadth of pupils’ vocabulary” Clive Davies OBE Focus Education)

• To ensure a broad and balanced curriculum,  children experience a range of fiction, poetry and non-fiction genres each term, which link to the Learning Challenge Curriculum  to provide meaningful links wherever possible.  We use whole texts in our English units, from a range of modern and classic authors, and use literature which our children can relate to and see themselves reflected in characters.  Alongside the main priority of the understanding of reading, we also strive to enable our children to read with stamina, fluency and expression.

• Literature is at the heart of our curriculum. Over an English unit, children will read as a reader, then as a writer and draft and edit a finished piece, introducing relevant grammatical and punctuation features in context. We use elements of the ‘Talk for Writing’ approach to support sentence rehearsal and the understanding of structure.

• Our teaching of phonics includes the introduction of letters and then sounds in the order set out in Read Write Inc. This learning is then supplemented using a range of activities from Letters and Sounds and Jolly phonics. 

• In order to be long term, learning should be meaningful and provide real experiences for children. We have a book week annually; have story-tellers and live performances in school; drama and debating specialists work with our children to enhance their learning and we give every child a book at Christmastime. Wherever possible we encourage our parents and carers into school to be part of these experiences.

Phonics

At the Nursery stage, learning is focused on listening skills, identification of sounds, rhyme and oral segmenting and blending (Phase 1 Letters and Sounds).

Letters are introduced when children are ready, using the order, rhymes and letter formation from the ‘Read Write Inc’ scheme. This is supplemented by songs and games from ‘Letters and Sounds’.

Through reception, year 1 and year 2, teaching continues to follow the RWI sequence. This is supplemented in Year 2 with the ‘Support for Spelling’ approach.

When children enter Key Stage Two, teacher assessment and data from the Y2 phonic check is used to identify children who require further bespoke learning opportunities linked to previous phonic learning.  Children work at an appropriate pace and level to support their learning and enable progress. Where appropriate, phonics learning in Key Stage Two is tracked using B squared.

Children working within or above ARE in Key Stage Two follow the ‘PLAN-IT’ Spelling programme.