Writing
Intent
At Adswood Primary School our vision is that children will become confident, capable, enthusiastic writers who develop a genuine love for writing.
Aims
They will use writing to express themselves and communicate to others and will write independently for a range of purposes. They will be become critical thinkers by reflecting on their own writing and their peers'.
Implementation
Writing begins with the physical development of fine and gross motor skills to enable children to pick up a pencil and begin to mark making leading to creative and confident writers through the primary years. Our learners are inspired by our ‘Adswood Authors’; these are the authors or poets who write the texts that we follow as part of our LCC Focus Education topics. We display images of them in class and discuss other books or texts that our learners may be familiar with or may wish to read in the future. We also offer the opportunities for our learners to work with real ‘Adswood Authors’ through author visits. We have enjoyed working with Sarah Oliver, Daniel Henshaw and Denise Popat in the past and are hoping to invite other authors into school in the future. We also provide the opportunity for our learners to take part in virtual workshops.
Motor skills are developed through implementing the Martin Harvey handwriting scheme, which is taught from Year 1 to Year 6. Children are encouraged to apply their taught handwriting skills across the curriculum and aim for “Gold Star Standard” presentation.
In our Phonics lessons we follow the Read, Write Inc scheme.This helps to support children to transfer sounds to print. Children are then encouraged to use their phonic knowledge in their writing. The scheme is a phased approach introduced in EYFS and continued through to Year 2. From Year 3 through to Year 6 children follow the Headstart Spelling scheme which covers spelling strategies and methods for learning commonly misspelt words for each year group.
In Early Years the writing journey begins from mark making to sentences, every child explores writing through our provision and every day practise.
From Year 1 – 6 we follow FOCUS Education’s Literacy scheme and use recommended, age appropriate texts to generate our own pieces of writing. These texts/authors/poets are used to inspire the children to write a range of fiction, non-fiction and poetry throughout the year. In the classroom, we use 'Writing Ladders' to build up skills and understanding before asking children to write independently and our English Working Walls are constantly updated and adapted to reflect learning within our classrooms.
Furthermore, as a school we feel it is important to boost children’s confidence and self-esteem. Therefore, we showcase our best pieces of writing on our WOW Walls and share our writing with parents/carers via Seesaw.
Impact
In our most recent assesments, writing outcomes have improved significantly across school. Not only in our writing sessions but also across other subjects. Learner voice confirms that the school writing cycle is consistent and improves their writing.
Follow the links below for Home Learning activities/games:
Sentence Doctor- Can you diagnose the problem with the sentence?
Dropping In- Learn to write sentences with embedded clauses
Definitions- These simple animated deinitions should help with the technical terms used when writing
Sentence Magic- Learn different ways to improve your sentences
