Learning to live out our calling with compassion and love.
Welcome to English
What Ofsted said about English at St. Mary's:
"Pupils apply their writing skills through well-considered activities across the curriculum. Examples of cross-curricular writing include history, geography, science and religious education. As a result, pupils are developing a better understanding of how to write for different audiences and reasons."
Intent
At St. Mary’s Catholic Primary School, we are dedicated to fostering a love of reading in our pupils. We are committed to ensuring that all pupils become confident, fluent readers who have a good knowledge of a range of authors and who use what they read to make sense of the world around them. It is our intention to immerse pupils in the wonders of quality texts to instil a passion for discovery and confidence to explore their imagination. At St. Mary’s we strongly promote the development of vocabulary, which is central to our broader curriculum We understand the importance of parents and carers in supporting their child to develop their reading fluency and comprehension, so a home-school partnership is paramount.
During their time at St. Mary’s, all children will be exposed to a high quality education in English. We are committed to ensuring that all of our pupils become highly competent writers. The development of key writing skills is central to our English curriculum and these are taught through high quality texts and visual stimulus, which are carefully selected in line with our pupils’ interests. Our pupils are given endless opportunities throughout their school journey to write for different audiences and purposes, therefore independently applying and securing the key writing skills, which are progressively built upon.
As a Voice 21 school, we strive to create an oracy-rich community, where we ensure that all children feel that their voices are valued and listened to. Quality first teaching aims to support children in using their voice confidently to reason, negotiate, present and explore ideas, which in turn will support their learning across the curriculum and prepare them for later life.
Implementation
At St. Mary’s, the English Curriculum consists of:
Writing
Reading
Spelling
Handwriting
Impact
We strive to ensure that our children’s attainment is in line with, or exceeds, their potential when we consider the varied starting points of all our children. The age related expectations are paramount when it comes to measuring attainment. We robustly and systematically track the progress and attainment of all children throughout the year, aiming for accelerated progress in all pupils. We aim for the percentage of pupils working at age related expectations and greater depth standard in each year group to be at least in line with national averages.
Children at St. Mary’s enjoy reading and this has a positive impact on reading attainment. They can confidently talk about what they like to read and who their favourite authors are. Children have enhanced levels of text comprehension and have a good understanding of the key reading skills, which is developed progressively across the school. Parents and carers have a good understanding of the importance of reading and know how to support their child at home.
As all aspects of English are an integral part of the curriculum, cross curricular writing is of a high standard. Skills taught in English lessons are transferred into other subjects, showing mastery of the key skills.
During their time at St. Mary’s, pupils’ speaking and listening skills progress rapidly so that by the time they leave St. Mary’s, they are able to communicate effectively for a wide range of purposes and to a wide range of audiences.
We hope that as children move on from us to further their education and learning that their creativity, passion for English and high aspirations travel with them and continue to grow and develop as they do. Our intentions are that our English curriculum will ensure all pupils are academically prepared for life beyond primary school and throughout their educational journey, into adulthood.