Writing

Intent

At Kirkdale St Lawrence CE Primary School, we are writers! We believe in the power of words and are committed to creating writing experts! We aim to inspire the next generation of authors, journalists, bloggers and teachers.

In the words of Albus Dumbledore (J. K. Rowling), ‘Words are our most inexhaustible source of magic.’ At Kirkdale St Lawrence, we are dedicated to instilling our pupils with the knowledge and passion they need to be successful writers, who have developed their own style and voice. We want our children to go forth equipped for secondary school and beyond with the literacy skills necessary to thrive in life.

Our high-quality text-based writing curriculum provides our children with vocabulary-rich learning and exposes them to a wealth of different authors and styles. We want to inspire every pupil at our school to use words to tell their own stories, express their uniqueness and individuality and stand up for rights and opinions of others.

A passion for writing is encouraged through exposing our children to a wide variety of genres and focusing on the audience and purpose of each text. Our book-centred approach allows our children to practise their written skills, develop their own voice and be inspired by the words of others.

 

Implementation

At Kirkdale St Lawrence, writing is taught daily from Year 1 to Year 6 alongside extended pieces of written work in the wider curriculum. We are following mixed age planning from Hamilton trust as the basis of our English lessons.

Each unit of work lasts 3 weeks, and are based upon high quality, age-appropriate texts. During the first week children are emersed fully in the genres, exploring the text structures and language choices of the author. During week two, children will work on GPS skills based around the books and intended outcomes for the unit. In the final, week children will learn to write in the style of the author or genre, and they will produce a plan, draft and final piece of work.

Impact

The impact of the teaching of writing is assessed using a variety of methods.

At the beginning of each unit of work children will undertake a cold task. This is whereby children will attempt the genre they are about to cover to using prior knowledge, enabling teachers to adapt planning to fill in gaps and misconceptions. At the end of the unit of work, children will complete a hot task, whereby they apply their new knowledge working against a success criteria. In Key Stage 2, children are increasingly aware of the checklists and are beginning to create their own to support themselves when self-assessing and editing their work.

All assessments and judgements are reviewed termly through a validation process where data, children’s books and teaching are discussed with the Senior Leadership to ensure accuracy in assessment.

Through a rigorous assessment system, we will foster independent writers who will have developed the necessary skills needed for secondary school and beyond. At Kirkdale ST Lawrence, we are firmly committed to creating writing masters!