English

We aim for all children to become confident critical speakers, listeners, readers and writers with a capacity to express themselves through a variety of different literary activities. Pupils are given opportunities to develop their use, knowledge and understanding of spoken and written English within a broad and balanced curriculum, with opportunities to consolidate and reinforce taught literacy skills. Following the National Curriculum 2014 and the guidance contained within the Birth to Five Matters planning will give the children the opportunity to achieve the aims set out by the National Curriculum.

These are:

Read easily, fluently and with good understanding
Develop the habit of reading widely and often, for both pleasure and information
Acquire a wide vocabulary, an understanding of grammar and knowledge of linguistic conventions for reading, writing and spoken language
Appreciate our rich and varied literary heritage
Write clearly, accurately and coherently, adapting their language and style in and for a range of contexts, purposes and audiences
Use discussion in order to learn; they should be able to elaborate and explain clearly their understanding and ideas
To enable our children to have fluent and legible handwriting;
Are competent in the arts of speaking and listening, making formal presentations, demonstrating to others and participating in debate

At St Thomas’s we seek to maximise children’s learning across all areas of Literacy and therefore we include opportunities for cross-curricular literacy activities. As a school we embrace every opportunity to enable the children to engage in purposeful writing within and beyond the curriculum. Our planning is creative and engages the children with key literacy texts that will excite and engage them in the literacy process.

All children have opportunities to participate in a range of drama activities which challenge and develop their skills as Speakers and Listeners both within the classroom and as part of their Key Stage activities or whole school performances. These activities give the children the opportunities to rehearse, perform and evaluate in small groups, to other classes or to the whole school.