Writing
IntenT
At Raglan, it is our vision that every child leaves our school as a competent, resilient writer, who can communicate their knowledge, ideas and opinions confidently. We want pupils to build and acquire a wide vocabulary and a solid understanding of grammar as well as being able to spell new words by effectively applying the spelling patterns and rules they learn. Through the teaching of high-quality, ambitious texts, we guide pupils to write clearly, accurately and coherently, adapting their language and style in and for a range of contexts, purposes and audiences. We believe that all pupils should be encouraged to take pride in the presentation of their writing, in part by developing a good, joined, handwriting style by the time they move to secondary school. We believe that all good writers refine and edit their writing over time, so we want children to develop independence in being able to identify their own areas for improvement in all pieces of writing, editing their work effectively during and after the writing process.
Implementation
At Raglan School, we teach writing sequences that are centred around high-quality texts. Long, medium and short term planning, alongside text progression maps, ensure that a variety of genres and purposes are progressively taught and built upon both throughout the year and throughout the school.
Each writing sequence is carefully planned and follows a detailed structure where children are taught the skills to enable them to become independent writers. Moreover, activities and opportunities are provided to ensure that the children consider and write with the purpose and audience in mind.
Within each unit of work, sequenced lessons ensure that prior learning is checked and built upon and that National Curriculum objectives are taught through a combination of approaches/opportunities.
In KS1 and KS2, sequences are planned and taught using the following stages:
Familiarisation of the text - A series of lessons are planned where the children can immerse themselves in the text, for example shared reading, book talk, oral retelling, role-play, character analysis, etc.
Analysis - This stage involves activating the children’s prior knowledge and will then move on to analysing an excellent model of the text type. The children will then use this analysis to co-construct a toolkit of structural and language features needed to be successful, considering the audience and purpose throughout.
Explicit grammar teaching - The teacher will identify and explicitly teach grammar for the text type. The children will have the opportunity to demonstrate their knowledge and understanding, in context, through completing short writing tasks throughout the unit.
Planning - The children discuss and record ideas, based on the core text, to support planning of their own innovative piece of writing.
Application - Children independently demonstrate their application of skills through a longer piece of writing.
Editing/Redrafting - During this stage, the children have the opportunity to evaluate their writing against the toolkit. They are encouraged to proof-read their writing and are taught how to edit and make improvements to their own and others’ writing. If appropriate, the writing is published for a particular purpose.
In the EYFS, children have many pre-writing opportunities to prepare them for early writing. Handwriting is taught through separate sessions, which start in Reception. Handwriting is a basic skill that influences the quality of work throughout the curriculum. By the end of Key Stage 2 all pupils should have the ability to produce fluent, legible and, eventually, speedy joined-up handwriting, and to understand the different forms of handwriting used for different purposes. Our intention is to make handwriting an automatic process that does not interfere with creative and mental thinking.
Curriculum Enrichment
Many enrichment activities for writing are closely linked to our wider curriculum and include trips and workshops, that can be used as a stimulus to for our writing. These include but are not limited to:
Hot Chocolate Writing Award - Weekly with Leading Teachers for improved Writing/Effort in Writing.
Now Press Play
EYFS - Local Library visits
Nursery - Walk to the postbox to post letters to our families
Reception - Bus to Broomfield Park
Year 1 - Capel Manor
Year 2 - Tower of London
Year 3- TeachRex Dinosaur Workshop
Year 4- St Paul's Cathedral
Year 5- Young Shakespeare Company
Year 6- Mexicolore
