English

At Abbott, we understand that English has a pre-eminent place in education and in society. We provide a high-quality education in English that aims to teach each individual pupil to speak and write fluently so that they can communicate their ideas and emotions to others and through their reading and listening, others can communicate with them.

Through reading in particular, pupils have a chance to develop culturally, emotionally, intellectually, socially and spiritually.  Reading for pleasure is actively encouraged across the year groups.  The high quality literature that we use to teach English, plays a key role in such development.  Reading also enables pupils both to acquire new knowledge and to build on what they already know.  All the skills of language are essential to participating fully as a member of society; pupils are therefore taught these through both speaking and listening as well as reading and writing.   

Aims

The overarching aim for English in the national curriculum is to promote high standards of language and literacy by equipping pupils with a strong command of the spoken and written language, and to develop their love of literature through widespread reading for enjoyment. The national curriculum for English aims to ensure that all pupils:

• 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
• are competent in the arts of speaking and listening, making formal presentations, demonstrating to others and participating in debate

By the end of EYFS, children will be expected to:

• demonstrate understanding of what has been read to them by retelling stories and narratives using their own words and recently introduced vocabulary.   
• anticipate (where appropriate) key events in stories.
• use and understand recently introduced vocabulary during discussions about stories, nonfiction, rhymes and poems and during role play.
• say a sound for each letter in the alphabet and at least 10 digraphs.
• read words consistent with their phonic knowledge by sound-blending.
• read aloud simple sentences and books that are consistent with their phonic knowledge, including some common exception words.
• write recognisable letters, most of which are correctly formed.
• spell words by identifying sounds in them and representing the sounds with a letter or letters.
• write simple phrases and sentences that can be read by others

By the end of Key Stage 1, children will be expected to:

• read accurately most words of two or more syllables, including words with common suffixes, and most common exception words;
• read words accurately and fluently, and sound out most unfamiliar words;
• check that their reading of a familiar book makes sense, whilst being able to answer questions and make some inferences based on what is being said or done;
• demarcate most sentences with a capital letters, and full stops (with some use of question marks and exclamation marks);
• use different types of sentences such as statements, questions exclamations and commands;
• write in past and present tense mostly correctly;
• use some expanded noun phrases;
• use connectives for co-ordination(or, and, but) and some connectives for subordination (when, if, that, because);
• segmenting spoken words into phonemes and representing these by graphemes correctly;
• spelling many common exception words, some words with contracted form, and adding suffixes to spell some words correctly;
• using the diagonal and horizontal strokes needed to join letters in some of their writing, writing capital letters and digits to the correct size, orientation and relationship to one another and to lower case letters;
• using the correct spacing between words.

By the end of Key Stage 2, children will be expected to:

• read age-appropriate books with confidence and fluency, whilst working out the meaning of words based on the context that it appears within a sentence;
• explain, discuss their understanding, draw inferences and make predictions based on what they have read;
• retrieve information, summarise main ideas, identify key details and use quotation from non-fiction;
• evaluate the use of author’s language, including figurative language, and state the impact that it has on the reader;
• create atmosphere, and integrate dialogue to portray characters and advance action;
• select vocabulary and grammatical structures (including adverbials within and across sentences);
• using passive and modal verbs mostly appropriately;
• using different sentence types including different clause structures;
• using adverbs, prepositional phrases and expanded noun phrases effectively to add detail;
• use inverted commas, commas for clarity, and punctuation for parenthesis mostly correctly, whilst making some correct usage of colons, semi-colons, dashes and hyphens.
• spelling most words correctly.
• maintaining legible joined handwriting with fluency and speed, choosing whether or not to join certain letters.

Spoken language

The National Curriculum for English reflects the importance of spoken language in pupils’ development across the whole curriculum – cognitively, socially and linguistically. Spoken language underpins the development of reading and writing.  The quality and variety of language that pupils hear and speak are vital for developing their vocabulary and grammar and their understanding for reading and writing.  Statutory requirements which underpin all aspects of spoken language across the six years of primary education form part of the national curriculum.

The Y1-6 English Programme of Study can be found below.

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