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English
Early Reading
At Seven Fields Primary School we understand that reading is the foundation for all learning and supports children in every area of the curriculum. For this reason it is prioritised across the school.
Reading begins in Nursery and Pre-School, with interactive storytelling sessions for parents, where children are encouraged to use multisensory approaches to explore language. Nursery children learn phonemic awareness which builds on listening skills and the ability to hear, identify and manipulate sounds in words to prepare for reading.
In Early Years, children follow a book based curriculum designed to give the foundations for learning across the school. The children explore the language from these books in a variety of ways during the day to develop a deep level of understanding of the words that are used.
Poetry basket is used as a tool for Reception children to memorise, comprehend and explore vocabulary through actions, voices and movement. Children perform these poems at various points in the year.
Early Writing
As a school we understand the importance of preparing children to be writers. Fine motor activities are a crucial part of the beginnings of a child's school journey. Children explore in a variety of ways to strengthen fingers in preparation for writing. Dough disco is used from Pre-School to Year 2 to support the development of fine motor skills.
Children in the Early Years Foundation stage are given opportunities to mark make, including as part of tummy time, to encourage giving meaning to marks and forming shapes with tools. Children are exposed to real life texts e.g. books, lists, magazines, to inspire their early writing and mark making.
Before learning to write, children are supported to develop the language to share their ideas. Children in Reception will use Helicopter Stories, to share their own adventurous and act these to a group. Adults are able to support in building their language in a playful way, scribing these stories, before the children learn to put pencil to paper.
Phonics
As a school we have adopted the Read Write Inc. phonics scheme. Children learn recognise sounds and blend them into words. Across Reception and Key Stage 1 children are grouped according to their ability. We follow a "keep up not catch up" approach, ensuring that children are quickly given interventions to close the learning gap and move on to the next group.
Children learn to read words and are assessed in lessons daily through the use of alien words. Each term children will be assessed and moved to the correct group. The groups are as follows:
A, B, C- learning individual sounds and orally blending them into words.
Ditty and Red Ditty- Reading some special friends (digraphs where letters join to make 1 sound) and blending them into words.
Green, Purple, Pink, Orange, Yellow, Blue, Grey- Children learn to read set 2 and 3 special friends and blend them into words. Children now focus on building fluency and reading words quickly in order to move through the groups.
For more information about the phonics programme please see your child's teacher.
Videos are available via the Ruth Miskin Portal to practise reading at home (and for extra practise in school). The phonics team send these, where appropriate, to support with additional learning at home.
At the end of Year 1, children are assessed using the Phonics Screening Check (PSC) this is a list of 40 real and alien words that the children must decode. Children are prepared for this throughout the year and have regular practises for it. Parents are informed of their child's result in their end of year report.
Lower KS2
The school follows the ARK English curriculum, which is ambitious, knowledge-rich, and carefully sequenced to ensure all pupils develop strong reading, writing, and spoken language skills. The curriculum is designed around high-quality texts that expose pupils to a wide range of genres, authors, and themes, building cultural capital and a love of literature. Vocabulary development is explicitly taught and revisited so that pupils are supported to understand and use ambitious language confidently.
Reading is at the heart of the ARK English curriculum. Pupils are taught to read fluently, with strong comprehension skills, through structured lessons that focus on inference, retrieval, and critical thinking. Texts are studied in depth, allowing pupils to explore language, structure, and authorial intent. This approach supports pupils to make meaningful connections across their learning and prepares them well for future study.
Writing is taught through a clear and consistent structure, enabling pupils to understand how high-quality writing is constructed. Grammar and punctuation are explicitly taught and applied within purposeful writing tasks linked to the core texts. Teachers model writing effectively, and pupils are given regular opportunities to draft, edit, and improve their work. The curriculum ensures that all pupils, including those with additional needs, are supported and challenged to achieve high standards and make strong progress in English.
Big Cat Reading Scheme
We have introduced the Big Cat Reading Scheme for our KS2 children and those who have graduated from the phonics programme in Year 2. These books offer a wide variety of genre and interest and match the children's reading levels so they can enjoy these books at home.
Lexia and Reading Plus
Lexia and Reading Plus are used within KS2 to support children with their reading. Lexia is being implemented in lower Key Stage 2 to support children with gaps in their reading knowledge and interventions are provided in a swift and timely manner. It allows us to keep track of our pupils and provide support for those who need it effectively.
Reading Plus is used in upper Key Stage 2.
Reading Plus supports pupils to become confident, fluent, and motivated readers by developing the key skills needed for successful comprehension. The programme uses adaptive technology to assess each pupil’s reading ability and provides personalised texts and activities that target fluency, vocabulary, and understanding. By strengthening pupils’ reading stamina and accuracy, Reading Plus enables children to engage more deeply with a wide range of texts and to access learning across the curriculum. Regular use of the programme helps pupils to build independence, track their own progress, and develop positive reading habits, ensuring sustained improvement in reading outcomes for all learners.
Handwriting KS2
The school uses the Letterjoin handwriting programme to teach a clear, consistent, and progressive approach to handwriting. Letterjoin supports pupils to develop correct letter formation, joins, and spacing from the early stages through to fluent, cursive writing. The programme provides structured lessons and engaging resources that help children build fine motor control, confidence, and pride in their written work. By embedding consistent handwriting expectations across the school, Letterjoin enables pupils to write with increasing speed and accuracy, supporting high standards of presentation and allowing children to focus more effectively on the content of their writing.
Writing
We start writing from the begining of our school journey in the Early Years Foundation Stage where we use pre-writing skills and mark making to ensure we are ready to learn how to write.
In Reception, we follow a story based curriculum in which the children are exposed to lots of vocabulary, writing opportunities and learning across all areas of the curriculum linked to the stroy.
This continues throughout the school where we use video clips and stories as the basis for our writing. We focus on writing across different genres to learn the key writing skills needed to be independent writing.
Handwriting:
In keystage 1 children use the Read Write Inc. letter formation rhymes to ensure accurate letter formation. In Keystage 2 we introduce cursive writing and use letter join to support with introducing accurate formation with our joins.
This year we are working on improving the presentation of our work to ensure all of our writing is something we can be proud of!
We use spelling shed to help improve our spelling as a school. Your child's class teacher will send home information about how to log in and use this at home. We hope that the game based learning approach will help motivate the children to do the activities at home. Each week there is a new spelling rule or pattern to learn. Children have daily opportunities to practise these rules and patterns to secure their knowledge and understanding.
