English

At Charles Kingsley’s we plan our English Curriculum so that children are exposed to the highest quality diverse literature which inspires, motivates and develops each child as a reader and writer. Concept led themes such as, ‘Hope’, ‘Courage’ and ‘Motivation’ are all reflected through texts that are read or written by the children.

Reading is a crucial part of the entire curriculum - not just during English sessions. Diverse texts are chosen carefully by looking at themes, cohort needs and interests, current affairs and recommended reads for the age range (including classics and contemporary). Extracts or whole texts will be used as inspiration for writing, during guided reading sessions to focus on developing age appropriate reading skills and to develop a culture of ‘reading for pleasure’ with class readers linked to the half termly concept. Children will be regularly assessed to ensure they are accessing texts from our scheme – Collins Big Cat, which will provide a home school reading link.

Phonics is taught daily in EYFS and Key Stage One following Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised to deliver a systematic synthetic phonics programme. Opportunities will be provided throughout the curriculum for application of these phonic skills. Please refer to our phonics and early reading tab for further information. 

Children will rehearse writing skills through shorter pieces of writing and create extended pieces as authors. The curriculum is planned to enable children to write for a range of purposes, with formal teaching of writing skills as well as creative writing opportunities. The children are taught to plan, draft, structure and edit and improve their work. Children will be taught to present their work in a legible, fluent, joined style of handwriting.

Spelling is taught following the CKS half termly spelling progressions adapted from Hampshire English team. The teaching of spelling encompass a range of phonemic, visual and morphological principles in order that children acquire a range of linguistic approaches in learning to spell. Spellings are taught discretely however they are then applied across the curriculum. Subject specific vocabulary will be taught as appropriate. Grammar and punctuation are taught through genre specific units of work, embedded within the unit of work. At times discrete teaching of these skills will be needed but children will always be given the opportunity of application within context.

To find out more about our reading curriculum across the school, please click below: