Our primary school’s writing program is designed with a clear intent: to nurture confident, creative, and ambitious young writers. We focus on foundational skills, nurturing creativity, and fostering critical thinking. Through a growth mindset, we empower students to embrace challenges and learn from their writing experiences. Our comprehensive writing curriculum seamlessly integrates speaking and listening lessons into each writing unit, providing vital support to enhance children’s literacy skills as well as sparking curiosity and imagination. Our ultimate goal is to inspire a love for writing and equip our pupils with the skills they need to excel academically and communicate effectively beyond primary school.
Cultivating a Love for Writing at Our Primary School
At Pocklington Junior School, our core mission is to nurture a genuine love for writing in all our pupils. We aspire for each child to develop a distinct and expressive writing voice, utilizing writing as a powerful tool for thought and expression. To achieve these goals, we uphold a set of guiding principles:
1. Diverse Writing Experiences: Throughout their primary journey, our pupils engage in a rich variety of writing experiences, exploring different genres. We believe that exposure to diverse forms of writing enhances creativity and skill development.
2. The Reading-Writing Connection: We emphasize the essential link between reading and writing. To illustrate how writing functions effectively, we use high-quality model texts that inspire and guide our students.
3. Oral Composition: We recognize the importance of oral composition. We encourage verbal expression as a foundation for confident and articulate writing.
4. Regular Writing Opportunities: In every writing lesson, pupils are provided with the opportunity to put pen to paper and express their ideas, fostering continuous growth. We value each child as an individual, and in our writing lessons and throughout interventions, we provide personalized support to help them realize their unique potential.
5. The Simple View of Writing: Our teaching approach is grounded in “The Simple View of Writing” (Berninger et al, 2002), which we break down into manageable knowledge and skills over time. This ensures a structured and comprehensive writing education.
6. Writing Process Mastery: Pupils are explicitly guided through the writing process, including planning, drafting, editing, and redrafting. This method empowers them to refine their work and take pride in their writing accomplishments.
Our primary aim is to equip each child with the tools and enthusiasm they need to become confident, skilled, and passionate writers. We believe that fostering a love for writing not only enriches their academic journey but also prepares them for a lifetime of effective communication and self-expression.
Wonder writing process
All pupils are taught to compose their writing using a process that is based on the writing composition process outlined in the EEF’s Improving literacy in Key Stage 2 report:
Essential elements of our writing curriculum:
At our primary school, we follow a structured writing process that revolves around key principles. Each topic centres on a fundamental concept, serving as the driving force behind the topic’s exploration. The central model text, often crafted by our dedicated teachers, aids pupils in understanding the underlying discourse structure. Grammar instruction is seamlessly integrated into context, aligning with overarching learning objectives. We utilize authentic texts to vividly showcase word usage, sentence construction, and discourse features, ensuring a comprehensive and engaging writing experience for our young learners.
Our Approach to Learning Objectives and Intentions
At our primary school, we understand that writing is a multifaceted and personal journey for our students. Therefore, our approach to learning objectives differs from the traditional format, where objectives are explicit statements of expected lesson outcomes. Instead, we use questions like “How can we…?” and “How well can we…?” to set ambitious expectations while acknowledging that successful writing can take various forms. These key learning questions serve several important purposes:
- Fostering a Culture of Inquiry: They encourage a classroom culture of curiosity and exploration, where students are encouraged to ask questions and seek answers.
- Keeping Learning Open: We avoid restricting learning to specific boundaries, ensuring that our students are not limited by narrow definitions or ceilings on their potential.
- Challenging All Students: Key learning questions are designed to challenge every student, regardless of their level, promoting growth and development.
- Encouraging Critical Thinking: They stimulate deep, critical thinking and encourage students to analyze and evaluate their work.
- Engagement and Stimulation: These questions engage and stimulate students’ curiosity and creativity, making learning a dynamic and exciting process.
- Reflecting on Learning: They provide natural opportunities for students to reflect on their progress during and after lessons.
- Retrieving Prior Knowledge: Key learning questions also prompt the retrieval of prior knowledge, helping students connect new learning with what they already know.
- Teaching Disciplinary Thinking: They promote thinking that is specific to the subject matter being taught, helping students become more proficient writers.
Our approach to learning objectives and intentions is designed to create an enriching and inclusive learning environment, where every student can thrive and develop their unique writing skills.
Assessment of writing
All skills taught to pupils are part of our writing skills progression, ensuring a structured and comprehensive approach. Pupils are regularly assessed against the expectations for their year group using assessment tick sheets. These sheets serve as valuable tools to gauge pupils’ independent understanding of the required writing skills and inform teacher assessments. To maintain accuracy, moderations occur routinely throughout the year, guaranteeing precise and fair evaluations of our students’ writing abilities.