Arden Primary School

IMPLEMENTATION

Children begin their writing journey in the Early Years Foundation Stage, where they take part in a range of high quality activities relating to speaking, listening and developing language. Creative play is fostered through role play areas and tasks are designed so that children are exposed to high quality talk. The foundations for writing readiness are fostered through activities designed to strengthen their gross and fine motor skills, and children engage in programmes that employ neurological and physiological movements to create marks. Our Early Years provision is meticulously designed to inspire children to learn to write through play. Activities are carefully designed to encourage mark making, writing, speaking and listening, and areas such as the outdoor 'Literacy Shed' inspire children to write regularly. Staff in the Early Years have undergone extensive training and CPD to facilitate high quality interactions, which are the bedrock of communication and language. 

We use the 'Read to Write' approach from Literacy Counts as the basis for our daily, discrete writing lessons from Reception to Year 6. Our writing units centre on high quality, engaging and ambitious 'Vehicle Texts', which inspire children's writing across a range of genres. Where possible and relevant, these Vehicle Texts link to the foundation subjects. 

Daily sentence accuracy lessons take place across school, and are a vital element of our approach to develop children who have a strong command of the written word. These lessons encompass word, sentence, and punctuation from the statutory National Curriculum programme of study for writing and Appendix 2 (Vocabulary, grammar and punctuation). This daily practice also helps build fluency and stamina for writing.

Units of writing are carefully planned and tailored for each class, using a structured writing sequence of 'Immerse, Analyse, Plan, Write'. Key elements of grammar, punctuation and spelling appropriate to the year group are woven through each unit and Daily Sentence Accuracy lessons. Throughout the teaching sequence, all children are given the opportunity to read and analyse 'Greater Depth' pieces of writing in a particular text type as an aspirational example. Throughout each unit, teachers and support staff look where children need extra assistance and offer swift intervention to provide the children with the skills to produce high quality writing.

IMPACT

Moderation:

We have a particularly strong focus on writing moderation at Arden. This supports our aspiration for excellent standards across school, as well as ensuring that judgements are accurate and fair. Two members of the teaching team, including the Writing Lead, are Local Authority moderators and Cluster Leads for Key Stage One and Two and work across the borough in this capacity. We conduct regular whole school, key stage and year group moderation in-house, as well as moderation exercises with year group colleagues in writing clusters. Staff engage with the Local Authority moderation process and participate in moderation meetings. 

We scrutinise the efficiency of our teaching approach and its impact on children's knowledge, understanding and progress through: 

• Information from formal book scrutinies

• Termly teacher assessments 

• Performance data (since the introduction of Read to Write in November 2022, we continue to see a positive trend in performance data across school)

• Subject leader monitoring

• Learning walks

• Lesson observations

• Lesson drop ins

• Weekly 'Friday Flicks'

• Pupil voice

• School Improvement Team liaison

• Governor visits

• Writing 'One Voice' document

PROGRESSION OVERVIEWS

VEHICLE TEXTS BY YEAR GROUP

Reception

Year 1

Year 2

Year 3

Year 4

Year 5

Year 6