Rights Link: Article 29 – Goals of Education
Our Vision for English
At Sydenham Primary School, staff ensure that all children develop a love of learning and that pupils at all levels achieve their full potential. In the EYFS, Communication and Language underpins all seven areas of learning and development. The adults in our EYFS work with the children in the provision to encourage, facilitate and model high quality talk. The development of vocabulary is a keen focus for us and staff highlight and model new vocabulary well. This is supported through a reading rich environment where children are read to frequently and children engage with stories, non-fiction, rhyme and poetry with enthusiasm.
It is crucial for children to develop a life-long love of reading and we have placed books at the core of our curriculum from Nursery to Year 6. Reading is at the heart of our curriculum. Reading is a key life skill. It is our intention that by the end of their primary education, all pupils will be able to read fluently and confidently. We endeavour for our children to become independent readers and thinkers who can develop their own thoughts and opinions on a range of familiar authors. We pride ourselves on providing an environment and curriculum which fosters a genuine enthusiasm for books and reading. The high quality texts we have chosen offer a window to the world, and reflect the rich and diverse school community; which enables our pupils to develop an understanding and acceptance of the world around them. Our aim: Every child a reader!
Our writing curriculum is text-based so it goes hand in hand with our mission to foster a genuine enthusiasm for books. We intend our children to be able to express their thoughts and ideas clearly and creatively through the written word. We aim to create confident and competent writers who have all the necessary skills and knowledge to write for a range of purposes and have the ability to draft, edit and improve their own work in order to create accurate, well considered pieces of writing. We set high expectations for all of our children to take pride in their work, have a fluent, joined handwriting style and consider the most effective way to present their final drafts.
We want all of our children to be capable readers, writers, spellers and speakers, who can transfer their English skills to other curriculum areas and who are prepared for the next phases in their education.
National Curriculum 2014
'All pupils must be encouraged to read widely across both fiction and non-fiction to develop their knowledge of themselves and the world in which they live, to establish an appreciation and love of reading, and to gain knowledge across the curriculum. Reading also feeds pupils’ imagination and opens up a treasure-house of wonder and joy for curious young minds.'
Progression in Reading Map
The Power of Reading
The Power of Reading is a whole school learning and teaching approach which engages teachers and children in the literacy curriculum through using high quality books and proven teaching approaches. The project offers multi-layered professional development drawing on Centre for Literacy in Primary Education's (CLPE's) highly regarded classroom-based research and experience of working with teachers. The Power of Reading project combines the use of outstanding books for teachers and children with an approach to teaching the English curriculum that is creative, engaging and develops a love of literacy. The Power of Reading resources enable our teachers to contextualise language, grammar, phonics and spelling in meaningful ways and plan for progression, enabling children to work at greater depth in both reading and writing.The Power of Reading meets all requirements of the English national curriculum.
Reception-Power-of-Reading-books
Year-1-and-Year-2-Power-of-Reading-books
Year-3-and-Year-4-Power-of-Reading-books
Year-5-and-Year-6-Power-of-Reading-books
Please see the link below for guidance on how to encourage reading for pleasure.
Reading-for-Pleasure-What-Works
Please take a look at some of our fantastic pupils reading Christmas stories and poems for pleasure at home:
Year 1
Year 2
Year 3 - video 1
Year 3 - video 2
Year 3 - video 3
Year 4
Year 5