KS2 Writing

Intent

At All Saints Primary School, we want all children to be able to confidently communicate their knowledge, ideas and emotions through their writing and reach their full potential. We want the children to enjoy the process of writing and feel excited in seeing what they can create. We want children to see the purpose of writing in real life situations and to use their skills beyond the classroom.  

 Our Aims

·         To guide and nurture each individual on their own personal journeys to becoming successful writers.

·         To provide exciting writing opportunities and experiences that engage and enhance all pupils.

·         To support children to acquire a wide vocabulary and to be able to spell new words by effectively applying the spelling patterns and rules they learn throughout their time in primary school.

·         To develop a solid understanding of grammar which can be effectively to writing.

·         To support children to write clearly, accurately and coherently, adapting their language and style in and for a range of contexts, purposes and audiences.

·         To encouraged all children to take pride in the presentation of their writing, in part by developing a legible, cursive, individual handwriting style by the time they move to secondary school.

·         To provide a good knowledge of phonics to springboard children to becoming fluent writers.

·       To plan a progressive curriculum to build upon previous teaching, with regular assessment to ensure each child’s needs are met to reach their full potential.

 Implementation

Writing

In KS2 we build on the children’s work from their ReadWriteInc journey. English is taught 5 times per week with the main focus being on grammar and writing skills as reading and spelling are also taught in addition during daily guided reading and Oxford Owl spelling sessions. At the start of each year we follow the Place Value of Punctuation and Grammar scheme from Grammarsaurus. This allows the children to revise and develop the key building blocks required to make them successful writers.  Following on from this, the teaching staff plan units of work focusing on a particular writing genre. During these units of work, the children will see model texts; will learn and practise a variety of linked grammar skills and will plan, write and edit their own final version.  These units of work are often linked to other curriculum areas and may sometimes allow the children to write for a real-life purpose. We have also developed our own Creative Grammar Curriculum which allows children to using different grammar techniques to develop a lively style of writing. 

Handwriting

It is paramount that children are rigorously taught correct letter formation from the very beginning of their time in school. During the foundation stage at All Saints Primary School, the children are taught to sit properly in order to have the correct posture for writing as well as correct pencil grip for developing their letter formation. Activities allow all children to develop their gross and fine motor skills. We use the handwriting scheme from ReadWriteInc across the whole school from foundation to Year 6 and staff follow a systematic, differentiated and progressive approach which supports children of all abilities.

Teachers are expected to be a role model for the school’s handwriting style when marking children’s work, writing on the board and on displays around the school. 

Spelling

From Year 2, children follow the progressive spelling scheme from Oxford Owl/ ReadWriteInc. Through exploring patterns and rules, we aim to create confident and proficient spellings using an approach underpinned by phonics.

 In KS2 children have focused spelling lessons 4 times per week where they will be taught to:

·         Spell accurately and identify reasons for mis-spellings.

·         Proof-read their spellings

·         Recognise and use word origins, families, prefixes, suffixes and roots to build their skills

·         Use dictionaries and thesauruses.

 Children are encouraged to learn the list of Year3/ 4 and Year 5/ 6 statutory spellings by the time they leave each phase. From the Oxford Owl scheme they use several ‘tricks’ to help them learn these trickier words: mnemonics, word in a word, sticky tricky letter, say it as it looks or rap it.

 Once a week, the children will have a ‘surprise’ spelling test. The children will be given a set of words to spell which are from the words they have focused on that week. Rather than learning by rote, the children will need to apply all their knowledge and spelling strategies to support them. 

 Impact

Teachers use assessment as an integral part of the teaching and learning process and link it clearly to the children’s next steps.

Assessment:

• Each unit of writing will result in an independent piece of work which is marked against a success criteria as well as children’s individual target.
• Constructive marking using a marking code allows children to see where they have succeeded and what next steps they need to take.
• At the end of each term, the children will complete a piece of independent writing which has not been taught as a unit of work. This piece of writing will be marked against the writing assessment statements for the year group they are currently working on. 

The impact on our children is that they will have the knowledge and skills to be able to write successfully for a purpose and audience. The children will have the ability to plan, draft and edit their own work. By the end of key stage 2, children will have developed a writer’s craft and will enjoy sustained writing where they can manipulate language, grammar and punctuation to create an effect. Children will see the link between reading and writing and their reading experiences will help develop their writing skills. As all aspects of English are an integral part of the curriculum, cross curricular writing standards will improve and evidence of English skills will be transferred into other subjects. 

 

	Grammar vocab progression map	[pdf 2MB]
	Read Write Inc Handwriting stage 1a	[pdf 1MB]
	Read-Write-Inc-Handwriting-Stage-2	[pdf 602KB]
	Read-Write-Inc-Handwriting-Stage-3	[pdf 1MB]
	Planning Overview Year A and Year B 2023 2024	[pdf 468KB]
	Place Value Punctuation and Grammar Year 3 and 4	[pdf 278KB]
	Place Value Punctuation and Grammar Year 5 and 6	[pdf 277KB]