Inspiring our writers: English at Marlborough St Mary's!

Our Vision:

Marlborough St Mary’s envisions an inclusive, happy, and thriving school at the heart of our local community. Together, our families and dedicated staff guide our children to become confident, independent learners who care for themselves, each other, and the environment around them. Our mantra is simple: Be brilliant, be bold, be kind. Together, we believe, learn, and achieve.

Subject leaders - Mrs Naomi Bathurst, Miss Georgia Derbyshire and Mr Russell Goodman

 

Life-long readers: Our Curriculum's Intent:

At Marlborough St Mary’s, we believe that the teaching of English is fundamental to our children succeeding, enabling them to access the next stage of their education and beyond. Our curriculum has been designed to ensure that children enjoy reading and writing and have a passion and enthusiasm for English.

Staff at Marlborough St Mary’s are aware of the differing groups of learners and vulnerable children in their classes which enables them to plan and teach personalised English lessons which focus on the particular needs of each child. We recognise that each child has their own starting point upon entry to every year group and progress is measured in line with these starting points to ensure every child can celebrate success. Across our curriculum, each year group aims to explore books, poems and events written by or about people from a range of cultures and races.

Through using high –quality texts, immersing children in vocabulary-rich environments and ensuring curriculum expectations and the progression of skills are met, the children at Marlborough St Mary’s are exposed to a creative, aspirational and engaging English curriculum.

The Adventure of Learning: How We Teach English:

Continuous and blended provision: In reception, children enjoy role playing traditional tales with props, puppets and dressing up. English skills can be seen in all continuous provision activities around the classrooms and adults are highly skilled at encouraging talk through play. In Year 1, blended provision is carefully planned to allow children to develop their early writing skills. Drama and imaginative stimuli are used to give exciting opportunities for engaging with texts and provide purposes for creative writing. 

Reading at Marlborough St Mary’s is at the core of our curriculum and an integral part of all our lessons. We teach reading through -

• Phonics: Phonic awareness helps the development of reading by segmenting and blending sounds. In Reception and for any child requiring phonics teaching, we use the phonics programme Read, Write Inc. In phonics lessons, reading is taught through a shared approach using books that are rhythmical and have repetitive patterns. Pupils are streamed into ability groups which match their reading levels and each term they are reassessed to determine any group changes. Children take home a copy of their group RWI book so that their learning continues at home.
• KS1: Reading continues to be taught through the RWI programme to ensure that children are learning to read and comprehend texts that match their phonic ability. Once children have moved through the RWI grey books, they then move on through the colour banded book spine which ascends through the school.
• Year 1 – Year 6 Book Talk: Across KS1 and KS2, pupils participate in daily Book Talk lessons, where they read high-quality books each term, amounting to 36 books over the course of their primary education at Marlborough St Marys. In Year 1, teachers introduce several picture books throughout the term under the visualiser. However, from Year 2 onwards, classes have multiple copies of the same novel for pupils to follow along with. These lessons are designed to foster a love of reading, expand children's vocabulary, and deepen their understanding of the author's intent. Teachers skillfully guide class discussions and questioning to elicit and extend pupils’ comprehension and learning. The focus of these questions is on vocabulary, prediction, inference, and summary. To support this, teachers use a highlighting system in their planning to ensure a range of question types are covered.
• Book Talk immersion lessons: At the beginning of every new book, children are immersed in the context; prior knowledge is not assumed. Immersion lessons set the place and time of the story, looking at countries and cultures as well as teaching key vocabulary. Children will look at pictures and props which are then put on display for the duration of the term.
• Supporting disadvantaged learners: To support disadvantaged learners, a variety of strategies are employed. One such approach is using "think-pair-share" with carefully chosen learning partners to encourage collaboration and idea sharing. Teachers also actively join partner discussions to provide guidance. Teaching assistants are used to helping pupils follow along in the correct section of the book, and in some cases, pre-reading sessions are held before the lesson to boost comprehension. Additionally, props and pictures from classroom displays are often referenced to enhance understanding and provide visual context.
• Reading comprehension: Once a week in KS2, children complete a reading comprehension. The text type will rotate between fiction, non-fiction and poetry and children will be exposed to a range of different question types that target the national curriculum reading strands.
• Reading for pleasure: At Marlborough St Mary’s, we actively encourage children to pick up a book to read for their own pleasure. Classrooms are well stocked with a wide variety of books and children visit the school library at various points in the day. It is important to say that teachers demonstrate their own love of reading by always having a personal book at hand.
• Reading homework: We use an online platform called ‘Learning for Parents’. Families can record their child’s home reading by leaving notes, audio entries or photos. Teachers can use this to keep track of children’s reading at home and award online stickers or house points.
• Reading interventions: Sometimes it is necessary for children to receive 1:1 or small group phonics or comprehension lessons. These sessions always happen outside of core lesson times and are carefully planned to help children work on gaps in their phonics knowledge or reading comprehension skills. Sometimes a child in lower key stage 2 may still be working through the RWI reading spine and it may be appropriate for them to join the key stage 1 phonic lessons.
• Reading Assessment: As well as using daily assessment for learning, we also make use of PIRA reading tests. These happen at the ends of term 2, 4 and 6 and are an invaluable tool for teachers to enable them to plan the next steps in learning for each pupil.

 

Writing

• Writing Sequence: Our English lessons are linked directly to the text studied in book talk. These lessons are delivered through 2 units of writing per term each containing two weeks of text related, skills based lessons leading through to an end of unit long write where children can show their application of the skills taught. Teachers use the visualiser to model writing and examples of skills covered within a unit are recorded on the working walls within the classroom.
• Grammar and Punctuation: Children are taught the grammar and punctuation objectives specific to their year group, and these skills are reinforced across 12 writing units throughout the year. In each writing unit, pupils focus on learning 3 to 4 grammar skills. For each skill, there are two lessons: one dedicated to teaching the rules, and the other to applying them. Lesson starters and working walls are used to revisit and reinforce the grammar objectives covered.
• Long Write Children participate in two extended writing sessions each term, providing an opportunity to apply the grammar skills they’ve learnt. Before these sessions, the teacher dedicates a lesson to introducing the text type, for example, a diary, a letter, a story or a report, followed by another lesson for planning the content. After completing their independent writing, pupils spend additional time editing and improving their work to enhance their final piece.

 

A Typical Writing Unit

 

Immersion x1 lesson

Skill 1 x2 lessons

Skill 2  x 2 lessons

Skill 3  x 2 lessons

Skill 4  x 2 lessons

Text type x 1 lesson

Planning x 1 lesson

Long write x 2-3 lessons

Editing

 

• Spelling: At Marlborough St Mary’s, a rigorous and consistent approach to spelling is implemented using the Read Write Inc. (RWI) Spelling programme, starting in Year 2 after the completion of the RWI phonics programme. The lessons incorporate a variety of strategies and resources, including "dot, dash, count," spelling zone videos, and word investigations. Dictionary skills are also taught as part of these lessons. For pupils still developing their ability to spell high-frequency words, word mats are provided, and every classroom displays the RWI complex speed sound chart to support learning.
• Handwriting: As part of the Read, Write Inc. phonics programme, correct letter formation is taught from reception. From year 1 onwards, year groups then use the Nelson handwriting programme. In key stage 2 this is taught explicitly in a handwriting lesson once a week.
• Assessment: Writing attainment is consistently measured throughout the year. During the three assessment periods in terms 2, 4, and 6, progress is tracked using the Wiltshire Teacher Assessment Frameworks. In addition, writing is also formatively assessed at the end of each writing unit, allowing us to adjust teaching plans based on pupil needs and progress.
• Writing moderation: We moderate our writing assessments throughout the year both internally and as part of a Wiltshire school cluster.
• SEND: We employ various strategies to support children with special educational needs. These include the use of assistive technologies such as the Clicker writing program and voice recordings, as well as tools like colourful semantics, topic charts, and high-frequency word charts. Additionally, teaching assistants are highly skilled at providing targeted support for children's writing.
• School Trips and Author visits in reception and KS1: We have an excellent relationship with the staff at the town library, and we make every effort to ensure children have a library card by organising memberships prior to a class visit. Year 1 and 2 also take an annual visit to the library where they receive an excellent interactive experience with the librarian. We then encourage families to make continued visits by joining in with summer reading challenges and advertising and promoting other reading events run by the library.
• School Trips and Author visits in KS2:  In lower Key stage 2, we build on this connection with the town when the children take part in the Marlborough Literature festival in Year 4. They take great pride in opening the weekend festivities by singing on the town hall steps. As a whole school we contribute to the festival's writing competition and it’s always exciting for the children to see the winning entries displayed in St Mary’s church. In Year 5, children go on a magical trip to Marlborough college where they enjoy a Harry Potter experience Day, meeting Hagrid and taking part in a Hogwarts quiz in the college library. This hands-on experience brings the text to life and results in some marvellous writing back in class. During the Marlborough literature festival Year 5 and 6 attend children’s author talks in the town hall. This is always an exciting event where the children are treated to an author reading and then given the chance to ask questions about story writing. Where possible, we try to enrich our reading with visits to theatres.

 

 

Measuring the Impact: Achieving Our Goals:

The impact of our efforts is clear: progress, passion, and transferable skills. By the end of Key Stage 2, we aim for all children to have made significant progress in their learning journey. They will be confident, creative writers and passionate readers, ready to embark on further education with high aspirations.

At Marlborough St Mary's, we are committed to nurturing well-rounded learners who are not only academically successful but also compassionate, confident, and full of curiosity. We hope that their love for English and their sense of pride in themselves and their community will continue to grow and flourish as they move forward in their educational journey.