Writing

“After nourishment, shelter and companionship, stories are the thing we need most in the world.” – Phillip Pullman

Writing is an essential part of education and of a child’s future. Pupils who do not learn to speak, read and write fluently and confidently are effectively disenfranchised and will not reach their potential as an individual or be able to participate fully as a member of society. Exposure to a wide range of high-quality literature plays a key role in a child’s opportunity to develop culturally, emotionally, intellectually, socially and spiritually. We have therefore made the use of such texts a central part of our writing curriculum.

At WASPS, the intention of our writing curriculum is to create young writers who are confident, aware of, and able to use their own knowledge. We want children to enjoy writing and experience the breadth and variety of a range of different genres and text types. Writing empowers children to communicate their ideas and emotions to others, to be creative and imaginative, or meticulous with details – we aim to create writers who relish the process of writing and the challenges that it presents.

Our curriculum enables pupils to develop expertise in writing with clear progression of grammar and vocabulary. Through our choice of high-quality texts, pupils are exposed to a wide variety of different styles and features of writing, whilst also gaining a broad knowledge of the world. As well as exploring texts that pupils can see themselves mirrored in, our choice of texts offers a window into cultures, experiences, voices and stories different from their own. It is our intent that our children understand the social functions of writing in order to use different genres of writing appropriately by considering its purpose and matching it to its audience.

Our carefully considered writing curriculum ensures that children gain knowledge of different story structures (imitation, innovation and invention) and a progression of non-fiction text types throughout the school. Alongside this, it is our intent that every child develops a progressive understanding of grammatical conventions, the way in which punctuation aids understanding and how to apply spelling rules. Our use of a three-week writing cycle ensures that children build up writing skills over time whilst providing regular opportunities for children to write independently.

High Quality Texts and Three-Week Writing Cycle

Across our long-term writing plan, we have mapped out high quality texts for each year group for every term. The texts have been carefully chosen to engage children with at least two ‘Big Write’ opportunities as an outcome. One of these follows a non-fiction focus and the other a fiction focus. Units are taught in 3- week blocks, where children are taught the skills building up to their final pieces of work.

Impact

At WASPS, teachers formatively assess children’s work after each piece of writing. This allows them to have a secure understanding of the impact of each writing cycle. This is assessed against the National Curriculum and our progression documents. Three times a year, teachers carry out summative assessment of children’s independent work against the Teacher Assessment Framework.