English
At King’s Park Academy, we are committed to fostering a love of language and developing confident, skilled writers. Through our English curriculum, we ensure that children at King’ Park Academy develop as capable and enthusiastic writers, ready to express themselves with clarity and creativity.
Writing
High-quality texts underpin our approach to writing, inspiring creativity and deepening understanding. Children explore how authors craft their writing through detailed composition analysis and high-quality teaching, which includes effective modelling of writing techniques. Pupils are provided with rich opportunities to write across a wide range of genres, including fiction, non-fiction, and poetry. Writing objectives and outcomes have been carefully mapped throughout the year to ensure regular review, practise, and application of key skills, enabling pupils to develop a strong foundation as accomplished writers.
Spelling
Our approach to spelling follows Spelling Shed’s systematic and engaging programme, which emphasises the relationship between sounds and written symbols and incorporates morphology to understand spelling through meaning. Discrete weekly sessions in each year group teach spelling rules and patterns, supported by carefully selected word lists and interactive activities. This approach integrates phonics and meaning to strengthen pupils’ spelling skills while enhancing vocabulary acquisition, equipping our learners with the tools needed to become confident communicators.
Handwriting
The ability to write fluently and legibly gives children a means to communicate their thoughts and ideas efficiently. Handwriting is a skill which must be learnt in order to provide a style which becomes simple to produce and easy to read. Skilful handwriting has an impact on composition and research suggests that writing letters supports early reading development.
Our objective is to help pupils enjoy learning and developing their handwriting with a sense of achievement and pride. We aim for our pupils to develop a neat, legible, speedy handwriting style that leads to producing letters and words automatically in independent writing by:
- Providing equal opportunities for all pupils to achieve success in handwriting.
- Producing clear, concise, legible handwriting in all areas of the curriculum.
- Developing accuracy and fluency.
- Helping children recognise that handwriting is a form of communication and as such should be considered important in order for it to be effective.
- Promoting confidence and self-esteem.
- Encouraging children to take pride in their work.
- Helping children recognise that handwriting as a life-long skill and will be a fundamental element of all forms of written communication throughout their lives.
- Adopting a common approach towards handwriting by all adults when writing in children’s books, on the whiteboard or on displays/resources.
- Having a consistent whole school approach to the teaching of handwriting.