Writing at St. Thomas'
At St Thomas’, we nurture a love of writing through purposeful and engaging writing opportunities.
At St Thomas’, we create a rich, enjoyable and stimulating Narrative Immersion based English curriculum, developing the children’s skills in writing both to inform and to entertain and providing them with opportunities to apply those skills in purposeful writing opportunities.
We believe in giving all children the chance to develop as skilled and creative writers, who can write effectively for a range of audiences and purposes.
To develop our pupils as writers we:
- Develop a rich and broad vocabulary through daily activities.
- Teach to write effectively for a range of purposes and audiences.
- Encourage them to write with interest, enjoyment and purpose in a variety of forms to express their ideas creatively.
- Give them the knowledge and strategies to enable them to spell confidently and accurately and to use grammar correctly.
- Teach them a neat, cursive handwriting style.
- Teach them how to use planning, drafting and editing to improve their work.
- Provide opportunities to present writing in a variety of ways and for different audiences.
To develop our pupils’ speaking and listening skills, every member of staff at St Thomas’ encourages quality talk and endeavors to model quality talk themselves, within a rich language environment. This takes place in lessons, assemblies and throughout every aspect of school life.
In addition we:
- Give children rich opportunities to express their ideas verbally through a range of drama activities related to our Narrative Immersion Curriculum.
- Encourage them to listen and respond appropriately to others.
- Help them to evaluate and reflect on their own speech and adapt it to different situations and challenges.
- Encourage them to use the grammar of Standard English where appropriate.
- Use P4C and debating sessions to encourage the development of speaking and listening skills and to help children empathise and formulate their ideas.
- Encourage multilingual children to use their home language.