READING

We have a passion at Flamstead Village School for our children to become independent readers who read for pleasure and purpose. Through exposure to a variety of different genres, we immerse pupils in high quality text where there are plenty of opportunities to engage and respond through various activities such as ‘Talk for Writing’. Focused guided reading takes place every day during which children acquire the skills associated with comprehension. Reading is so developmentally important and we believe reading is key to unlocking all potential in English. We believe good writers are keen readers because reading helps develop an ideas bank on which they can draw upon when writing.  The Oxford Reading Tree is our core scheme which is supplemented by other schemes such as Project X.  It is further enhanced through a wide variety of both fiction and non-fiction texts.

PHONICS

Phonics development is also a feature in the lower school and confidence in phonics, along with other strategies, will be used to assist children in the development of reading and spelling skills as they move through the school.  We follow the Read, Write Inc Phonics Scheme.  More information can be found on the link below.

SPELLING,  GRAMMAR  AND  PUNCTUATION

We want all children to have the skills necessary to be excellent writers. Attention is paid to developing grammar, spelling and punctuation through the delivery of well-planned, rigorously monitored lessons. These always incorporate both modelled and shared writing to demonstrate to the children the thought processes and skills necessary to be an effective writer. Extended writing is encouraged and editing skills play an important role within our lessons, where children often peer assess and help each other to re-draft and improve their work. Assessment is vital in all lessons and children are regularly given personal targets to help improve their writing.

SPEAKING  AND  LISTENING

We want our pupils to become articulate and confident young people and therefore we present children with frequent opportunities to develop these skills through debate, public speaking and active listening.