Beacon Academy - English

English at Beacon Academy:

English, whether spoken, written or listened to, under-pins all areas of our curriculum and at Beacon Academy our aim is to provide the children with the skills which are essential to participate fully as a member of modern British Society. We do this with a sense of enjoyment and purpose as the children go about their learning by providing a high quality education in English which will teach pupils to speak and write fluently so that their ideas and emotions can be communicated to others.

Writing

At Beacon, we follow the objectives of the EYFS Framework and National Curriculum . Our aim is to develop a love for language and literacy and this is at the heart of our teaching.

Our children's journey begins in the Nursery and EYFS, where we follow Pie Corbett's 'Talk for Writing' approach. Talk for Writing is used to teach fiction, non-fiction and poetry through a multi-sensory approach. This ensures that there are plenty of opportunities for children to talk, share experiences and explain their thinking.

The children will then transition onto our AET English Curriculum in Years 1 and 2 and then they will follow ARK Mastery Curriculum in Years 3-6, so that they can make rich connections across the English curriculum. English units of work are planned to include reading and writing (as well as spoken language opportunities) allowing children to compare texts, develop as a reader and learn about authorial choices and their impact on the reader. Children can then use this knowledge to inform their own creative writing. For each unit of work, lessons have been developed to include the knowledge and understanding the children need to produce their own writing. High-quality texts have been carefully selected so that they are engaging, yet ambitious,

We celebrate national events such as National Poetry Day and World Book Day and we encourage the children to enter competitions. To enhance their enjoyment of English we also enjoy visits from authors and theatre companies.

Reading

At Beacon, we want to give the children a chance to build a ‘love’ for reading from an early age, which will make them life-long readers. Through this reading, our children are given the opportunities to develop culturally, emotionally, socially and spiritually. We follow the ‘Whole Class Reading’ model, whereby all children have the opportunity to study and discuss the same texts. In order to support the children’s understanding of these quality texts, the children will read a variety of non-fiction texts and answer questions about these. Additional reading opportunities are given to those children who require extra support.

Spoken Language

Spoken language is integrated throughout our curriculum. We aim to raise children’s awareness and understanding of their use of spoken language and help them communicate more effectively.

We deliver by:

Captivating children’s interest, stimulating children’s thinking and encouraging them to engage with others through spoken language, leading to deeper understanding.

We place a high emphasis on learning vocabulary across the subject areas, and understanding more abstract vocabulary through quality class readers and weave in opportunities for application.