English

English at Darnhall Primary School 

At Darnhall Primary School, the development of English skills is crucial to all areas of the curriculum. We believe good literacy skills are the fundamental building blocks towards academic and social success. 


Pathways to Write

We follow a Mastery approach to English through the programme ‘Pathways to Write.’ Units of work are delivered using high-quality texts and children in all year groups are given varied opportunities for writing. Skills are built up through repetition within the units, and children apply these skills in the writing activities provided.  Many opportunities for widening children’s vocabulary are given through the Pathways to Write approach and this builds on the extensive work we do in school to provide our children with a rich and varied vocabulary.  

 

You will find the end of year expectations for writing, reading and spoken language for each of our year groups in the attached documents. For further detail on the skills that your children are learning on a termly basis, please contact your class teacher.


Pathways to Read

We follow a Mastery approach to English through the programme Pathways to Read. Units of work are delivered using high-quality texts and children in all year groups are given varied opportunities for reading. Skills are built up through repetition within the units, and children apply these skills in the reading activities provided.  

We deliver one whole class shared reading lesson per week from years 2-6 with bespoke grouped reading for every pupil at least once a week as well as individual reading. For pupils still needing support with phonics from years 2-6, we provide an individual reading programme that has phonically decodable texts at the heart of it. In our shared and grouped reads, there is a clear teaching focus with the opportunity to master key reading skills in each session. There are follow on reading tasks to enable pupils to evidence the skills they have mastered independently.

Many opportunities for widening children’s vocabulary are given through the Pathways to Read approach and this builds on the extensive work we do in school to provide our children with a rich and varied vocabulary. 

You will find the end of year expectations for reading for each of our year groups in the attached documents. For further detail on the skills that your children are learning on a termly basis, please contact your class teacher.

Expert tips to get your child reading | Encourage kids to love books

 


SPaG

At Darnhall Primary School, we aim to achieve proficiency in spelling, punctuation and grammar (SPaG). Each week, classes promote the learning of spellings, including statutory words, common exception words and the national spelling rules through the no-nonsense spelling scheme. We believe that the teaching of spelling, grammar and punctuation enables children to be able to maximise their potential in reading and writing.

SPaG lessons are embedded throughout the Pathways to Write planning and they will be implemented on multiple occasions over each unit of work. The different 'keys' will ensure that previous year groups' SPaG targets are recapped too.

Files to Download

DARNHALL PRIMARY SCHOOL
Sandyhill Road,
CW7 1JL,
and Darnhall School Lane CW7 1JR
Mrs Sarah Tomlinson, Headteacher
Mr Davie Kindon, SEN Contact