Writing

Writing

Writing is a key life skill and is therefore a main focus for teaching at Gilthill. Children are given the opportunity to practice and refine their written skills through structured planning, writing and editing activities using a variety of high-quality fiction, nonfiction and poetry texts. Children learn how to present their thoughts, ideas and understanding as well as developing their spelling, grammar and punctuation skills through a carefully designed, progressive writing curriculum.

Foundation Stage/Key Stage 1

Having the desire to learn and achieve at the start of their writing journey, building on letter recognition, to formulating short sentences and producing longer pieces by the end of Key Stage 1, starting to ask questions to further their knowledge of writing and become more independent, persisting with their writing and starting to write a range of styles, beginning to form their individual style and ideas and having the confidence to showcase this in their work, start to talk about their ideas with others but also listening to others ideas, starting to recognise their strengths and weaknesses in their writing and working hard to improve these, talking about their likes and dislikes in writing, having belief in themselves and starting to take risks with their writing/spellings, having an awareness of different writing styles and be able to talk about their writing to others by the end of Key Stage 1.

Key Stage 2

Children will continue to build on their skills from key stage 1 and now be more aware of their strengths, weaknesses, likes and dislikes in writing, having the desire to continue learning and achieving with their writing, asking a range of deeper level questions to further develop their writing and build their understanding of different writing styles, persisting with their writing and being ready to move forwards and continue to further their learning. Most children will have developed their own individual style and will have the confidence to build on this whilst appreciating and accepting similarities and differences of others, believing in themselves and having the confidence to take risks with their writing/spellings, knowing what makes them feel good with their writing and building on it but be willing to try new ideas and challenges too, being able to discuss different aspects of their work and explain why they have made certain choices with their writing, being aware of others writing and tolerating/supporting the ideas of others.

Handwriting

Throughout school children have regular handwriting practice. In KS2, handwriting is integral to English lessons with children being taught to join their handwriting from the start of KS2.

Writing Progression

Writing is very important to us here at Gilthill. We celebrate the children’s writing achievements by awarding them with a writing certificate each time they progress to the next stage in their writing journey. The writing certificates linked to each year group are as follows: 

Writing Certificates 

Reception- SPARKS 1,2,3 

Year 1- FIRE 1,2,3 

Year 2- EARTH 1,2,3 

Year 3- NATURE 1,2,3 

Year 4- WATER 1,2,3 

Year 5- AIR 1,2,3 

Year 6- SPACE 1,2,3 

When assessing the children, teachers will use their judgement based on the National Curriculum statements below. This will be a best fit and children may or may not be secure in every area.