This page contains information about how English is taught and events to promote reading and writing at our school. We hope you find it informative and useful.
English Subject Leader & Writing Lead - Mrs Eve
Reading Lead - Mrs Collins
Phonics and Early Literacy Lead - Miss Chesters
Here are some links to websites offering advice for appropriate books to read for pleasure at home:
https://www.booksfortopics.com
https://www.thereaderteacher.com
https://schoolreadinglist.co.uk
Reading at Newton
At Newton we believe that reading is an essential life skill and we are committed to enabling our children to become lifelong readers. At the heart of our school is our drive to foster a love of reading, enriching children’s learning through well planned teaching activities that utilise imaginative stories and thought-provoking texts. We carefully plan how we can ensure that our children learn through books across our curriculum also to gain knowledge through reading.
We show our children how wonderful and rewarding reading can be in lots of different ways! Whether it is through our wide selection of reading material at school, our well stocked whole school and classroom libraries or our reward scheme - we are always striving to show our children that reading is fun and the centre of our whole curriculum.
Please click on the icon below to access the English Long Term Intent for 2025/26 to see how English skills progress at our school.
Oracy at Newton
Oracy is an essential skill for life. We promote this skill in lots of ways here at Newton and take advantages of opportunities for our children to have a purpose when using the skills involved in Oracy. We plan Oracy teaching and learning into our curriculum carefully and across many subjects to enhance the current curriculum offer, but to also directly teach the important skills involved in Oracy and effective speaking and listening.
We love to hear from our pupils and build in many opportunities within the curriculum in which to do so. Presentations of work a. re encouraged through topic based projects, meetings with different classes and year groups is common where the children share their work and ideas and we seek the children's thought and opinions across the school when discussing dinner choices, playground improvements and links with our community. Drama is very important to us here at Newton too and we have a successful KS1 Christmas production and our upper KS2 Drama Club performance are something we are very proud of. Our children feel that they have a real voice at our school and we ensure that the skills are taught well and that there is a purpose for these skills.
The following document outlines how Oracy skills are developed at our school.
Writing at Newton
Writing is an important skill for life and at Newton we like to make sure that our children see the value and fun in writing by giving their writing purpose and linking it to lots of areas of their curriculum. The children are always visiting different classes to share their writing with other children and teachers and love to see it on display too.
Our staff are highly skilled in teaching writing and use the recommended 'I do', 'we do', 'you do' approach with the children. This means that we are considering cognitive load for the children and providing effective scaffolds to ensure that they reach their full potential. Teachers model the writing we want to see from the children and this, together with high-quality, explicit teaching of the key skills os spelling and handwriting, provides an excellent environment to foster effective writers.
We follow 'Pathways to Write' guidance and enjoy fantastic books to enthuse our children about writing!
The Long Term Intent document above outlines how writing progresses at Newton and how the handwriting, spelling, phonics and reading all links in with the skill of writing.
Useful website links
The National Curriculum: National curriculum in England: primary curriculum - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
BBC Learning: Primary Homework Help | Online Games For Kids - BBC Bitesize
Spelling/English games: Spelling and Grammar, English Games for 7-11 Years - Topmarks
Spelling Frame:SpellingFrame
Oak National Academy: Oak National Academy (thenational.academy)
OFSTED: Ofsted - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)