CURRENTLY UNDER DEVELOPMENT - AREAS THAT ARE NOT COMPLETE WILL BE UPDATED BEFORE THE START OF THE 2026/2027 ACDEMIC YEAR.
English : Writing
Our Approach to Writing
At Kexborough Primary School, we want every child to become a confident, capable and motivated writer who can communicate their ideas clearly and effectively. We want children to understand that writing has a purpose: it allows us to tell stories, share information, explain our thinking, persuade others, describe experiences and communicate with different readers.
Learning to write is complex. Successful writers need ideas and vocabulary, but they also need to be able to form letters fluently, spell increasingly accurately, construct sentences, organise and connect ideas and make choices about the language they use. Our writing curriculum therefore develops transcription and composition together, with expectations carefully sequenced from the Early Years to Year 6.
Learning to Write – and Learning from Writers
Reading, language and talk sit at the heart of our writing curriculum. Children regularly encounter high-quality texts and learn from the choices that successful authors make. Rather than simply spotting grammatical features, we encourage children to consider how and why a writer has made particular choices and the effect these choices have on the reader.
Rich discussion and oral rehearsal are important throughout school. Children are given opportunities to develop ideas, rehearse sentences, explore vocabulary and explain their thinking before and during writing. We recognise that children are much more likely to write successfully when they have the knowledge, vocabulary and language structures they need to communicate what they want to say.
Explicit Teaching and Growing Independence
Children are not expected simply to discover how to become successful writers. Teachers explicitly teach and model the knowledge and strategies that writers use.
New learning is introduced carefully through explicit instruction, teacher modelling, shared writing and guided practice before children are expected to apply it with increasing independence. Teachers often think aloud as they write so that children can hear the decisions a writer makes when choosing vocabulary, constructing sentences, organising ideas or improving a piece of writing.
As children become more secure, responsibility gradually moves from teacher to pupil. Importantly, independence does not mean removing all support. Discussion, oral rehearsal, vocabulary teaching, planning tools, model texts and shared experiences remain valuable tools. What changes over time is children's ability to apply what they have been taught and make increasingly independent decisions as writers.
Developing the Foundations for Writing
Throughout school, we give deliberate attention to the skills that allow children to get their ideas onto paper efficiently.
In the early stages, considerable emphasis is placed on developing the physical foundations for writing, accurate letter formation, phonics, spelling and sentence construction. As children progress, handwriting becomes increasingly fluent and automatic and spelling knowledge continues to develop through explicit teaching, retrieval and application.
These skills remain important because when handwriting and spelling require less conscious effort, children have greater capacity to think about ideas, vocabulary, sentence construction, organisation and the effect of their writing on the reader.
Writing for Purpose and Audience
Our curriculum is driven by purpose rather than simply teaching a series of text types.
Across school, children write to entertain, inform, explain, recount, describe, persuade and communicate ideas. As they develop, they increasingly consider who they are writing for, what they want their writing to achieve and how their choices of vocabulary, sentence structure and organisation can help them achieve that purpose.
This progression is carefully mapped. Children move from learning to communicate and construct sentences, to organising ideas into paragraphs, developing cohesion and, ultimately, making increasingly sophisticated choices about vocabulary, grammar, structure and style for different purposes and audiences.
Writing is a Process
We teach children that successful writing is rarely produced perfectly first time.
As they progress through school, children learn to engage increasingly independently with the writing process:
Planning → Drafting → Revising → Editing → Sharing
Children learn that revising means improving the meaning and effectiveness of their writing, while editing focuses on accuracy, including spelling, punctuation and grammar.
Not every writing sequence needs to result in a lengthy final piece. Sometimes a carefully constructed and improved paragraph provides much richer learning than several pages of writing. Our focus is always on the quality of children's thinking, communication and application of learning rather than simply the quantity they produce.
Assessment That Helps Children Improve
Assessment is an ongoing part of teaching writing at Kexborough. Teachers use the ECM Prioritised Writing Curriculum to identify the most important knowledge and skills children need to secure, retain and apply as they progress through school.
Assessment is used to identify strengths, misconceptions and barriers and, most importantly, to decide what needs to be taught next. Where a child is experiencing difficulty, we identify the particular barrier—such as handwriting, spelling, vocabulary, sentence construction, organisation or cohesion—and provide teaching and support targeted to that need rather than simply asking the child to write more.
Ultimately, our aim is for children to leave Kexborough able to write fluently, accurately and purposefully, drawing upon everything they have learned to make thoughtful choices about vocabulary, sentences, organisation and style. We want them to see themselves as writers: people who have ideas worth communicating and who have the knowledge and confidence to communicate those ideas effectively.
At Kexborough Primary School, we want every child to become a confident, capable and motivated writer who can communicate their ideas clearly and effectively. We want children to understand that writing has a purpose: it allows us to tell stories, share information, explain our thinking, persuade others, describe experiences and communicate with different readers.
Learning to write is complex. Successful writers need ideas and vocabulary, but they also need to be able to form letters fluently, spell increasingly accurately, construct sentences, organise and connect ideas and make choices about the language they use. Our writing curriculum therefore develops transcription and composition together, with expectations carefully sequenced from the Early Years to Year 6.
Learning to Write – and Learning from Writers
Reading, language and talk sit at the heart of our writing curriculum. Children regularly encounter high-quality texts and learn from the choices that successful authors make. Rather than simply spotting grammatical features, we encourage children to consider how and why a writer has made particular choices and the effect these choices have on the reader.
Rich discussion and oral rehearsal are important throughout school. Children are given opportunities to develop ideas, rehearse sentences, explore vocabulary and explain their thinking before and during writing. We recognise that children are much more likely to write successfully when they have the knowledge, vocabulary and language structures they need to communicate what they want to say.
Explicit Teaching and Growing Independence
Children are not expected simply to discover how to become successful writers. Teachers explicitly teach and model the knowledge and strategies that writers use.
New learning is introduced carefully through explicit instruction, teacher modelling, shared writing and guided practice before children are expected to apply it with increasing independence. Teachers often think aloud as they write so that children can hear the decisions a writer makes when choosing vocabulary, constructing sentences, organising ideas or improving a piece of writing.
As children become more secure, responsibility gradually moves from teacher to pupil. Importantly, independence does not mean removing all support. Discussion, oral rehearsal, vocabulary teaching, planning tools, model texts and shared experiences remain valuable tools. What changes over time is children's ability to apply what they have been taught and make increasingly independent decisions as writers.
Developing the Foundations for Writing
Throughout school, we give deliberate attention to the skills that allow children to get their ideas onto paper efficiently.
In the early stages, considerable emphasis is placed on developing the physical foundations for writing, accurate letter formation, phonics, spelling and sentence construction. As children progress, handwriting becomes increasingly fluent and automatic and spelling knowledge continues to develop through explicit teaching, retrieval and application.
These skills remain important because when handwriting and spelling require less conscious effort, children have greater capacity to think about ideas, vocabulary, sentence construction, organisation and the effect of their writing on the reader.
Writing for Purpose and Audience
Our curriculum is driven by purpose rather than simply teaching a series of text types.
Across school, children write to entertain, inform, explain, recount, describe, persuade and communicate ideas. As they develop, they increasingly consider who they are writing for, what they want their writing to achieve and how their choices of vocabulary, sentence structure and organisation can help them achieve that purpose.
This progression is carefully mapped. Children move from learning to communicate and construct sentences, to organising ideas into paragraphs, developing cohesion and, ultimately, making increasingly sophisticated choices about vocabulary, grammar, structure and style for different purposes and audiences.
Writing is a Process
We teach children that successful writing is rarely produced perfectly first time.
As they progress through school, children learn to engage increasingly independently with the writing process:
Planning → Drafting → Revising → Editing → Sharing
Children learn that revising means improving the meaning and effectiveness of their writing, while editing focuses on accuracy, including spelling, punctuation and grammar.
Not every writing sequence needs to result in a lengthy final piece. Sometimes a carefully constructed and improved paragraph provides much richer learning than several pages of writing. Our focus is always on the quality of children's thinking, communication and application of learning rather than simply the quantity they produce.
Assessment That Helps Children Improve
Assessment is an ongoing part of teaching writing at Kexborough. Teachers use the ECM Prioritised Writing Curriculum to identify the most important knowledge and skills children need to secure, retain and apply as they progress through school.
Assessment is used to identify strengths, misconceptions and barriers and, most importantly, to decide what needs to be taught next. Where a child is experiencing difficulty, we identify the particular barrier—such as handwriting, spelling, vocabulary, sentence construction, organisation or cohesion—and provide teaching and support targeted to that need rather than simply asking the child to write more.
Ultimately, our aim is for children to leave Kexborough able to write fluently, accurately and purposefully, drawing upon everything they have learned to make thoughtful choices about vocabulary, sentences, organisation and style. We want them to see themselves as writers: people who have ideas worth communicating and who have the knowledge and confidence to communicate those ideas effectively.
Writing in Nursery
TO BE COMPLETED
Writing in Reception
In Reception, we believe that children become writers long before they are able to write complete sentences independently. Our writing curriculum therefore begins with the foundations children need to communicate successfully: rich talk and vocabulary, stories and storytelling, drawing and mark making, physical development, phonics and handwriting. Adults model language throughout the day and give children frequent opportunities to talk, rehearse ideas and communicate through play and purposeful writing. New skills are explicitly taught and then practised and applied within meaningful contexts.
As children develop, they gradually move from marks, sounds and words towards phrases and simple sentences. Daily phonics and handwriting help letter formation and spelling become increasingly automatic, while routines such as Hold a Phrase and Hold a Sentence help children learn to say, remember and record their ideas. Expectations increase carefully according to children's development; our priority is to establish secure foundations, confidence and a genuine desire to communicate rather than rush children towards lengthy independent writing.
As children develop, they gradually move from marks, sounds and words towards phrases and simple sentences. Daily phonics and handwriting help letter formation and spelling become increasingly automatic, while routines such as Hold a Phrase and Hold a Sentence help children learn to say, remember and record their ideas. Expectations increase carefully according to children's development; our priority is to establish secure foundations, confidence and a genuine desire to communicate rather than rush children towards lengthy independent writing.
Writing in Year 1
In Year 1, children continue the writing journey begun in Reception, moving from highly supported early writing towards becoming increasingly fluent and confident sentence writers. Reading, talk and oral rehearsal remain central. Through high-quality texts, Talk Through Stories, story mapping and discussion, children build the vocabulary and sentence structures they need before writing. Routines such as Hold a Sentence and Build a Sentence help children say, rehearse, remember and construct complete sentences before recording them.
Alongside composition, we place a strong emphasis on developing increasingly automatic handwriting, phonics and spelling so that the physical act of writing does not overwhelm children’s thinking. Daily handwriting and systematic phonics are combined with explicit teacher modelling and repeated sentence-level practice. As these foundations become more secure, support is gradually reduced and children begin to sequence short groups of related sentences, reread their writing and communicate their ideas with increasing independence.
Alongside composition, we place a strong emphasis on developing increasingly automatic handwriting, phonics and spelling so that the physical act of writing does not overwhelm children’s thinking. Daily handwriting and systematic phonics are combined with explicit teacher modelling and repeated sentence-level practice. As these foundations become more secure, support is gradually reduced and children begin to sequence short groups of related sentences, reread their writing and communicate their ideas with increasing independence.
Writing in Year 2
In Year 2, children build on the secure sentence-writing foundations developed in Year 1 and begin to become increasingly purposeful writers. Reading, vocabulary and talk remain central, with children discussing and rehearsing ideas before writing and learning from the choices authors make. Sentence-level teaching continues as children learn to combine and extend ideas, select increasingly precise vocabulary and consider why they are writing and who they are writing for. Familiar strategies such as Hold a Sentence, Build a Sentence and dictation continue to support fluency and reduce the demands placed on working memory.
Children are also introduced more explicitly to the writing process: planning, drafting, revising, editing and sharing. Alongside this, handwriting and spelling continue to be explicitly taught so that transcription becomes increasingly automatic. Teachers model each stage carefully and gradually reduce support as children become more secure, enabling them to apply their learning with increasing independence. Our focus remains on quality, control and purposeful communication rather than simply the quantity of writing produced.
Children are also introduced more explicitly to the writing process: planning, drafting, revising, editing and sharing. Alongside this, handwriting and spelling continue to be explicitly taught so that transcription becomes increasingly automatic. Teachers model each stage carefully and gradually reduce support as children become more secure, enabling them to apply their learning with increasing independence. Our focus remains on quality, control and purposeful communication rather than simply the quantity of writing produced.
Writing in Year 3 and Year 4
In Years 3 and 4, children build on the secure sentence writing developed in Key Stage 1 and begin to understand more deeply how writers make choices. High-quality texts, discussion and vocabulary remain central, but children increasingly explore why authors choose particular words, sentence structures and ways of organising their ideas. They continue to rehearse ideas orally and receive explicit teaching and modelling, while gradually taking greater responsibility for making their own choices according to purpose, audience and the effect they want to create.
A significant development in Lower Key Stage 2 is the move from constructing individual sentences to organising and developing ideas through paragraphs. In Year 3, children learn to group related ideas within paragraphs; in Year 4, they increasingly consider how paragraphs connect and how cohesion helps the reader follow a whole piece of writing. Handwriting and spelling continue to be explicitly taught, while children become increasingly involved in planning, drafting, revising and editing their work. Our focus remains on developing thoughtful, increasingly independent writers who can apply what they have learned with control and purpose, rather than simply producing longer pieces of writing.
A significant development in Lower Key Stage 2 is the move from constructing individual sentences to organising and developing ideas through paragraphs. In Year 3, children learn to group related ideas within paragraphs; in Year 4, they increasingly consider how paragraphs connect and how cohesion helps the reader follow a whole piece of writing. Handwriting and spelling continue to be explicitly taught, while children become increasingly involved in planning, drafting, revising and editing their work. Our focus remains on developing thoughtful, increasingly independent writers who can apply what they have learned with control and purpose, rather than simply producing longer pieces of writing.
Writing in Year 5 and Year 6
TO BE COMPLETED
