English Intent Statement 

Effective literacy skills from our youngest children in nursery to our oldest pupils in Year 6 ensures that our children develop culturally, emotionally, intellectually, socially and spiritually. We see English as not only a subject to be taught discretely, but as a vehicle for children to explore their knowledge, skills, ideas and opinions across the breadth of our curriculum. Our intention is that our children leave Sefton Park with a strong command of the spoken, read and written word, and that they use their excellent linguistic and literary skills to reach their full potential. 

Confidence: Speaking and listening, reading and writing are essential foundations for success in all subjects. Our holistic approach to delivering the curriculum focuses not only on narrowly teaching reading and writing as skills in abstraction, but provides children with opportunities to use spoken language, debate and discuss, make authorial choices and become masters of their language across the curriculum. Giving children real life, purposeful outcomes for their learning in English empowers them to use their skills with clear intention, and to communicate their thoughts, feelings and ideas effectively and with sophistication. 

Creativity: Our curriculum gives children the opportunity to enjoy, explore, interpret and create literature, poetry, film, drama and music with creativity and imagination. Children develop ideas and concepts through the high value placed on talk within classrooms. Talk enables children to explore their own learning, and evaluate and build on the learning of their peers. Through a masterful understanding of vocabulary and grammar, our children are equipped to make informed decisions when sculpting their writing, honing their work to achieve their intended purposes. By refining, editing and seeing work through to publication and performance, children are encouraged to continually improve and enhance themselves as young authors, poets, actors, songwriters and activists.

Curiosity: Time spent on speculating, hypothesising and exploring ideas gives our children opportunities to ask questions, justify their ideas with reasons and clarify their own thinking and the thinking of others. Children have time to practise and deepen their skills in order to absorb them in the consideration of their own language choices and interpretations, and an active encouragement of reading for pleasure ensures children acquire a wide vocabulary. 

The Yearly Curriculum Overview documents give a clear picture of the content, language and genre of English work taught in a term.