English

English Intent Statement

At St. Leonard’s, our intent is to instil a love and passion for reading and writing in every child. We want children to flourish by giving them access to a rich English curriculum based on high quality texts. Our aim is to give the children the opportunities to write across a range of genres and for different audiences and purposes, and to read a variety of books from different authors and topics. In our school, English is to be the foundation for every subject in our curriculum, and the skills that children develop in their English lessons are to be transferred across the whole curriculum.

Below you will find intent, implementation and impact statements for each area of English:

English is the foundation of our curriculum, the core building block of learning within our school. It opens doors to explore and enhance learning within all subjects, so it's imperative that our English curriculum is robust and effective to ensure that all children make effective progress and achieve. Please explore the pages below to delve into each area of our English curriculum: 

English Priorities 2025/6

This year (2025/26), we are working on the following areas:

1. To effectively implement a new programme for spelling in KS2. 
2. To ensure that our teaching of writing is in line with the recommendations in the Ofsted publication: The Writing Framework.
3. To ensure that the assessment of writing is thorough and accurate. 
4. To implement a new set of assessments for grammar, spelling and punctuation across Years 1-6. 

If you would like any more information about how English is taught in our school, please contact our English Lead, Mrs Cooke, on the following email address: office@st-leonards-wigginton.staffs.sch.uk

Our Curriculum in Action

At St. Leonard's, our English curriculum is centred around high-quality texts. We want our children to be exposed to a rich and diverse selection of books that will give them the inspiration and platform in which to progress. Our aim is for our children and teachers to be excited and passionate about the texts they're studying, so while this lists recommends books to support their learning in the wider curriculum, it is not definitive. We take inspiration from the children, recent publications and recommendations to strengthen and enhance our text offering and therefore our curriculum. 

Below you will find an outlined long-term plan, which indicates the recommended text choices for each half term. Not all of these will be studied - the teacher will select the appropriate ones for the needs and interests of the children in their class. We ensure that over the year, the children are exposed to texts of different genres, to include fiction, non-fiction, poetry, visual texts and culturally diverse texts. You will see these mapped out in the document below:

When teaching, we ensure that we cover the objectives as outlined in the National Curriculum for Reading, Writing, Grammar, Punctuation, Spelling and Speaking and Listening. Further information on how we teach each of these areas can be found on the pages above. Below you will find the link to the National Curriculum objectives along with documentation to support them.

English in Early Years

English in Early Years is taught through discrete, teacher-led sessions, phonic sessions and through purposeful and incidental activities within the environment. In our school we use Little Wandle Letters and Sounds to teach the children to read and write, which is supplemented by a 'Drawing Club', which is a programme specifically designed to allow the children to apply their learning from phonics. Further information can be found on the phonics page above.

Below are the aims for English within Early Years, as outlined in the Development Matters document: