Writing at Shanklea

Intent

At Shanklea Primary School, we are committed to helping all pupils confidently convey their thoughts, knowledge, and feelings through writing. We aim for every child to develop a broad vocabulary, a solid understanding of grammar, and the ability to spell unfamiliar words by applying the spelling patterns and rules learned throughout their time in school.

Our goal is to nurture confident writers who enjoy writing and can sustain their focus across different tasks. Children are exposed to a variety of genres and are guided to write with clarity, accuracy, and coherence, tailoring their language and style to suit different purposes, audiences, and contexts. Each lesson ensures pupils understand the type of writing, its purpose, and the impact it should have on the reader.

We set high standards and encourage children to take pride in the presentation of their work, developing a neat, joined handwriting style by the end of Year 6. We also emphasise the importance of editing, supporting pupils to independently identify areas for improvement and refine their writing throughout the process.

We recognise the essential role of parents and carers in developing children’s writing, grammar, and spelling skills. By fostering a strong home–school partnership, we aim to enable families to support and reinforce the skills children are learning in the classroom.

EYFS

At Shanklea Primary School, early writing begins with a strong focus on communication and language. In the Early Years, we nurture children’s ability to express themselves and play with language through rhymes, alliteration, and listening activities, which also support the development of phonemic awareness. Expanding children’s vocabulary is central to our approach, and we provide frequent opportunities to introduce new words. Daily story sessions and shared reading help children become familiar with story language and structures, laying the foundations for thinking and writing.

Building the physical skills needed for writing is equally important. Children participate in activities that strengthen their core, upper body, hands, and fingers, while developing hand-eye coordination. Our daily routines include Wiggle Me into a Squiggler, Dough Disco, Funky Fingers, and Squiggle Whilst You Wiggle, all designed to improve fine motor control and ensure children can hold a pencil comfortably and confidently.

We encourage children to explore mark-making both indoors and outdoors, using a variety of tools such as chalks, clipboards, post-it notes, and notepads. Through modelling and guided support, they begin to give meaning to their marks and form letter-like shapes. As their skills progress, children are supported in attempting to capture the sounds they hear in words, building early writing confidence.

In Reception, pupils use the Read Write Inc. phonics programme to start writing recognisable letters, spell simple words, and create short phrases and sentences that can be read by others. This structured approach supports the development of confident, independent young writers.

KS1

In Key Stage One we continue their writing journey by teaching the skill of recognising and writing simple and multi-clause sentences, using the correct punctuation and correct capitalisation. Listening to and sharing of key texts continues to be a part of our daily routine to support awareness of a range of writing genres. Writing in a range of styles such as narrative, poetry and non-fiction are driven by high quality texts and video stimuli to engage and provide a range of opportunities to write.

Further building of key vocabulary are displayed on working walls. Teacher modelling of writing styles and sentence structure supports writing and offers starting points as well as demonstrating correct handwriting techniques. 

Year 1 are encouraged to write sentences in order to create short narrative and non-fiction texts. They work towards using adjectives to describe and re-read their writing to check if it makes sense. 

Year 2 progresses a little further by writing about real events, recording these simply and clearly, writing simple coherent narratives about their own and others experiences and as they re-read their writing they are encouraged to suggest changes. Personal creativity is encouraged in every piece of writing and there are planned opportunities for cross curricular writing.

Spelling is taught discretely using Spelling Shed, children are given opportunities to practice spellings, using the principles of etymology (word origins) and morphology (word structure) to teach effective spelling, by examining word parts and how their historical roots influence modern spellings. 

LKS2

In Lower Key Stage Two development of the children’s writing journey continues through a range of high quality texts and video stimuli. The children begin to use ideas from their own reading and modelled examples to plan their writing. The children are encouraged to use deliberate ambitious word choices to add detail and creativity to their writing. Proofreading confidently and amending their own and others' writing becomes an important part of their writing journey. 

Year 3 are expected to use subordinate clauses and write using correct tense throughout a piece of writing. Progressing further from conjunctions used in year 2 the additions of adverbs and prepositions to show time are encouraged as well as the correct use of inverted commas for direct speech. 

Year 4 continue to maintain accurate tense throughout a piece of writing and consistently organise their writing into paragraphs around a theme. They are encouraged to expand noun phrases regularly with the addition of modifying adjectives and prepositional phrases

UKS2

In Upper Key stage two children continue to use high quality texts and video stimuli which enhance English lessons and the wider curriculum; provide inspiration for writing; give the opportunity for children to widen their vocabulary and understand how grammar and punctuation can engage the reader. Children gain an increasing awareness of audience and develop their proof reading skills, using the editing process to create final pieces to the best of their ability with increased independence.  Across key stage two, children write a wide variety of genres for fiction, non - fiction and poetry writing in a fluent and legible hand writing style which by the time they leave year 6, will suit their audience. 

In Year 5, children are expected to consciously engage the reader using descriptions of settings, characters and atmosphere and use dialogue to convey a character and advance the action with increasing confidence. Children will aim to select and use organisational and presentational devices that are relevant to the text type, e.g. headings, bullet points, underlining, etc. 

The children will write in paragraphs which are usually suitably linked, using adverbials to build cohesion. They will build upon their use of basic punctuation and increasingly accurate use of commas and begin to use brackets or dashes to indicate parenthesis, including those used in relative clauses. Children will use modal verbs appropriately and adverbs will be used to indicate degrees of possibility and create shades of meaning in a text. 

In Year 6, when our children complete their writing journey at Shanklea, they will be able to write effectively and independently for a range of audiences and purposes, understanding how to engage the reader and write in a lively and interesting way across a wide range of genres. 

Children will continue to build upon their use of language, sentence structure and punctuation from year 5 and use effective descriptions to advance action and convey character in narrative. They will become increasingly aware of the different types of vocabulary and grammatical structures that reflect what the writing requires and use a range of devices to build cohesion within and across paragraphs.  Children will be encouraged to use the range of punctuation taught at key stage 2 and also show they can use colons, semi-colons and hyphens correctly. 

Spelling Punctuation and Grammar (SPaG) at Shanklea

Spelling is taught discretely using Spelling Shed, children are given opportunities to practice spellings, using the principles of etymology (word origins) and morphology (word structure) to teach effective spelling, by examining word parts and how their historical roots influence modern spellings. 

Grammar and Punctuation is also taught discreetly using Spelling Shed’s Shed Sentences. Children are taught specific grammar and punctuation skills which then feed into writing. 

In July 2025 the Writing Framework states that sentence-level instruction must be explicitly taught, modelled and practised in context. It should be embedded within the wider writing process and carefully planned to improve composition and help children write with greater control, precision and intent. Shed Sentences supports this by offering sentence-level instruction that is completed daily and can be placed at the heart of a writing curriculum acting as ‘the engine that propels pupils from writing the way they speak to using the structures of written language’. Shed Sentences’ rationale aligns with the overarching aims of the composition strand in the Writing Framework: 

1. There is a whole school understanding that, for most pupils, composition begins orally, and that talk remains valuable throughout the writing process. 

2. Teaching sentences is recognised as central to teaching composition. Pupils learn to write well by mastering sentences first. 

3. Sentence structure work forms part of writing lessons.

4. Teachers support pupils to apply grammatical knowledge in sentence construction. 

5. Vocabulary is built through robust, explicit and purposeful instruction. 

Schemes used to support writing 

Literacy Shed https://www.literacyshedplus.com-gb/ 

Spelling Shed https://www.spellingshed.com/en-us