Spelling

Children at St Martin's are taught to spell using the Spelling Shed programme, which begins in Year 1. Spelling Shed's approach to spelling involves the relationship between sounds and written symbols as well as using morphology to help spell through meaning.

The carefully selected word lists and engaging activities provide opportunities to incorporate phonics and meaning to strengthen spelling skills and build vocabulary acquisition. 

Handwriting

To ensure our pupils develop fluent handwriting skills, we use "Letter-Join," which is a whole school handwriting scheme offering a combination of traditional and digital resources, to make handwriting fun. Children will be taught a cursive letter formation and will be taught to join letters at the end of Year 1 and throughout Year 2.

Writing Approach

At St Martin's, we aim to ensure all of our children develop a genuine love of language and the written word, through a text-based approach, please see our text driver map below. 

Our writing curriculum ensures that children develop both their transcription (spelling and handwriting) and composition (articulating ideas and structuring them in speech and writing). Across our writing curriculum, a range of purposes for writing are sequenced so that children make progress in different styles of writing (for example narrative writing, informative writing and persuasive writing). Writing units span two to three weeks, focusing on writing with a specific outcome in mind, during this time pupils are taught the key skills needed to succeed in the final piece of work for that unit. This structure ensures children have time to refine and embed their writing based on feedback and responsive teaching.

By focusing on four core purposes of writing: to entertain, to inform, to persuade and to discuss, we ensure that children develop an understanding of how widely writing is used in everyday life and, therefore, how important and useful the skills are that they are learning.