* Team coordinators were asked to complete
a questionnaire based on statements in the Initial Statement document
for Language, prepared when the school first opened.
One other member of each team was also
asked to complete the same questionnaire
* Each team was asked to provide 8 General
Books showing a range of abilities.
* Discussions with children from each year group:
I) on a formal basis using the focus
of some of the questions from the questionnaire. ii) on an informal
basis during breaks and lunchtimes and during cover situations
* Evidence in the environment from displays
topic books, assemblies.
Findings.
Findings have been broken down and applied
to the three Attainment Targets, with individual Year Group analysis
where appropriate.
Speaking and Listening
Throughout all year groups a significant
number of children are confident, coherent talkers who are able
to converse at length on a number of issues with a variety of
people.
* There are a number of occasions in
school when pupils are encouraged to enter into worthwhile purposeful
speaking and listening situations on a more formal basis e.g.
Library Committee, School's Council, assemblies.
* Children are generally encouraged to question situations and offer opinions during
discussions in most classes.
* Despite featuring in the forecasts there are few classroom activities planned where speaking
and listening are the focus.
* Children perceive any group talk or discussion as being only a stepping stone to a writing
* Not enough opportunities are offered
to children who participate in speaking and listening situations
to evaluate their own performance and personal participation.
Reading
* There are lots of opportunities in
all year groups for choosing and reading books, both fiction and
non-fiction, either from the school library or personal material.
* There are opportunities for reading
books with peers, either in a paired or shared reading situation,
in all year groups.
* There are fewer opportunities for
reading with an adult in Years 6, 7 and 8 than in Year 5. In Year
8 children identified as SEN have more opportunities to read with
an adult. Reading aloud of worksheets or non-fiction books during
research is the most common method of monitoring a child's reading
in Year 8.
* Various times of day are used for
whole class reading situations, although immediately after lunch
is the most popular time for individual ERIC in the lower years
and a longer single session each week is the norm for Year 8.
* In classes where children are encouraged
to read aloud, little or no time is given for preparation of the
piece unless the text is to form part of an assembly, when a significant
amount of time is given.
* Book reviews are the main method used to monitor completion of reading books in Years 6
and 7. These reviews are generally written by the child for the teacher and not shared with
other children. No one method is favoured
in Years 5 and 8.
* Monitoring and recording of pupil progress is limited throughout school, and in a high number of classes no reading records of any type are kept.
ÍÞ_ _*
The Library has a high profile in school. Children are actively
encouraged to spend time in the library to choose books for reading
for pleasure, research using computers and books, and for quiet
work and investigation.
* Borrowing from the library varies
greatly between year groups (see appendix 1). Year 5 children
have two days for changing books at breaktime and opportunities
during class time to select new material. Year 6 have one day
a week and generally class time for book changing. Year 7 also
has one day allocated to them but children generally have fewer
opportunities for changing books during lesson time. Year 8 similarly
have one day and are able to change books during lesson time.
The most popular authors selected from
the library by children are limited to a very small number (see
appendix 2), although there is evidence to suggest that children
are reading a wider range of authors, usually their own material.
* Evidence suggests written work on
displays is rarely read by other children.
* Staff training is needed to help support
the awareness of reading strategies and techniques which can support
children.
Writing
* Writing is the most common method
for recording used by the children.
* All children throughout school write
something everyday.
* Through forecast planning there are
lots of opportunities to write for a variety of reasons, although
the audience is often limited to the child and the teacher.
In Years 5 and 6 transactional writing
is more evident in General Books; in Year 7 there is a more even
balance between transactional and compositional writing; in Year
8 the balance is slightly towards compositional writing.
* Children in all year groups frequently
write as an individual. Group or paired writing occurs at times.
There is no evidence for pieces of whole class writing.
* A teaching partnership has significantly
improved the standard of compositional writing in Year 6 (Ros')
and Year 8 (Gaynor). Throughout school the quality of writing
in general covers the range (poor to very good) with the bulk
of written work settling at the middle of the continuum.
* Poetry is used less often as a form
of writing, although almost every forecast has poetry
based activities.
* IT use is mainly limited to presentation
for display work and some topic book work.
Various strategies are used by the children for spelling unfamiliar
words; staff would benefit from INSET to become more aware of
the
Recommendations
* The Spelling Guidelines should be
finalised and presented to staff as part of an INSET on identification
techniques and strategies for supporting spelling in the classroom.
* The proposed Reading initiative should
seek to raise the profile of reading in all year groups and with
parents and staff. Involvement of the language advisory team and
more use of experts in the classroom (authors etc. as in BookWeek)
are human resources which may be utilised.
* The current reading record sheet needs
re-evaluating and possibly modifying.
* In light of the expected demise of
NARA sheets, a recording/monitoring system for language needs
developing.
Future language initiatives and/or staff
INSETs should focus on
1) developing the quality of writing
and
2) opportunities for developing effective
speaking and listening activities in the classroom.
* The current forecasted language work
needs reassessing in light of the new National Curriculum developments,
and more differentiated activities need adding.