Writing

Writing

At Bushbury Lane Academy, we believe that every child can become a confident, successful writer. Our writing curriculum is carefully designed to develop strong foundational skills, inspire a love of language and literature, and give children meaningful purposes for writing. Through high quality texts, clear progression, and engaging learning experiences, we nurture young writers who can express themselves effectively and creatively.

Early Writing in Reception

Writing begins in Reception, where children are immersed in opportunities to make marks, draw, and write across all areas of learning. Through Drawing Club and a language-rich curriculum, children learn that marks and drawings can communicate meaning, ideas, and stories. These early experiences help children develop confidence, creativity, and a strong understanding of the purpose of writing.

Building Strong Foundations in Key Stage 1

In Year 1, children begin a structured five-day writing process focused on developing the essential foundations of writing. They learn key skills such as capital letters, full stops, finger spaces, and simple sentence construction. Children are introduced to Colourful Semantics to help them understand how sentences are organised and constructed.

Through exciting writing opportunities, including character descriptions, setting descriptions, retells, and other engaging genres, pupils develop their writing skills within meaningful contexts.

In Year 2, children build upon the foundations established in Year 1 through a ten-day writing process. They continue to use Colourful Semantics to strengthen sentence construction and secure their core writing skills. Pupils are also introduced to model texts and begin to explore the key features of different writing genres, preparing them for the demands of Key Stage 2.

Developing Expert Writers in Key Stage 2

From Years 3 to 6, children follow a carefully sequenced three-week writing process:

Week 1: Understanding the Text Children explore a high-quality model text, identifying its key features and developing an understanding of the intended audience and purpose for writing.
Week 2: Practising Writing Skills Pupils learn and practise new spelling, punctuation and grammar (SPaG) skills, alongside genre-specific writing features, which they apply through focused writing opportunities.
Week 3: Drafting, Editing and Publishing Children produce their first draft, carefully edit and improve their work, and publish a final piece that showcases everything they have learned throughout the unit.
Every unit of work is inspired by high-quality texts, enabling children to learn from rich vocabulary, varied sentence structures, and excellent examples of writing.

Writing with Purpose

Our writing curriculum provides opportunities for children to write across a wide range of genres and for authentic purposes. These genres have been carefully selected to align with our wider school priorities and values.

For example, every child will have opportunities to:

Write and perform speeches, developing confidence in oracy and public speaking.
Write and share poetry, fostering creativity and self-expression.
Explore significant local, national, and global issues through writing.
Write about topics such as the environment, sustainability, immigration, and other issues that shape the world around them.
Create narratives, reports, persuasive texts, explanations, and many other forms of writing.

Our Vision for Writing

Our writing curriculum balances the explicit teaching of statutory spelling, punctuation and grammar skills with meaningful opportunities for creativity and self-expression. By securing strong foundations, immersing children in high-quality literature, and providing clear purposes for writing, we inspire a love of writing and develop confident, capable young authors who are prepared for the next stage of their education and beyond.