
We believe that literacy skills underpin robust learning across the curriculum and supports life-long learning. We aim to equip children with the skills, knowledge, and understanding necessary to foster a love of literacy which will stay with them.
When our children leave Colne Engaine, we expect them to be avid readers; children who read for a variety of reasons -fluently and widely – and are able to express preferences and opinions about the texts that they read. We provide them with opportunities to read for pleasure, having had access to a wide range of text types, genres and authors. We support the children to write with confidence and accuracy for a variety of purposes and audiences whilst developing their own individual flair. We support our children to write with grammatical accuracy and be able to apply spelling patterns correctly using a neat handwriting style. We are driven to ensure our children to have access to a wide range of vocabulary so that they able to decipher new words and then use them when speaking so they become strong, confident communicators ready for the wider world.
Phonics
To support your child with their phonics learning at home, please go to the Little Wandle parent page for some helpful videos and information about how we are teaching phonics in school.

There is no greater skill that we can teach a child than how to read fluently and for enjoyment, thus opening a world of endless learning possibilities and academic success. We understand that if children have a positive start with early reading and phonics it will have endless benefits across all areas of learning.
At Colne Engaine we follow the accredited phonics programme ‘Little Wandle Letters and Sounds’. This programme aims to build children’s speaking and listening skills in their own right as well as to prepare children for learning to read by developing their phonic knowledge and skills. It sets out a detailed and systematic programme for teaching phonic skills for children, with the aim of them becoming fluent.
Children begin with Phase 1 in the early years and progress through to phase 6. Children have daily phonics sessions. They participate in a range of activities to help to develop their reading, writing and spelling, each tailored to their personal needs.
The Little Wandle Letters and Sounds curriculum for phonics supports children to:
- learn to segment and blend sounds in order to read them phonetically
- learn to decode words as a means to be able to read them by sight
- identify and read the 40+ graphemes taught across phases 2-5
- understand and be able to read words that cannot be sound out phonetically e.g. ‘tricky words’
Phonics Progression at Colne Engaine
Writing
We want children to write with purpose and through carefully planned units of work, we intend for our
children to be able to plan, draft, proofread, evaluate and edit their writing. With the use of good quality modelling and texts, they will also develop awareness of the audience, purpose and text type for a piece of writing as well as an increasingly wide knowledge of vocabulary and grammar. We want them to take pride in their work and expect children to leave school being able to use fluent and legible handwriting. Handwriting is a key literacy skill that needs to be taught actively through frequent, discrete lessons. We use the Nelson Handwriting scheme to promote joined and legible handwriting. We believe that good handwriting is underpinned by developing the necessary fine and gross motor skills in readiness for handwriting and in our reception class the children join in with a daily Dough Gym and Funky Fingers activity to build these fine and gross motor skills.
The teaching of writing across the school consists of two dimensions; transcription (spelling and handwriting) and composition (articulating ideas and structuring them in speech and writing).
The learner as a writer is taught & encouraged to;
- spell quickly and accurately through a knowledge and understanding of phonics, word structure, spelling patterns and word recognition
- develop the stamina and skills to write at length, with accurate spelling and punctuation using legible, correctly formed and (eventually) speedy handwriting. Children are taught to use ‘joined’ handwriting from Willow Class onwards.
- develop, articulate and communicate ideas, organising them coherently for a reader, with clarity, awareness of the audience, purpose and context, and an increasingly wide knowledge of vocabulary and grammar.
- use grammar correctly, building on what they have been taught to expand the range of their writing and the variety of the grammar they use.
- write fluently across a range of genre, mapped within our curriculum overview, including narratives, explanations, descriptions, comparisons, summaries and evaluations
- plan, revise and evaluate their writing.
Vocabulary
The capital obtained through becoming an articulate user of a wide and rich range of vocabulary is one of the key drivers underpinning our whole curriculum. Interwoven through all areas of the curriculum is a determination to support children to develop confidence and fluency in using a wide range of vocabulary in a wide range of contexts, including vocabulary as ‘multi-contextual’ (tier 2) and subject specific vocabulary such as accurate mathematical and scientific (tier 3). This will expand the vocabulary choices that are available to children’s when they write, and enable them to understand the meanings of words they meet in their reading across all subjects and develop an interest and enjoyment in language.
The identification and teaching of Tier 2 and Tier 3 vocabulary is actively planned for across the school. Tier 3 language is linked to topic themes within relevant subject areas, as well as mathematics, science, computing and R.E. Vocabulary is prioritised and a focus across the curriculum in all lessons.
As a result of our English curriculum, we aim to have a community of enthusiastic readers and writers who enjoy showcasing their developing literacy knowledge and skills. They are confident to take risks in their reading and writing, and love to discuss and share their ideas. writing and be well equipped for the rest of their education.