Writing

Subject Lead: Mrs Prinold

Our Vision for Writing

At Wrockwardine Wood Infant School and Oakengates Nursery Federation, we believe that writing is a powerful tool that enables children to express their thoughts, ideas, and emotions. It gives children a voice and empowers them to communicate for a wide range of purposes. Writing also supports creativity, imagination, and critical thinking—whether children are composing stories, poems, or factual texts.

We aim to nurture enthusiastic, imaginative, and reflective writers who take pride in their work and see the value and joy in the writing process.

Curriculum Intent

Writing allows children to share their ideas and connect with the world. Our children enter school with a wide variety of experiences, and we recognise the importance of helping them find pleasure in reading—because readers are inspired to become writers.

Through reading, children are introduced to:

• Worlds beyond their own experience

• A wide variety of characters, settings, and themes

• Language that evokes curiosity and emotion

By reading widely, children begin to understand how authors craft their language to inform, persuade, and entertain. This helps them:

• Develop critical thinking

• Explore alternative viewpoints

• Learn how language can be used creatively

Through stories, poems, and information texts, children encounter rich vocabulary in context. They learn to "magpie" interesting words and phrases to use in their own writing.

We believe that for writing to be meaningful, children must first be given opportunities to think, feel, and experience. When writing is linked to real-life experiences, it has purpose and power. Our goal is to develop confident, capable writers who take pride in their writing and enjoy the creative process.

We will equip children with the skills to:

• Orally rehearse their ideas

• Plan and structure their work

• Compose clearly and coherently

• Revise and edit their writing to improve its quality

We have high expectations for all children and support every learner to make strong progress in writing.

Curriculum Implementation

To ensure children develop a love for writing and gain the skills they need to write effectively, we:

• Provide ongoing professional development to ensure teachers have strong subject knowledge

• Plan our curriculum progressively, allowing children to build on previous knowledge and skills

• Ensure children write for real purposes and audiences

• Immerse children in high-quality texts, helping them view themselves as authors

• Use a variety of stimuli—including film clips, artefacts, visitors, and real-life experiences—to spark inspiration

• Model the writing process daily, clearly demonstrating expectations

• Create opportunities for children to develop a rich and expressive vocabulary

• Use Floppy’s Phonics, our systematic synthetic phonics scheme, to support early spelling

• Explicitly teach grammar and punctuation

• Teach children how to proof-read, edit, and improve their work through structured revision

• Provide opportunities to write in a range of genres, including:

  • Narrative

  • Poetry

  • Instructions

  • Persuasion

  • Reports

  • Newspaper writing

We also ensure children apply their writing skills across the curriculum in meaningful contexts.

Handwriting and Presentation

We place a strong emphasis on developing clear, legible, and fluent handwriting from the earliest stages. To support this, we follow the Kinetic Letters Programme, a structured and highly effective approach that combines physical development with letter formation.

Children take part in daily handwriting sessions to build strength, stamina, and correct posture, ensuring they develop the physical foundations required for writing with ease and accuracy.

Our handwriting teaching includes:

• Encouraging the correct tripod grip for pencil control

• Supporting the development of core strength, dexterity, and coordination

• Teaching children to:

  • Form lowercase letters of the correct size, relative to one another

  • Use appropriate spacing between words

  • Begin using diagonal and horizontal strokes to join letters

We aim for all children to develop a sense of pride in their presentation, understanding that neat, legible handwriting is key to communicating meaning clearly.

Please see our dedicated Handwriting page for more information about the Kinetic Letters programme and our handwriting approach.

Please click the links below to access key Writing documents: