What is Spoken Language?

The national curriculum for English reflects the importance of spoken language in pupils’ development across the whole curriculum – cognitively, socially and linguistically.

Spoken language underpins the development of reading and writing. The quality and variety of language that pupils hear and speak are vital for developing their vocabulary and grammar and their understanding for reading and writing.

Curriculum Intent

At Marston Moreteyne VC School, we value Spoken Language as an important part of the children’s entitlement to a broad and balanced curriculum. Spoken Language provides the children with the opportunities to develop and extend skills and an opportunity to express their individual interests, thoughts and ideas.

Our aim is to enable the children improve their levels of spoken language so that all pupils are able to communicate effectively and confidently in front of any type of audience.  These skills are encouraged in every area of our curriculum as good communication skills can enhance every type of learning. The children are encouraged to explore ideas through talk; challenge each other’s opinions and develop their own reasoned arguments, as well as talking in full sentences with a clear and confident voice.

Implementation

The teaching and implementation of the Spoken Language curriculum at Marston Moreteyne VC  School is based on the Early Learning Goals and National Curriculum; it is supported by expectations from Classroom Monitor, ensuring a well-structured approach.

Staff at our school model the use of higher level vocabulary within their speech and expanding children’s vocabulary is a key focus in all years. Subject specific vocabulary is embedded across the curriculum, through teacher modelling, in context. Contextual learning helps children to understand new words and supports them in including new vocabulary in their work. This model is reflected in both shared and guided reading sessions, where children are given the chance to explore unfamiliar vocabulary and expand their knowledge of words. 

Drama is used across a range of subjects including History, problem solving in Mathematics, hot-seating during English lessons and Religious Education. This allows children to explore and engage children in their learning. This gives children the chance to embed the use of specific vocabulary repetitively.

Through the year all children are given many  opportunities to perform  a variety of different plays and performances to different audiences.

Impact of the Curriculum

Through the explicit teaching of Speaking skills, teachers and the children assess their learning continuously throughout the lesson. Children are given a range of  opportunities to develop these skills, in a safe and stimulating environment.

The wide range of speaking and listening activities help to develop ideas, vocabulary and confidence, as, the more we talk, the more we notice different words that other people use.  Three times each year, in autumn, spring and summer, attainment is assessed using the key objectives from the outlined list. This enable teachers to make informed judgements about the depth of children’s learning and the progress children have made over time.