The Intent of our English Curriculum at Holy Family

At Holy Family, English is the core of our curriculum. Across each stage of our education in school, pupils are provided with opportunities to develop and apply their spoken and written English within a balanced, inspiring and creative curriculum.

Reading is the master skill of school and we aim to foster a life-long love of reading in all our children, developing avid readers who can access and appreciate our rich literacy heritage. We aim to provide a wealth of powerful reading experiences to fuel our pupil’s imaginations and develop their knowledge of the world in which they live. We prioritise the development of reading fluency to ensure that by the end of their primary education, all pupils who at Holy Family are able to read with confidence, enabling them to be successful in their next stage of education and beyond.

A key aim for our pupils is effective communication of ideas and emotions, both orally and in written form. Spoken language is paramount at Holy Family, forming foundations for reading and writing. By immersing our pupils in high-quality texts and language-rich environments, we aim for our children to be able to describe their world, expressing their views and opinions articulately. We want our children to use discussion and debate to communicate and further their learning across the curriculum, elaborating and explaining their thinking and ideas. We strive to enable all pupils to develop a love of writing and the confidence to explore their imagination, nurturing our pupils’ motivation to write with purpose and with pleasure.

We believe that a secure knowledge of the English language is crucial to a high quality education and will give the children of Holy Family, the tools they need to contribute positively to the life of the school, their local community and the wider environment as a member of society.

At Holy Family, we value the development of our children's vocabulary. All staff have completed Word Aware training, which focusses on widening children's vocabulary and enabling them to use adventurous word choices in their spoken language and written work. 

In this lesson, the children were exploring the character deeper, using questioning techniques and hot seating.

Children completed a carousel of handwriting activities including fine motor precision, adult led tasks and independent letter formation jobs.

Children listened to the new story ‘Giraffes Can’t Dance’. The children rehearsed and performed the story using action signifiers. They even create a story map to help them remember the story.

Children learnt different dance styles like the animals in the story. Animals like the waltzing warthogs, rock ‘n’ rolling rhinos, tangoing lions and chimps that cha-cha.

In this lesson, the children developed their understanding and language about our new main character Gerald the Giraffe.

In our literacy lesson, the children immersed themselves in role play as Roman soldiers, asking and answering questions in character to explore what life in the army was like. Through marching, discussing daily routines, and imagining their duties, they gained a deeper understanding of a soldier’s experiences, which helped them to write authentic and engaging diary entries from a Roman perspective.

Literacy learning from 2024-2025

Children listened to the new story ‘What the Ladybird Heard at the Seaside’. The class discussed any unknown vocabulary and the moral of the story. The children developed their listening skills to follow instructions to create their own ladybird. 

Children listened to the new story ‘Snail and the Whale’. The children rehearsed and performed the story using action signifiers. The class discussed any unknown vocabulary and the moral of the story. The children developed their listening skills to follow instructions to create their own whale.

The year 1 children used the Suffix trains to create new words.

The children in Year 5 have finished their writing journey focusing on a science-fiction narrative, and I think the children all agreed that they enjoyed this genre.

Based on the book 'War of the Worlds', the children immersed themselves with the main characters (the alien invaders) and created their own stories of mechanical monsters who try to take over the planet.

The nursery children have been drawing 'The Gingerbread Man' in Drawing Club this week. They were given the challenge of adding 4 buttons and writing the code 'm'. Some children couldn't wait for their turn at Drawing Club and drew their own Gingerbread Man in the Mark Making Area!

The children listened to the new story ‘The Tower Bridge Cat’.

The children rehearsed and performed the story using action signifiers.

Children in Reception are really enjoying drawing club. They are learning new vocabulary and beginning to write extended sentences. 

In our second immerse lesson, the children were using role play techniques to describe the experiences of travelling through different settings. The children took the roll of a character in their book and imagined biking around the world to different countries. The children immersed themselves in what their characters might have been thinking, feeling, seeing and doing, visiting different countries around the world. 

In our first immerse lesson, the children have been understanding what makes an adventure narrative, by using prediction from evidence of events. The children were given a text extract of the beginning of an adventure story. It was then up to the children to predict where our character would travel to next using a world map. The children enjoyed developing their oracy and story telling skills in small groups and partners.

To begin our topic on science fiction, the children explored the aliens from the book, 'War of the Worlds'. They listened to sound clips and examined various images of these otherworldly lifeforms and then created their own.

In Year 2, children have been working hard on editing. They worked in pairs/small groups and followed a criteria to edit their peers work. Children are developing their oracy skills and this lesson showcased how hard they are working, giving their peers some fantastic critiquing and next steps. 

The children in Year 5 have finished their writing journey on non-chronological reports, writing their own about a human feature of Asia.

In Spring 2 Literacy, Year 6 wrote a Rondeau Poem based on Flanders Fields and wrote a diary written from a soldier in a WW1 trench. For our creative writes, we wrote a horror narrative based on the film Alma and an adventure narrative based on Shrek for World Book Day!

Holy Family celebrated World Book Day 2025 by reenacting the story 'Shrek' for the children. The children loved the performance.... and so did the staff!

Year 4 dressed up for World Book Day theme, 'A land far, far away'. The children retold the story, 'Hansel and Gretel' and they recreated the witch's house through modelling and water colour painting. 

It was wonderful to see all of the children in Year 5 dress up as their favourite characters as we celebrated World Book Day!

During this lesson, children focused on developing our 'oracy' skills. We focused on how to give and receive instructions and how to be mindful of our audience, by focusing on our tone and pace of voice. We then looked at how to position ourselves when having conversations. 

Children then played 'instructions master' and gave and followed instructions. 

Children explored and researched all about rhinos. They read fact files, watched videos and listened to stories. They created a spider diagram to collect all their information.

In this immerse lesson, the children were putting them self’s into a member of ancient Egyptian civilisation shoes to create a mini sketch of a Pharaohs day. The children chose roles such as an advisor, pyramid worker, Pharaoh, priest or guard. This helped the children to generate emotive language and understand what their characters daily life would have been like.

In todays lesson, the children have been immersing themselves in understanding a daily life as a significant ancient Egyptian citizen. The children used hot seating techniques and activities to develop understanding.

The children listened to the new stories ‘Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs’. The children rehearsed and performed the story using action signifiers.

Here is a display of year 3‘s fantastic learning in our most recent literacy units. The children have enjoyed practicing skills and writing techniques, to develop their learning to create a set of instructions on how to mummify and ancient Egyptian, and a riddle poem based around ancient Egyptian artefacts and significant people.

The final writing journey for Spring 1, was to write a cinquain poem based on aspect of Asian culture. The children explored metaphor and simile to enhance their poetry and used a thesaurus to improve their vocabulary choices. Take a look at some of their work above...

In literacy, Year 6's journey involved Journalistic Writing, where children wrote a newspaper report about the outbreak of World War 1. They also wrote a historical narrative, a battle scene and an autobiography on Charles Darwin!

We are so pleased to announce, that one of our very own year 5 pupils was a finalist in this year's Danum Read Aloud competition, competing with children from all over Doncaster.

Well done!

Year 4 children have entered a whole school poetry performance competition. The children displayed great expression, tone and pace. The Holy Family winner will represent our school at the Danum Read Aloud competition. Good luck Holy Family!

During our Amazon Rainforest topic, the children have written persuasive letters to David Lammy (Foreign Secretary). They have used persuasive language to persuade David Lammy to reduce deforestation. The children have posted these off this week and look forward to his reply. 

Year 4 created their own persuasive arguments to convince the class to agree with them about a topic of their choice. The children used persuasive words and phrases in their presentations and their peers gave feedback to each group. 

The class were lucky enough to have a visit from a member of The Beat Goes On, who worked with the children to understand the famous Shakespeare play, Romeo and Juliet. By using body percussion and other percussion instruments, they were able to explore key scenes and lines within the play and express their understanding through music.

Take a look at the wonderful session below...

Year 1 loved this writing unit and enjoyed creating their own versions of We're going on a bear hunt'. 

Each week the children in FS1 learn a new nursery rhyme as well as singing lots of nursery rhymes that the children already know. This week we have been learning 'Polly Put the Kettle On'. 

Reception children really enjoy this activity and ask for it to be in provision daily. They roll the dice, read the word and write the word. So much fun whilst learning!

In this lesson, Year 3 have experienced reading and performing different types of poetry. The children have immersed themselves in a wealth of poetry, analysing which they enjoyed reading and performing and why.

In teams, the children looked at the poem ‘The Caterpillar’ by Christina Rossetti. They read and discussed the poem. They looked at the words used and the shape of the writing. After the poem was read aloud by an adult, the children noticed and discuss the sounds of the words. We discussed rhyming words and how they have the same sound at the end.

As a class, we read the story ‘We’re going on a bear hunt’. We discussed what we liked and disliked. We thought about our favourite words and phrases. In groups, the children decided about what actions and sounds we could add to the story. We rehearsed the story and then performed it.

Children in Reception really enjoy Drawing Club. They love drawing, learning new vocabulary and being able to bring their imagination to life.

Children immersed themselves in our new genre, poetry. They listened to Roald Dahl's revolting rhymes, they watched Michael Rosen performing poetry and then they listened and observed to some 'top tips' by Joel Coelho. 

Children then had the opportunity to explore poetry books in our reading room and perform to one another. 

The children in nursery love reading books and stories. Drawing Club is an adventure that the nursery children always get very excited about. It helps to enrich their language skills and develop their fine motor skills at the same time.

In our final immerse lesson, the children enjoyed working in small groups to organise and follow instructions, for how to build a real mummy. After the activity the children used class discussion to pick out which bits of the instructions made the task easier and clearer to complete.  

In this immerse lesson, the children enjoyed working as a class to follow the clues and step by step instructions to solve a treasure hunt hidden in the Egyptian tomb.

In our first immerse lesson, the children enjoyed following a set of instructions on how to build a pyramid.

In this lesson, the children followed written instructions to create a rocket craft.

The children explored different types of instructions that we use. We discussed recipes, games and building activities. We had lots of fun playing ‘Simon says’. We also read our new story ‘Rosie Revere Engineer’ and discussed what an engineer is.

Year 6 wrote some instructions on finding lost treasure in the jungle as well as writing an adventure narrative based on the novel; The Explorer. 

Here a few examples of children learning from our most recent unit of writing ‘Non-Chronological‘ report. The children have enjoyed using new and learnt skills such as subordinating conjunctions and adverbs of place, in their writing and producing a report on UK Land and Settlements.

In our second immerse lesson, the children have presented their formal PowerPoints in partners. The children enjoyed exploring their use of formal language.

In our English immerse lesson, we have been creating formal PowerPoint presentations, about UK land and settlements. 

The Grinch came into the classroom and stole Miss Argent’s stickers. The children asked questions and read clues to work out where they were hidden around the classroom.

The children listened to the story and became very excited that our new writing unit involves Christmas. We discussed the new vocabulary and they gave their opinions using sentence starters.

Year 4 have created explanation texts based on Roman baths. They have presented their Powerpoints to the class using targeted vocabulary and sentence stems. 

The Nursery and Reception children have been taking part in World Nursery Rhyme Week. Nursery rhymes are incredibly important to early childhood development and education. They help to develop early language and literacy skills, numeracy skills and social, physical and emotional skills. They are also lots of fun! The children have have learnt 5 rhymes and have completed the 'Rhyme a Day' challenge by singing the nursery rhymes and taking part in supporting activities. They even performed one of the rhymes at our Celebration Assembly.

Children in Year 2 reflected on the importance of Remembrance day and then wrote some prayers of thanks to God. 

During one of our immerse lessons for our new genre; recount: journalistic writing children explored a range of texts. They listened to news reports, observing how facts were reported. They then role played being reporters, organised a range of statements and looked at fiction and non-fiction texts in our reading room. 

In our second immerse lesson, year three enjoyed answering and asking questions by solving riddles to find the lost objects and clues hidden in the classroom.

In our immerse lesson, year 3 have been understanding the concept of a mystery, and have been working together in small teams of deceives to solve the clues and riddles. The children enjoyed working with each other to place their answers and discover the mystery items with a grand reveal!

The children explored different types of toys. They played ‘what’s in the box?’. The children developed their turn taking and speaking and listening skills. The children also discussed whether the toys are modern or old and whether they would like to play with them.

The children in year 3 enjoyed writing a Sci-Fi narrative based on the events inside our focus text. The children loved to use drama techniques and act in role when immersing them self’s in the characters shoes.

The children in year 3 enjoyed using our class focus text The Iron Man’ by Ted Hughes, to create their own wanted poster of the Iron Man. The children enjoyed learning all the skills needed to form an excellent final wanted poster.

Year 6 enjoyed writing their own character description based on their favourite Greek God...

The children published their autumnal feast menus on a special writing frame. They really wanted to take their menus home.

Literacy in FS1

We have enjoyed reading 'The Very Hungry Caterpillar' in FS1. We have practised our vocabulary every day and thought of actions to go with each word. We drew our own caterpillars and made caterpillars and butterflies in the provision.

In Year 2, we have read 'Prince Cinders' and 'King Change-a- lot' written by Babette Cole. These stories  link to our current history topic; Kings and Queens. Children have made comparisons between both stories and are now developing skills to rewrite an alternative fairy tale narrative using fairy tale language. 

Year 6 wrote some fantastic non-chronological reports on some of their favourite Greek Gods that they researched

Year 4 have written a Roman diary entry. They have analysed a diary entry, identified the features, learned new skills, planned a diary entry and then applied all that they have learned to a written piece. The children have edited their writing and then published their final pieces.

The children completed a feely bag challenge and used adjectives to describe what they could feel in the bag. They then guessed who the character might be. After, they listened to the new story 'The Squirrels Who Squabbled' and used post-it notes to write down their adjectives for the pinecones.

Children have been practicing how to hold a pencil and have been working really hard to write their letters, starting and finishing in the correct places.

Year 1 finished their first writing journey. They explored the basic skills involved in writing labels and sentences. The children created a character description about Gerald the Giraffe.

The children in Year 5 have now reached the end of their first literacy journey of the year, learning how to write a historical narrative. They began by immersing themselves in the genre by reenacting an Anglo-Saxon battle and exploring ambitious vocabulary to build word banks to support their future writing. Then, they analyses a given text for its features and an effective setting description to support writing their own. Finally, using what they had learnt in their skills lessons, the children were able to plan, write, edit and publish their very own historical narratives. Take a look at their amazing work!

The children in Year 5 have been practising their handwriting by joining to and from the letter 'r' and ensuring letters are consistent in height and size. One of the them even achieved their handwriting pen in celebration assembly due to their hard work!

Children completed a carousel of handwriting activities including fine motor precision, adult led tasks and independent letter formation jobs.

Year 4 have interviewed a Roman solider! They have asked the solider questions about what they wore, where they had travelled and how they felt about going into battle. 

Children in Year 2 were fully immersed in our current literacy writing journey, we celebrated a royal coronation. We have been exploring 'Prince Cinders' this links with our topic 'Kings and Queens'. 

In our second immerse lesson, the children have been getting better at using drama techniques in the form of an interview. The children have created questions to ask ‘Hogarth’ (a character in our book) about his sighting of Iron Man. The children have enjoyed using their newly generated vocabulary to describe Iron Mans appearance.

In our first immerse lesson, year three have been Getting better at developing vocabulary about the Iron Man. The children have used a role on the wall character to create interesting and ambitious adjectives to describe Iron Mans body, head, eyes and legs. 

The children in Year 5 had a wonderful time immersing themselves into the history of the Anglo-Saxon invasions of England by watching and then re-enacting the storming of Pevensey Castle. While performing the long journey over the North Sea, to the attack on the unsuspecting Britons, the children really enjoyed learning about this historic event that will influence their writing in the following weeks.

Children listened to the new story ‘Giraffes Can’t Dance’. The children rehearsed and performed the story using action signifiers. They even create a story map to help them remember the story.

The children learnt about different dance styles like the animals in the story. Animals like the waltzing warthogs, rock ‘n’ rolling rhinos, tangoing lions and chimps that cha-cha.

Class Discussion and Knowledge Builder:

What do you know about giraffes? What do they look like? What do they do? Where do they live?

The children used their knowledge and research from the video to answer these questions.

Children listened to the new story ‘What the Ladybird Heard at the Seaside’. The class discussed any unknown vocabulary and the moral of the story. The children developed their listening skills to follow instructions to create their own ladybird. The children rehearsed and performed the story using action signifiers.

In our immerse literacy lesson, Y3 have been been developing their understanding of what a persuasive text brochure is, by viewing, comparing and analysing different writing techniques and presentation methods. The children have discovered some aspects of what makes this piece of text persuasive, exciting and informative to the target audience. The children enjoyed comparing texts and finding differences and similarities between them. They then contributed their ideas and findings to the class discussion, by using their chosen brochure, to refer back to and give examples.

During this lesson, children were immersed in our first lesson of the mystery narrative learning journey. Children began the lesson with listening to mystery narrative music, they were also surprised to find a mystery delivery...what could be in the box? We then listened to two examples of mystery narratives. 

Will Year 2 solve the case of the 'red box' what is inside the box....only time will tell! 

In today’s ‘immerse’ lesson, the children were getting better at developing their understanding of purpose, by using drama techniques to act in the role of a character from a well know fantasy narrative, experiencing a sequence of events.

In Year 2, children worked in small groups to generate vocabulary about Rosa Parks. They focused on using a range of adjectives and adverbs to describe Rosa Parks' appearance and her actions. They then discussed the Montgomery bus boycott and generated more vocabulary to support this. 

The children listened to the new story ‘Snail and the Whale’.

The children rehearsed and performed the story using action signifiers.

Earlier this year, Year 4 wrote a persuasive letter to David Cameron about the deforestation of the Amazon Rainforest. The children were very excited to get this response. 

The children in year 5 explored the genre of science fiction narratives through the lens of the famous text- War of the Worlds.

They immersed themselves in the story by creating their own version of the alien invaders, using this stimulus to then write their own narratives.

In Year 4, the children have written their own Ancient Maya recipes. They have recreated traditional recipes for chilli hot chocolate and corn tortillas!

In Year 4, the children have cooked corn tortillas and made spicy hot chocolate to inspire their instructional writing for an Ancient Maya recipe.

The children in Year 2 enjoyed our immerse lesson for our new writing genre 'recount'. We discussed the purpose of a recount and shared some examples in the reading room. We then discussed the features and worked in small groups to identify them and then recount our day so far, noting the importance of recounts being in chronological order. 

Children listened to the new story ‘The Tower Bridge Cat’. The children developed their spoken language and group work skills to build their own version of the Tower Bridge. Children had to discuss and negotiate with their group, giving reasons to explain their ideas.

Year 1 enjoyed writing letters to Aunt Lucy from Paddington.

During the Spring term, in Literacy, Year 6 wrote a diary entry from the trenches of World War 1 and Rondeau poetry linked to the famous war poem; Flanders Fields

The children explored and researched all about rhinos. They read fact files, watched videos and listened to stories. They created a spider diagram to collect all their information.

In year 3 we have completed our journey on Diary entries. The children have learnt new skills and practiced new ones such as writing in first person and past tense, chronological order, ambitious vocabulary and suffix spelling rules. These were then demonstrated in a final piece of writing of their own diary entry.

In year 3 the children have completed their immerse lesson, where they have enjoyed reading diary entries and matching them to a diarist, by highlighting clues in the text.

Year 6 wrote a flashback narrative based on the clip, The Piano. 

Year 6 learnt about Journalistic writing and wrote their own newspaper report on the outbreak of World War 1

In Year 3, the children have been writing a poem. The children have enjoyed learning new skills and being imaginative with their poems about the Mysteries of Ancient Egypt.

In Year 3, the children have written a list of instructions on how to find an ancient Pharaoh. They have included their learnt and practiced skills such as similes, expanded noun phrases, use of chronological order, fronted adverbials, and subordinating conjunctions.

Reception were curious as to why the table was covered in paper! They got really excited when they were asked to work together to sequence the Ginger Bread Man story in pictures. They had so much fun they asked to label the pictures they had drawn. They used newly introduced vocabulary and joined in with repeated refrains.

At Holy Family, the children have generated huge amounts of their favourite words. They have gathered these words from books, cross curricula lessons, thesauruses and words they use in spoken language. The children will continue to add words to our vocabulary tree and they will be challenged to use them verbally and in their writing. 

During this lesson, the children in year 2 enjoyed a game of roll and read! They rolled the dice and then formed sentences using the present tense. 

They then moved on to generating sentences themselves using the present tense. 

In teams the children looked at the poem ‘The Caterpillar’ by Christina Rossetti. They read and discussed the poem. They looked at the words used and the shape of the writing. After the poem was read aloud by an adult, the children noticed and discuss the sounds of the words. We discussed rhyming words and how they have the same sound at the end.

In Y3s Immerse lesson, they have been discovering riddle poetry. Y3 have enjoyed trying to solve the riddle poems to discover the correct answer. Before the answers were revealed, Y3 contributed their thoughts and reasoning through class discussion, for each answer they had given.

As a class, we read the story ‘We’re going on a bear hunt’. We discussed what we liked and disliked. We thought about our favourite words and phrases. In groups, the children decided about what actions and sounds we could add to the story. We rehearsed the story and then performed it.

Year 4 have created persuasive presentations using PowerPoint. The children had to use persuasive vocabulary in their presentations so that the audience would be swayed towards their point of view.

In Year 2, children enjoyed our immerse lessons. They had to follow instructions in different sequences given by the 'instruction master'. They also had to hunt for instructions to find the hidden location...which was our reading room. 

They then explored different books and instructions, focusing on a range of genres and information texts. 

In Y3 we have completed our first Immerse lesson. In today’s lesson we have been following instructions to find our destination. Each group had a different set of instructions to follow. Some were written with better techniques than others. After the groups had reached their destination, Y3 came together to discuss which line of instruction they found easiest or hardest to follow and why. Then Y3 discussed what they could change in their instructions, to make them easier and more suitable to follow.

Year 6 immersed themselves into adventure narratives by watching clips from adventure films, analysed an adventure narrative for key features, practised the skills of organising paragraphs and a range of cohesive devices and then, planned and wrote their own adventure narrative

Year 6 immersed themselves by following a set of instructions around school, analysed instructional texts, practised including imperative verbs and adverbials of time and then planned and wrote a set of instructions useful for an adventurer. 

The children enjoyed creating a mystery narrative based on our class novel ‘The 1000 year old boy’. Here is our journey along with some of the children’s learning.

In todays immerse lesson, children have been analysing some news headline hooks, and watching some clips to think about what techniques are used to cause suspense and tension for the reader. The children have analysed the choice of headline, music used, choice of wording, and the emotions they felt whilst watching. 

This is Y3’s completed learning journey. The children have enjoyed completing their journey with a News paper report, linked to our current topic (UK Land and Settlement). The children have enjoyed immersing their knowledge and learning new skills needed to create their final piece, such as sub-headings, past  tense, formal language, speech, and homophones. Hear is a few pieces of work from our learning journey.

During Anti-Bullying week, Year 4 wrote their own creative poems about friendship. The children then performed their poetry to others Please take a listen to the children's amazing poems!

In Nursery we use our listening skills in Phonics. We enjoyed our listening walk and heard a fire engine, birds singing, a lorry and children talking. We watched some drumming and then had a go at drumming fast, slow, loud and quiet on different things to hear how the sound changed. Developing our fine motor skills is very important for when we start to learn how to write so we practise by using lots of different equipment to build the strength in our arms and fingers. We enjoy sharing books, telling stories and acting things out to develop our communication and language skills.

In Year 4, the children have created explanation presentations using powerpoint. They have then presented these to the class. 

Y3s lesson focus was to get better at developing understanding of a News report. Y3 enjoyed sorting the texts into Non-Chronological, News paper articles, and Fictional texts. Y3 excelled at using clues provided to find the correct matching News paper report, which were displayed around the classroom. They took careful consideration in finding specific clues, such as titles, subheadings or comments in the articles.

Year 4 have immersed themselves in the topic of Rome. They have analysed the features of diary entries so they understand the genre and it's purpose. The children have learned key skills and then applied this to write their own Roman diary entries. 

The children acted in the role of a Roman solider and took it in turns to interview the 'soldiers'. We used this first account of a battle for our Roman diary entries. 

In Literacy, Y3 have enjoyed creating a character description of Iron Man, and a Sci-Fi narrative.

Y3 have developed skills such as prefix/suffix, paragraphs, conjunctions, adjectives, and exciting punctuation such as commas in a list.