At APPS, we are passionate about our ambitious and innovative English curriculum. English is the key to accessing all areas of learning; therefore, we aim for all of our children to leave us with a love of the English language, good vocabulary acquisition and the ability to communicate effectively both verbally and in the written word.

We have worked hard to ensure that our English curriculum reflects our diverse community, whilst also providing our children with the opportunity to experience work from our rich literary heritage. Our curriculum places quality texts at its core. Throughout their time at APPS, children are introduced to a range of authors, forms, styles and text types, in order to broaden their skills and ignite their interests within the world of English.

We have worked hard to successfully implement our rich, diverse and inclusive literary curriculum at APPS and are proud to welcome colleagues from other schools and trusts to see our talented staff and pupils in action. Please read some of the feedback we have received below.

“I reached out to Ashford Park Primary School to get support with launching and implementing The Literacy Tree approach to our English curriculum. The English lead, Melanie Wootton, has been fantastic at supporting me through this stage, her friendly and open approach is a reflection of the ethos of the school. Melanie facilitated a visit for some of our teachers to see how The Literacy Tree and the English curriculum works at Ashford Park and again, all teachers and support staff were so welcoming towards our visit. During the visit we were able to see how well English is taught at Ashford Park, the teachers were confident in their delivery of lessons, they questioned the children excellently to support their understanding and modelled clear writing expectations during the lessons we saw. The high expectations of the teachers were evident in the engagement of the children, all classes had a calm and hardworking environment and the children were confident in articulating their learning to our staff. We were also impressed with the learning environment Ashford Park has created, the working walls in every room, variety of books on display and beautiful mosaics outside demonstrate just how much Ashford Park values its English curriculum, with reading at the heart of it.

Thank you to all the staff for allowing us to come and visit, it has helped us with our new curriculum and you made us feel very welcome!”

Peaches Demetriou, English lead – Colham Manor Primary School.

 

"Thank you so much for making us all so welcome today.  It is always such a privilege to get out and visit other schools.   Please can you pass on our thanks to all your teachers who welcomed us and took it all in their stride.   We have taken lots away that we will introduce and develop across our primaries within the trust. It is really clear that you have worked on this, refined it and adapted it to work for you and your team - which is great to see as we embark on our journey with Literacy tree.   The enthusiasm from all your teachers, who clearly enjoy teaching using this approach, was a joy to watch.   We particularly liked the consistency of your working walls - they were packed with really useful vocabulary, grammar and modelled writing - and we will work on this as a team at our school.  

The children in all your classes were an absolute credit to you all, they were confident when talking to us all and so articulate about their learning. There were supportive and encouraging of each other during think, pair, share and when teachers were cold calling - really lovely to see. 

Your books looked great! We are working on live editing this year and you could see the positive impact it is having on children's writing in your books.  After talking to you I think we will move to write a line miss a line as the presentation looked so much better that way.  Your staff and children should be very proud of their books.  

Thank you for your time, I will be in touch in the new year and maybe organise for other teachers to come and visit. 

With warmth,

Hilary MacMeekin                                                                                        Headteacher, Noremarsh Junior School"