Building on Meanwood’s vision and values and the National Curriculum for spoken language, we aim to provide an exceptional oracy education that embraces our school vision. The basic skills of spoken language are vital for the life opportunities for our children. 

Open Hearts – We create a cooperative learning environment, encouraging children to work together, share ideas and learn collaboratively.  

Open Minds – We inspire our children to strive for excellence in oracy, supporting them to develop fluency in their spoken language through numerous opportunities to different audiences. We celebrate their achievements and encourage them to reach their full potential.  

Open Arms – We foster empathy in our pupils, encouraging them to understand and appreciate different perspectives using their excellent communication skills.  We promote an inclusive environment where all learners feel valued and supported in their oracy journey. 

Intent 

At Meanwood, we prioritise language development, recognising its crucial role for our pupils. This commitment propels us to enhance spoken language, listening skills and vocabulary, positively impacting on their reading and writing as well as all their learning in all other subjects. By integrating the school vision into our oracy curriculum, we aim to create a learning environment that promotes collaboration, celebrates achievement and fosters empathy and respect. Our curriculum reflects a comprehensive approach to high-quality oracy skills, addressing physical, linguistic, cognitive, social and emotional aspects. With elevated expectations, the entire school community upholds standards for children's spoken language and listening skills. We believe eloquence, articulate expression, collaborative abilities, and confidence in sharing views are indispensable life skills fostering success in both learning and life.   Through our commitment to excellence, inclusivity and holistic development, we aim to empower our pupils to make a positive impact in their communities and the wider world.  

Our curriculum will enable children to: 

• Speak with confidence, clarity and eloquence, 

• Recognise the importance of listening in conjunction with speaking, 

• Be confident in the value of their own opinions and be able to express and justify them to others, 

• Adapt their use of language for a range of different purposes and audiences, 

• Sustain a logical debate, question, reason and respond to others appropriately, 

• Concentrate interpret and respond appropriately to a wide range of immersive experiences, 

• Be open-minded to respect the contribution of others and to take account of their views, 

• Celebrate the diversity of languages, dialects and accents in the school and appreciate the experience and value of contributions of children with a wide variety of linguistic abilities, 

• Share their learning in an engaging, informative way through presentations, recitals, drama, poetry and debate. 

Implementation 

At Meanwood, we follow an oracy progression map that provides planned opportunities in every year group, starting in the EYFS, for every pupil to develop their proficiency in the components of spoken language also equipping them with the necessary listening skills. This includes the explicit teaching of vocabulary and ideas necessary for effective communication. In order to become improved speakers and listeners, pupils also need opportunities to practise, refine and apply this knowledge in a range of different contexts and for a range of different audiences. The four strands of oracy are planned for each year group and include: physical, linguistic, cognitive and social and emotional aspects.  Planned opportunities include teachers modelling the physical, linguistic, cognitive, social and emotional aspects of spoken language using forms of speech that children may not have encountered previously.  Teachers use progressive sentence stems and new vocabulary to help children speak for different purposes and audiences. 

Communication and language is at the heart of our EYFS. High quality conversations and questioning take place at every opportunity with practitioners modelling speaking in full sentences. Developing pupil’s oral composition through the frequent retelling of stories, rhymes and poems is a key element of our language rich curriculum.  New vocabulary is specifically planned into the curriculum to support language acquisition.   Children begin to speak in front of an audience during half termly planned show and tell themes. Talk partners are integral in our lessons where children support each other in their learning. 

Across KS1 and KS2, children are immersed in a rich environment where they observe their teachers demonstrating high-quality oracy skills, while simultaneously being encouraged to hone their own speaking abilities. This happens through a variety of informal channels, such as sharing books, participating in relational circle sessions, engaging in spontaneous discussions, and responding to cold-call questions during lessons. In addition to these informal interactions, there are also structured opportunities for formal oracy development. These include exercises in verbal reasoning, planned debates, presentations, and discussion sessions aimed at assessing and enhancing understanding across all subjects whenever possible. Throughout these experiences, children are equipped with the necessary skills to thrive and build confidence in their communication abilities. 

Impact 

At Meanwood our aim is to keep all the children working together at broadly the same place by taking small steps in their learning. 

Formative Assessment 

The children’s progress is assessed using regular formative assessment in lessons through listening to children’s spoken language for different purposes.  Teachers assess against the oracy progression document.  We place emphasis on oracy and use it as an effective assessment tool for other subjects through planned oracy lessons e.g. debating or presenting. These inform the teacher of any children that need further consolidation and/or intervention.  

Summative Assessment 

Summative assessment in oracy takes place at the end of the year in line with our school’s assessment schedule.  

Tracking Pupil Progress 

In oracy children are tracked in multiple ways against the progression document: 

· Baseline assessment in EYFS and tracking against Early Learning Goals (communication and language) 

· End of year teacher assessment data tracking  

· Individual progress is reported to parents through two termly Parents’ Evenings and an end of year report  

Staff Development 

Training needs are identified as a result of whole school monitoring and evaluation, performance management and through self-analysis. The subject leaders are keen to share best practice and disseminate up-to-date initiatives to staff via planned CPD and development time. This will ensure oracy is constantly evolving to meet the demands of curriculum expectations. Subject leaders have attended Noctua training and oracy is currently part of the School Development Plan.  

Monitoring 

The subject leader, SLT and Governors all play a role in the monitoring of oracy at Meanwood. Regular monitoring via learning walks, book looks and pupil/staff voice feedback ensures the subject is constantly being reviewed and regulated to ensure the best learning opportunities for all.