Writing at Old Basford School

The Journey- Written by Mrs Kelly Writing Lead

There once was a passionate, hardworking and dedicated teacher who was determined to ensure the children at Old Basford School, were immersed in wonderous writing. Fortunately, there was a team of inspiring staff who worked their magic, gave endless encouragement and shared their love of literacy. Some might say that the words written on the page, flow beautifully like a song. At OBS there are classrooms just like Hogwarts but no witches to be seen! However, you might just find…children bursting with excitement, following their deepest desires and creating unique pieces of literature. Where imagination flows like a river, drawing the reader in, making them want to read on and sometimes blowing their socks off! If you’re intrigued, then search no more. Patiently, await the page turners that might have the slightest possibility of whistling their way onto this webpage.   

Intent

At Old Basford School, writing is a vital part of our curriculum. All children from Foundation Stage to Year 6 are provided with many cross-curricular opportunities to develop and apply their writing skills. We believe pupils should be able to confidently communicate their knowledge, ideas and emotions through their writing. We want pupils to acquire a wide vocabulary, a solid understanding of grammar and be able to spell new words by effectively applying the spelling patterns and rules they learn. We want them to write clearly, accurately and coherently, adapting their language and style in and for a range of contexts, purposes and audiences. We believe that all pupils should be encouraged to take pride in the presentation of their writing, in part by developing a fluent, joined, handwriting style by the time they move to secondary school. We also believe that all good writers refine and edit their writing over time, so we want children to develop independence in being able to identify their own areas for improvement in all pieces of writing, editing their work effectively during and after the writing process.

We have adopted the Talk for Writing approach to support this vision, through this approach we believe we enable our children to be:

• Educated with the knowledge of a range of text types (fiction and non-fiction) and in a range of genres and be able to write and communicate in a variety of styles and form appropriate to the situation.
• Be equipped with the skills to write confidently and fluently; understanding and orchestrating a range of independent strategies to self-monitor and correct.
• Access enriched provision by providing quality experiences that will enhance their knowledge, skills and understanding. This includes providing opportunities to use drama as a tool to express themselves and deepen their understanding.
• Empowered with the skills to become lifelong learners of reading and writing and be able to form a critical view of texts they encounter.

Aims and Ambitions:

• Develop children’s ability to express their thoughts and ideas with confidence in a way appropriate to the situation.
• All children are encouraged to listen to and support the ideas of others.
• Give children the confidence to use drama, performance and rehearsal strategies to develop their understanding of texts and real-life situations.
• Use good teacher modelling and exposure to powerful texts to ensure children have an interest in words and their meaning and a growing vocabulary.
• That children have a good understanding of the sound and spelling system and use this to read and spell accurately.
• Through good modelling, children produce handwriting that is fluid and legible and all children have pride in their presentation.
• That children have the capability to write in a range of genres in fiction, non-fiction and poetry, and understand and be familiar with some of the ways in which narratives are structured through basic literary ideas of setting, character and plot.
• Help children to plan, innovate, revise and edit their own writing, so that by the end of Key Stage 2, they are able to work through these phases independently.
• That children have a suitable technical vocabulary through which to understand and discuss their reading and writing.
• Ensure that an enriched curriculum develops children’s imagination, inventiveness and critical awareness.
• That all children make rapid progress from their individual starting points and achieve age related expectations or above by the end of Key Stage 2.

Wicked Writers: Be the Change!

Some of the Year 6 children have taken part in an environmental themed writing competition. It's all about creating a positive change for the environment. 

The children have been working extremely hard over the last few weeks and have produced some convincing speeches. 

Prizes include: A trip to London to see the show Wicked, a writing workshop with MG Leonard or a set of books!

Keep your fingers crossed we win...watch this space! 

Harry Potter Runner Up Winners!

Wow! What an achievement year 4 you were highlighted for your inspirational ideas for the Harry Potter competition. We would have loved to have won...however being a runner up is a great achievement! Just take a look at the wonderful letter that arrived at OBS! We are incredibly PROUD of each child who took part.    

News, News Read all About it!

Are you a Harry potter fanatic? Do you fancy a free trip around the Harry Potter studio?

We did, so we decided to tackle this inspiring competition...

"We’re challenging students to get creative and imagine their own magical plant creation, using Professor Sprout’s greenhouse as inspiration. Try reading the start of Chapter Six of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets and watching this clip from the film to get you started. This is where Harry first discovers Greenhouse Three and the magical plants that live inside. Using the descriptions in the book and the scene from the film as inspiration, challenge students to think about what their own magical plant would look like, what properties it would have and how it  might be useful." Warner Bros Studio  

We just couldn't resist entering! Mrs Kelly and a group of year 4 children took on the challenge. Check out the amazing plants that the year 4 children designed below. We are so proud of what they produced over such a short period of time, well done everyone. We have everything crossed that we might win! 

Parent and Carer Ideas to help Children:

Giving children reasons to write is a great way to keep children engaged and help support them with their writing!

Reasons to write:

• Birthday cards
• Letters
• Notes to toys/ family or ask questions – get the children to write back (post-it notes are great for these)
• Secret messages
• To talk about an occasion
• Fact file
• Stories
• Newspaper article or report
• For fun- nonsense sentences- think of four things beginning with the letter h and make a sentence with them all in e.g. The hungry horse hadn’t eaten his hay for over a hundred years!
• To share ideas, passions.
• To write a how to e.g. how to bake cakes, play football, swim etc
• Posters
• Songs/ raps etc
• Poems

The list is endless...whoops I nearly forgot shopping lists. 

Take a Walk down Memory Lane

 We are very fortunate to have some wonderful readers and writers at Old Basford School. Please take a look at our page below for updates on Literacy and to celebrate our talented students. 

READ ALL ABOUT IT!  

Our team of journalists form Basford Buzz have been busy writing articles based on the following term, take a look at what they have been working on.

Talented Writers

There has been some phenomenal writing taking place across school over the last term. Teachers have been so impressed with some of the lovely pieces being produced by our very talented pupils. Please take a look at the videos below, where you can listen to the authors reading their work aloud, as chosen by their teachers.

New books for school!

Due to the City library relocating, an opportunity arose for us to buy some discounted books for school. Mrs Priddy was delighted to return with over 250 new books for school! These books have replenished our library, added to our classroom books and joined our reading for pleasure books to take home. Here are some photos of the children enjoying reading them.

World Book Day

What a brilliant day for enjoying books! The OBS mission for teachers was to fill your day with lots of book talk and enjoyment and we think they did a brilliant job! From book picnics to illustrator tutorials, it was a fantastic day across school. All of the children chose something comfortable to wear to school and they brought their favourite book too.

What happened on the day?

In nursery the children brought their best book to school and shared it with a friend. Over in F2 the children met up with year 4 to share some stories in a 'booknic' complete with cakes. In year 1 the children had a book tasting event where they got to try some tasty reads. Year 2 joined the illustrator Axle Sheffler as they illustrated Zog together. In year 3 children created dream jars inspired by the BFG and year 4 illustrated their favourite book cover again. In year 5 there was a fantastic book quiz and year 6 enjoyed more book tasting, especially when there was a spare copy that they could enjoy with a friend. 

The day was finished by a visit from a mystery teacher reader which all of the children enjoyed!

New library furniture 

We are pleased to announce that our library is getting a makeover! Children will need to look our for the beautiful new library shelves which will be arriving in March. Photos will be uploaded when our library is ready.

World Book Day is 25! 

We will be once again celebrating World Book Day on the 3rd March. All of our children took home a £1 book voucher with their newsletter before the February half term holiday. Please find a copy below.

We are really looking forward to World Book Day where the children can come to school in something comfortable and bring their favourite book. There are all sorts of exciting things planned including a year 4 and F2 'booknic' (a book picnic), mystery class readers and live author talks. Come back to this page for an update after the big day!

Reading for pleasure newsletter

Please see below for a copy of the second Autumn term newsletter by Mrs Priddy. Remember to let her know if you try any of the recommended books!

READ ALL ABOUT IT!  

We have some very exciting news! Old Basford School will be starting its very own newspaper. The reporting team will be made up of Year 5 and 6 children, who will be writing stories all about daily school life. There are always lots of exciting events happening at school, so keep your eyes peeled for this half term's newspaper, which will be released at the end of this term.

Reading for pleasure newsletter

Mrs Priddy has written our first reading for pleasure newsletter this half term with the help of the OBS librarians. The newsletter will come out each half term and will contain a variety of book recommendations, reading news in school and ideas for how to make reading enjoyable. We hope you enjoy taking the time to find out about some new books! Please let Mrs Priddy know if you have any suggestions for the next newsletter.

Talk for Writing

As you may already know, we believe strongly in developing enthusiastic, creative, independent writers at Old Basford School. To support this vision, we made the exciting decision to adopt the Talk for Writing approach last year. Staff received some fantastic training on this and since that point, we have never looked back! We are now in our second year of this journey and the quality of our writing and the teaching the children are receiving is just fantastic. Here is a little taste of some of our writing from F2-Y6 from Autumn 1. Please share in our success and watch some of our talented children in action: 

Our Memories of

2020-2021

We raised a fantastic £236 for BookTrust from Pyjamarama Day. Well done everybody!

Pyjamarama Day - Friday 14th May

Come dressed in your pyjamas and raise money for reading books for children who can't afford them at home. There will be lots of fun activities planned in classes that morning, all around READING!

OBS Poetry Competition - Enter Now!

Closing Date Friday 14th May

World Book Day #OldBasfordSuperhero

The day was a huge success! The children loved our bespoke assembly and workshops with the very talented Chris White. Take a look at some of our photos, lots of fun had by all! 

World Book Day Winners

Take a look at our winners for 'Best Book', 'Best Cape', 'Best Story Den'.

Online Reading

There are so many wonderful resources online when reading at home, please take a look at the letter below to see all some excellent websites offering free access to a whole library of books.

Reading Rainbow