Spelling

Lowedges Junior Academy believes that foundations in spelling should be put in place from an early age. Within Reception and Key Stage 1 the focus is on phonics and pupils are immersed in the world of phonics (closely linked to their early reading development) as soon as they enter school and access a daily phonics lesson. The pupils in Years 1 and 2 also learn the common exception word lists for their year groups. As pupils complete their phonics journey, the focus changes from phonics to the acquisition of spelling rules and strategies.

At Lowedges Junior Academy, from Year 2, Spelling Shed is followed to support the teaching of spelling rules, common exception words (for Y2) and word lists from the national curriculum (Y3-Y6). Spelling rules are explicitly taught and then practised throughout each week, with a weekly spelling test. Pupils are encouraged to use Spelling Shed when at home in order to practise their weekly spellings.

Spelling is important to all pupils and it is essential that they are given every opportunity to embed key spelling rules so that they are then able to apply them to their own writing. Link to Spelling Shed: https://www.spellingshed.com/en-gb/

Vocabulary

At Lowedges Junior Academy, vocabulary is developed throughout the whole curriculum using the ‘Word Aware’ model. Vocabulary development is a key principle within all areas of our curriculum. Word Aware is a comprehensive and structured approach to use throughout the academy to promote vocabulary development in all children.

Children need twelve meaningful encounters of a word before they really know it. Word Aware promotes a method called STAR, which stands for Select, Teach, Activate and Review. This process ensures the children encounter the new words many times and in many different ways.