Our English curriculum

Contents

• Introduction
• Which English curriculum plans are available?
• Unit sequences
• Curriculum explainer
• Downloading plans and the national curriculum alignment document
• More about our English curriculum
• FAQs
  • Using our primary English curriculum
  • Using our secondary English curriculum
  • General English FAQs

Introduction

We’ve worked closely with curriculum partners, subject experts and teachers on our interactive English curriculum plan.

Our curriculum partners for English are:

• English primary: Fox Federation
• English secondary: Twyford Church of England Academies Trust

You can read more about how our expert groups helped shape our curriculum thinking in our Blog: Collaborating with our English expert group.

Which English curriculum plans are available?

We have the following English curriculum plans available to browse and download.

• English KS1 and 2 unit sequences
• English KS3 and 4 unit sequences for:
  • AQA
  • Edexcel
  • Eduqas

Unit sequences

You can view our curriculum sequence using the unit sequence tab. It will display the units available for each year group, how many lessons are available in a unit and a recommended order.

All units have a description of 'why this, why now' and 'prior knowledge requirements' to help you consider the sequence of your current planning.

You can look at how threads develop across an entire phase or filter the view to see a single year group.

Curriculum explainer

We've added a curriculum explainer to our English curriculum to help you understand our thinking when we were making them with our curriculum partners.

For English this will help you understand:

• our overarching curriculum approach and the subject principles we used
• how our curriculum reflects the aims and purpose of the national curriculum
• information on delivering it in your school
• how we use threads to provide curriculum coherence.

Downloading plans and the national curriculum alignment document

Download the curriculum plan to help you see all the content in one place, including the explainer, the units and the lessons.

The national curriculum alignment document explains how the Oak English curriculum aligns with the national curriculum.

More about our English curriculum

In our primary English curriculum video guide, our English subject lead Chris Fountain, explores the key thinking behind the creation of our primary English curriculum with Emma Madden from Fox Federation. 

In our secondary English curriculum video guide, our English subject lead Chris Fountain, talks to Sam Barnsley from Twyford Academies Trust to highlight some of the thinking behind the design of our secondary English curriculum. 

FAQs

Using our Primary English curriculum

Where should I start the primary English curriculum? What is the first unit I should do, and in what order should I teach the domains?

Our primary English curriculum is 5 separate domain sequences that should be taught alongside each other. For each domain, the first unit in the sequence is the best place to start.

Do I need to teach one lesson from each domain every day?

No, it is not necessary to teach one lesson from each domain every day. The ‘Reading, Writing, Oracy’ domain sequence is designed to be used every day, but the other domains are designed to be used in the format that suits your classroom timetable and needs.

Do you teach phonics?

No, our resources do not cover phonics teaching. The DfE already support a thriving phonics market for schools.

With units that have mixed reading and writing outcomes, do we have to study the same reading text as the Oak curriculum?

No, you can use the writing lessons in these units alongside your own reading texts. The writing is designed to be independent of the reading, as pupils learn clear structures and techniques to support their narrative or descriptive writing for instance.

What is a ‘book club’ unit?

'Book club' units are not full reading units. Rather than focusing on building up pupils' fluency or comprehension, these book club units are focused on exploring and discussing the themes, plot and characters of the text. The expectation is that pupils will have read the text before starting the 'book club' units as the unit is solely focused on whole text exploration.

How should I use your handwriting content?

Our handwriting lessons are designed to be used flexibly to suit your context. Each of these lessons features four learning cycles, one of which is a warm up. Whilst you might want to do a single extended handwriting lesson per week, we would recommend doing three shorter (roughly 15 minute) handwriting lessons dedicated to one learning cycle each, with the warm up repeated in each mini lesson.

Do I need to teach all of the year 2 handwriting content?

No, in year 2 we offer two possible handwriting pathways: pupils can either complete lower-case letter revision OR they can complete the pre-cursive lessons. You do not need to complete all of the year 2 handwriting lessons.

Do you provide spelling homework or word lists for spelling test revision?

Yes, in the additional materials for each spelling lesson you can find a list of rules and tips from the lesson, as well as a list of the words from the lesson to practice.

How should I organise your primary English content across the day and week?

This is for you to decide within the structures of your timetable. The curriculum is designed so that pupils do one lesson from the ‘Reading, Writing and Oracy’ domain per day, and then study a selection of grammar, spelling, handwriting and vocabulary throughout the week, depending on your timetable and the curriculum structure.

Do pupils read all of the text during your lessons?

In key stage 1, pupils will read all of the text during the lesson. However, with the longer texts in key stage 2, it is expected that teachers will read the text with their pupils during class reader time.

How can I use the Oak primary English curriculum to align with the curriculum in other subjects?

We offer topic options in many of our non-chronological report units to help you align the content with the topics you are studying in other parts of our curriculum. This means that for many of the non-chronological units, we have two possible units you can choose on different topics.

How does your approach to reading, writing and grammar interact with the individual lesson in English?

We have sequenced our primary English curriculum in different domains: handwriting, spelling, grammar, vocabulary and reading, writing and oracy.

We teach handwriting, spelling and grammar discretely so that pupils can develop confidence in these areas outside of their reading, writing and oracy lessons.

However, the content from those discrete lessons is revisited in the relevant reading, writing and oracy lessons so that pupils are learning how to use and apply a certain grammatical construction, and utilise that knowledge in context. This means all of the content does develop coherently across domains, but it can also be used independently.

Using our Secondary English curriculum

Are there teaching resources for GCSE English Language? And if 'yes', are they provided as separate resources, or embedded into literature teaching?

Yes, we provide resources for GCSE English Language. English Language teaching is both embedded into literature teaching and taught separately during key stage 3. At key stage 4, we have specific English Language units that cover fiction reading, fiction writing, non-fiction reading, non-fiction writing, and spoken language.

Which exam papers are your GCSE English Language resources aligned to, and do they include explicit exam practise?

We use the same lessons for all exam boards as our approach is to teach the underlying GCSE English Language subject knowledge rather than simply prep pupils for an exam. Throughout the lessons, pupils will cover all of the skills and knowledge they need to excel in the exams, but they will not be taught through exam questions.

What do the icons mean in the different parts of the GCSE English Language lessons and units?

Across GCSE English Language lessons and units, we use four distinct learning phases: reading comprehension, analysing a writer’s craft, emulating a writer’s craft, and then finally developing original voice. This helps link the reading texts with writing outcomes, helping pupils to recognise what a writer is doing before they integrate a version of that into their own writing.

Which texts should I choose for key stage 4? Do I need to adapt key stage 3 to support them?

Within your exam board, you should select the text you think is most interesting and exciting for your pupils. Our key stage 3 curriculum builds towards all of the outcomes, so whether you select 'Animal Farm' or 'Leave Taking' for instance, the key stage 3 curriculum will have prepared you.

How do you prepare pupils for exams? What exam skills are they taught?

Our curriculum does not feature any exam practice, and no exam skills are taught. Instead, with GCSE English Literature, we develop pupils' critical thinking and knowledge of the text. With GCSE English Language, we look at a range of fiction and non-fiction and explore how they are constructed.

Do you offer assessments in your units?

No, there are no formal summative assessments included in our resources. There is formative assessment present throughout lessons, with starter and exit quizzes, as well as checking for understanding questions throughout the units.

The units do generally build towards a final writing task, often an extended piece of writing, so this can be used to form the basis of an assessment in your school if you wish.

What exam boards are you aligned with for GCSE?

We are aligned to AQA, Edexcel and Eduqas in GCSE English Literature and GCSE English Language.

With English Language, we deliberately do not practise exam skills or questions. Instead, we give pupils regular practise of reading and writing fiction and non-fiction, particularly through the exploration of short stories and articles.

For English Literature, we cover a range of texts that are included in the specifications for two or more of AQA, Edexcel and Eduqas. We also cover at least two poetry anthologies for each exam board, except Eduqas which only has one poetry anthology.

General English FAQs

How are you building oracy into English?

It is important to us that pupils are given many discussion opportunities so this is an integral part to all lessons in the curriculum giving pupils a chance to express their views clearly and can develop confidence in doing so.

However, we also explicitly teach pupils how to structure and present their ideas orally. This includes an 'Introduction to debate' unit in year 5 where pupils learn and practise the building blocks of making an oral argument and the year 8 unit 'Victorian childhood' where pupils learn how to give a presentation.

How do you encourage your children to think like a writer?

There are lots of ways in which this is achieved. It is important that pupils read like writers and write like readers to help them reflect thoughtfully on texts and write their own thoughtful texts. Where appropriate during reading lessons, pupils are asked to discuss 'why has the writer done this? what other choice could they have made?' Similarly, where appropriate during writing lessons, pupils are asked to think about how they would respond as a reader.

How have you selected the texts to teach in English?

Our Subject Lead Chris Fountain has discussed some of the key challenges for text selection and how we have solved that problem for the Oak curriculum in his Blog: Selecting texts to teach in English.

Why have you chosen these texts for literature? Do they all belong to a traditional ‘canon’?

Simply, because we think they are great! We think all pupils should read these texts as they are entertaining, enlightening and thought provoking. We have got a range of different text types from a range of time periods, with everything from old English through to twenty-first century classics.

What should we consider if we are teaching different texts to the Oak curriculum?

You need to consider whether the text you want to fit into the curriculum works within the same curriculum thread. Is it building up understanding and knowledge of the same concept, and therefore building towards the same later texts in the curriculum? For instance, if you were to remove 'Small Island', you would want to ensure the text that replaces it also focuses on migration and community and helps build pupils towards study of 'Leave Taking'.

Does my school need to purchase whole texts?

Yes, we would generally expect schools to purchase the texts because it is not possible for us to provide the full text in our lesson resources. It is also preferable to read a book rather than a screen. However, you do not necessarily need to buy a full class or year group set of books