The Literacy Tree

From Year 1 to Year 6, our English curriculum is underpinned by The Literacy Tree, a carefully structured, book-based approach that places high-quality texts at the heart of learning. This enables pupils to develop a deep love of reading while building the knowledge and skills needed to become confident, articulate writers.

Through The Literacy Tree, writing is taught in a progressive and coherent way, with lessons structured around rich texts that provide meaningful contexts for speaking, reading and writing. Pupils explore vocabulary, sentence structure and authorial techniques before applying these skills in their own writing across a range of genres.

A strong emphasis is placed on transcription skills, including handwriting, spelling and punctuation, to ensure pupils can record their ideas fluently and accurately. Dictation is used regularly, both in whole-class and small-group contexts, to strengthen spelling patterns, grammar and sentence construction, while also supporting pupils to retain and apply learning independently.

The approach supports adaptive teaching, enabling teachers to break learning into small steps, revisit key concepts and provide targeted support where needed. This ensures that all pupils, including those with SEND and disadvantaged learners, are supported to make strong progress from their starting points.

By combining high-quality texts, explicit teaching of transcription and regular opportunities for dictation, The Literacy Tree helps pupils to develop confidence, creativity and accuracy in their writing, preparing them well for the next stage of their learning.