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Good Practice Case Study

Camp Primary and Nursery School

School No: 418

Speaking and Listening

Camp Primary and Nursery School is a thriving multi-cultural school in St Albans. The ethnic mix of the school, although changing, has just under half of the pupils coming from White British families, with around equal numbers coming from Bangladeshi families. Other ethnic groups represented include Indian, Pakistani, German, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Polish, Moroccan and mixed-race pupils. This means that we are quite different from most other schools in the area. It is this diverse mix that gives the school its distinctive ethos.

We decided to take part in the Speaking and Listening project for several reasons. Firstly, our high proportion of EAL pupils (53%) means that many children start school with little or no English. Their very low baselines upon entry mean that end of Foundation Stage scores for Literacy are lower than both the national and LEA averages. Throughout their schooling, and particularly in the Foundation Stage and Key Stage 1, our EAL pupils need high levels of support with the development of speaking and listening skills. Secondly, we felt that the development of ‘Emotional Literacy’ skills are also important for many of our children with emotional and behavioural needs, who struggle to express themselves. Over the last five years we have focused heavily on the development of teaching and learning in Reading and Writing. We felt that our knowledge and confidence in the effective teaching of speaking and listening skills, and the strands within the teaching of speaking and listening, seemed a logical priority. Our speaking and listening focus has been very successful and has included staff development, purchasing of resources and whole school events.

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