Summary
Contents
Subject index
Language and communication are essential in the classroom, essential in children’s learning, essential in teachers’ communication with children and essential in children’s understanding of themselves. This book is about talk - why it’s important, how it helps with learning and how you make the most of it in the classroom. There are increasing concerns about levels of language difficulties and delayed language development among children entering school. This presents a very real challenge for primary school teachers today. Talk is central to children’s learning across the curriculum as well as to their language and communication development. This book is a guide for trainee and beginning teachers on how to use talk in the classroom. It explores the theory behind the teaching of language and communication skills and includes lots of practical advice on how to translate this into the classroom.
Chapter 5: Language and Communication in the English Curriculum
Language and Communication in the English Curriculum
Despite an apparent reduction in the emphasis on speaking and listening in the English National Curriculum (DfE, 2013), oracy remains at the heart of children’s learning.
If we simply look at the number of times different aspects of English are mentioned, the impression is that speaking and listening are accorded little status:
- Writing 140
- Reading 115
- Spelling 101
- Books 60
- Grammar 50
- Punctuation 33
- Listening 19
- Poems 14
- Poetry 11
- Drama 8
- Speaking 6
- Literacy 2
Literature 2
(Waugh et al., 2014: 2)
In this chapter, however, we will show that oracy underpins all aspects of English, helping to develop children’s ability to write well, their reading comprehension skills, and their understanding of spelling, punctuation and grammar.
Talk for Writing
Writing often can, and probably should, be a solitary and silent activity. Many writers like to find a quiet and perhaps ...
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