At St Clare’s we are passionate about developing children’s oracy. Speech, language and a good range of vocabulary allow children to make sense of the world around them and to be able to articulate their thoughts, ideas and feelings. We recognise that language is a vital building block for all areas of learning and it is very difficult to make up the gaps later on in their development. At St Clare’s we use a progression document and plan experiences for our children to help support and grow good oracy skills that set our children up for the future.

We aim to promote all forms of communication in our school’s community to encourage children to interact and learn through talk. Oracy is embedded across the curriculum and used to unlock new learning and challenge thinking.

In our Early Years, meaningful conversations are at the heart of everything we do. Staff model conversational language and turn taking. Snack time is dedicated to talk time; children are able to sit, talk to their teachers and peers and share news thus allowing them to gain confidence in public speaking from an early age. Children work on the skills or turn taking, listening and speaking in the correct volume. 

As children move into Key Stage Once they continue to develop their oracy skills with teaching focussing on listening and questioning for understanding.  Sentence stem are introduced to support children when talking to their partner or in a group. Children are introduced to the idea of an audience and the way in which they speak changes depending on an audience.

In Key Stage Two, children learn the skills needed foe a discussion and this is extended as they work through the different year groups. children learn strategies for maintaining attention and how to bring a discussion back on track. As children move into upper Key Stage Two, they learn the skills needed to have a stage presence and how to build evidence based arguments.

All classrooms are language rich and vocabulary is at the heart of our learning in every subject. The CUSP curriculum provides teachers with necessary vocabulary to be taught in every year group, across all subjects. Vocabulary is built upon year on year with children explicitly taught vocabulary in the Early Years Foundation Stage that they will be exposed to through print in Year 1. High quality texts immerse our children in a world of rich vocabulary which is then used in their own written work.

All children are invited to share their own achievements in assembly. They are encouraged to explain and talk about their achievements independently, projecting their voice.