Developing Oracy and Language Skills

According to the Oxford Language Report, a research study looking at the importance of children’s language development, ‘… the size of a child’s vocabulary is the best predictor of future success, and children with a poor vocabulary at five years old are four times more likely to struggle with reading in adulthood and three times more likely to have mental health issues.’

Developing our children’s language skills and oracy is the number one priority at Powers Hall Academy after supporting and championing children’s emotional and physical wellbeing. We see the skills of communication as one of the keys that will unlock the potential of all our learners, enabling them to find their voice and prepare them for successful and happy futures.

Research indicates that children’s vocabulary development directly impacts upon their future success in education and into adulthood. Reading is at the heart of this, as is engaging children in conversation and modelling good use of language so that their vocabularies develop. The use of ‘sentence stems’ to support our children’s classroom talk is an important part of how our Powers Hall staff model language to the children.

 Examples of sentence stems used in Science lessons:

• ‘I predict that_________ because________.’

• ‘We want to test ________ to find out whether _______.’

• ‘The similarities/differences between __________ and ________ are ________. 

Kagan Cooperative Learning Structures

One of the ways in which we are working to incorporate the promotion of ‘talk’ across the curriculum, is through Kagan Cooperative Learning Structures. Kagan Structures are classroom strategies which improve children’s social skills and relationship skills by promoting and facilitating quality discussion during lessons.

Cooperative learning theory suggests that students learn best when they can encourage and ‘coach’ each other, when they are held individually accountable, when they all participate equally, and when there is a great deal of active, interactive engagement. Kagan group work usually produces very equal participation as the activities cause children to take turns and share information, and often includes individual accountability, a dimension proven to be essential for producing consistent achievement gains for all children.

Voice 21 – Oracy Framework

Skills within this framework are woven throughout all subjects within our curriculum and opportunities for both exploratory and presentational talk are planned for explicitly as part of the Express Stage of our curriculum. Lessons are talk-rich and opportunities for partner and group talk are carefully built into each lesson plan. Teachers use targeted questioning and assessment for learning tools, which ensure all children are able to fully participate and every voice is valued. Subject specific vocabulary is provided in lesson plans in order to support children in working on collaborative projects, group discussion and debate or oral presentations. Every classroom also promotes subject-specific vocabulary acquisition through displaying key vocabulary on working walls and actively encouraging children to use these key words in their verbal communication.

A range of purposeful opportunities are used across the curriculum to encourage learning through talk and learning to talk including:

• Presentations
• Discussions
• Hot Seating
• Exploring a Text through Performance
• Oral Fluency Tests in reading and book reviews
• Collaborative discussions around maths reasoning
• Debates
• Group and Partner Work
• Role Play

Oracy Progression

In order to plan effectively for progression, staff at Powers Hall Academy use Year group progression maps for each of the strands.