Literacy Overview
What is our vision?
We believe literacy is powerful knowledge, so we make it stick. Academically, it enables students to read, write and speak like experts across a multitude of disciplines. This is why it is our vision to expand their vocabulary, allowing them to communicate with increasing confidence, fluency and comprehension. We want to foster a culture of reading across the school in which students read ambitious and diverse texts for pleasure, whilst gaining cultural capital. We want our students to develop the habits that enable them to read and speak with fluency and confidence throughout their academic journey and in later life.
Beyond academia, high levels of literacy will enable our students to flourish in a world beyond education that is fast-paced and rapidly changing. They will have the tools to become active citizens in which they ensure their voice is heard through challenging injustice and becoming part of the national conversation. Effective communication skills will ensure our students can articulate their emotions, own their relationships and compete in an ambitious and competitive labour market. High levels of literacy is therefore a social justice issue as it directly correlates to students living happy, healthy and successful lives no matter their starting point.
How do we turn our vision into a reality?
Drawing on the Education Endowment Foundation’s ‘Improving literacy in secondary schools’, HAOC has identified five key principles for the intent and implementation of whole school literacy:
- Disciplinary vocabulary is specified in the curriculum and enables students to write and speak like experts
- Vocabulary is explicitly instructed
- Reading is prioritised and guided with vocabulary signposted
- Writing opportunities are structured
- Oracy is prioritised, modelled and structured
