Park Road Junior Infant and Nursery School

At Park Road School, we strive to give our pupils the opportunity to become confident, fluent and articulate speakers. Speakers that are able to navigate their way through the different types of talk and vast range of social situations they will experience in their day to day lives. Our aim is to provide a curriculum rich in exploratory and presentational talk, enabling the children to learn to talk and through talk. It is our goal to foster sensitive, attentive and responsive listeners. Our pupils will develop socially and emotionally by learning to take turns, allowing and encouraging others to contribute and through knowing that their thoughts and ideas are listened to and valued.

Our teaching of oracy is embedded across the curriculum, allowing our children to be immersed in purposeful talk across all subjects. Our planning and teaching for all lessons is designed to facilitate good quality discussions and interactions between pupils and staff. Through talk and higher order questioning, children are able to revise their understanding, negotiate and problem solve deepening their understanding of the content that is being taught. During lessons, there will be opportunities for oracy skills to be taught explicitly and modelled. Through modelling, the children will learn to adjust their register, body language and vocabulary to suit the content and purpose of a given situation. They will be able to adopt different roles in a conversation and carry these out with confidence, building on, challenging and critiquing the points of views of others. We will encourage our children to be reflective, internalising what they have heard and making adjustments to their understanding or point of view to incorporate new thinking or information. They will be able to bring their own thoughts and ideas to the discussion, explaining and justifying their points of views clearly. The children will know the components needed to have a successful and purposeful conversation and therefore be able to evaluate and analyse the discussions they have had or witnessed.

Inclusion is at the heart of our oracy intent and we want all our children to know that their thoughts and ideas are valued. We want our children to embrace opportunities to speak with or without support, inspiring others with their words and delivery. The benefits of oracy extend well beyond the classroom, teaching our children self-worth and vital speaking and listening skills, not just for in school, but in preparation for their future career and life.

Upon completion of their journey through our school, our aims for oracy are to ensure that all pupils will:

• listen and respond appropriately to adults and their peers
• ask relevant questions to extend their understanding and knowledge
• use relevant strategies to build their vocabulary
• articulate and justify answers, arguments and opinions
• give well-structured descriptions, explanations and narratives for different purposes, including for expressing feelings
• maintain attention and participate actively in collaborative conversations, staying on topic and initiating and responding to comments
• use spoken language to develop understanding through speculating, hypothesising, imagining and exploring ideas
• speak audibly and fluently with an increasing command of Standard English
• participate in discussions, presentations, performances, role play/improvisations and debates
• gain, maintain and monitor the interest of the listener(s)
• consider and evaluate different viewpoints, attending to and building on the contributions of others
• select and use appropriate registers for effective communication

Click on link to Oracy Empowerment