With our Scottish and international schools already back in session and the remainder of our schools on the brink of a shiny new school year, children and staff alike may well be feeling a little bit lost! New routines and…
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Celebrations and festivals, in all their glorious forms, are symbolic; a moment for reflection and a chance to mark the cycle of the year quietly or less quietly with colleagues, family and friends. Teachers will already have been thinking about…
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C.S Lewis’ classic novel, The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe begins with a wardrobe, a doorway through which the magical kingdom of Narnia awaits. Indeed, across literature there are many such examples of portals to other worlds, and of…
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With many children about to be at home for the longest school-break (although this may be different for our international schools), we wanted to explore the complexities that might exist around this. The idyllic vision of a long, carefree summer…
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We were thrilled to send our brand-new Whole School Writing Root into the world earlier this month when it was shared with our lovely subject leaders. And several of our schools have already said that they’re going to explore this…
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Reading matters. As one of the opening sentences in the DFE’s Reading Framework states, “To the individual, it matters emotionally, culturally and educationally; because of the economic impacts within society, it matters to everyone”. Following the initial release of the…
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Historical Texts History and literature permeate each other and, whether we set out to or not, it is impossible not to gain some new historical insight when reading most books - every genre can shed light on history. Even sci-fi and…
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At Literacy Tree, writing and reading for pleasure is at the heart of everything we do. At this time of year, as we start to move away from end-of-year data drops, it feels an ideal time to bring the focus…
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How it is already time for a summer bibliotherapy seems rather baffling… another full rotation around the sun and so much has happened in the world of children’s publishing! This is perhaps why there was much deliberation amongst staff as…
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Have you ever wondered what a week in the life of a Literacy Tree consultant is like? If so, or even if the question has only just occurred to you, then this blog should shed some light on our weekly…
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June is, of course, PRIDE month: a global celebration of members of the LGBTQIA+ community, but more importantly, a protest. The ‘Pride is a Protest’ movement reminds us that there is still much to be done both nationally and internationally.…
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Preparing for a Moderation Visit On the 12th May, as SATs week came to an end, many schools across England will have received notification from their local authority whether they will receive an external writing moderation visit for Year 2…
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Europe Day, held each year on the 9th of May, marks the anniversary of the Schuman Declaration – a commitment to secure long-term peace in post-war Europe. When the war in Ukraine began just over a year ago, none of…
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AI versus the writer’s craft: Why AI can’t replace teacher modelling in the creative process of writing Artificial Intelligence text generation tools like ChatGPT have sparked fierce debate in the world of education recently surrounding their potential benefits and drawbacks in…
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Editing is an essential part of the creative writing process, whether this be for fiction or non-fiction genres, and the sooner children learn to do this in a meaningful way, the sooner they will become better writers. The English curriculum requires…
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Teaching through a text is an inclusive model of teaching reading and writing, allowing everyone in the class to become immersed in the world of a rich, high-quality text. This shared experience is central to our ethos at Literacy Tree.…
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This month we’re exploring the theme of how our minds work: how do we process thoughts and ideas? Why are some people really good at spotting patterns? How is it that some people are incredibly good with their hands or…
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Every culture around the world has its own fairy tale traditions and in western tradition these are predominantly the stories that were written and collected by Hans Christian Anderson and the Grimm Brothers during the nineteenth century. These fairy tales are…
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