Lansdown Park Academy aims to develop a love of language and literature while building students’ ability to communicate confidently across a range of contexts.
Students access a wide variety of texts, with explicit teaching of key vocabulary to strengthen expression, style, structure and form, helping them become imaginative and effective writers.
Reading and literacy are embedded across the whole curriculum to promote a lifelong enjoyment of reading, enabling students to understand and engage with the wider world.
Our texts and activities are deliberately chosen to align with the mainstream National Curriculum and the CLF curriculum, giving students broad exposure to English and ensuring continuity with what they will study upon reintegration.
This approach helps students understand the purpose and value of English for both their present learning and their future opportunities, supporting smooth and successful transition back to mainstream education.
By giving this context to their learning, the children understand the value of English to them both now and in their futures.
Students have an opportunity to study both English Language and English Literature, developing inference skills and exploring how language is used to create meaning before applying this knowledge to their own writing. Students explore fiction and non-fiction and learn how to analyse the effect of language, form and structure as well as how to apply linguistic devices and genre conventions to their own writing.
In English Literature, students explore Macbeth. This allows students to develop knowledge of our literary heritage and the social and historical context. Students will also use the skills developed to comment on language choices, themes and characterisation throughout their learning in English.
Reading opportunities are embedded throughout the curriculum, using Accelerated Reader and texts and resources relevant to all subjects. Students are encouraged to explore a range of fiction and non-fiction so that they can access and enjoy texts from our literary heritage, as well as understand and comment on current events and contemporary issues in the wider world. The library is organised to support this with a clear strategy of how to improve the literacy of our students.
Students also practice speaking and listening skills which are applied to their work linking to employability and careers. We aim for students to practice speaking aloud and at length so that they can express themselves articulately and convincingly in both formal and informal settings.
Our 12-Week offer will vary depending on when the students arrive, with the content they will study shown in the table below. If a student arrives after a certain module has started, they will receive a bespoke lesson to enable the student to catch up and take a full part in lessons from that point onwards.
| Period | Autumn/Winter (T2/T3) | Winter/Spring
(T3/T4) |
Spring/Summer
(T5/T6) |
Summer/Autumn
(T6/T1) |
| Topic | Reading Non-Fiction | Creative Writing | A Murder Mystery | Macbeth |
| Key Skills | Students develop essential skills in learning how to understand, question, and make meaning from real-world texts. | Students experiment with language, structure, and imagination to craft original pieces. | Students explore genre conventions and deduction through studying a murder mystery. | Students will study character, theme, and dramatic technique through this core work of Shakespeare. |
Across all four modules, the curriculum is structured to strengthen literacy, promote independent thinking, and support success in English.
The English curriculum at Lansdown Park Academy equips students with the knowledge, skills and confidence needed to communicate effectively and engage meaningfully with the world around them. Through consistent exposure to a wide range of texts, students develop stronger reading fluency, improved comprehension and an expanding vocabulary that supports their learning across all subjects. Their writing becomes more purposeful and controlled as they learn to apply linguistic devices, structural features and genre conventions with increasing accuracy. Study of Macbeth and other core texts deepens their cultural understanding and strengthens their analytical abilities, enabling them to identify themes, interpret character motivations and recognise how writers influence an audience. Students demonstrate increased resilience, independence and motivation, supported by regular opportunities to read for pleasure and to speak with clarity and confidence. Over time, this leads to improved engagement, more positive attitudes towards English and measurable progress towards their individual academic targets. Most importantly, students leave Lansdown Park Academy better prepared for reintegration into mainstream education, further study and future employment, with a stronger belief in their own potential as readers, writers and communicators.
