Foundational knowledge
Foundational knowledge approach at Sherborne Primary School
At Sherborne Primary School, our aim is to create strong foundations for every child, enabling them to grow in confidence and build upon these foundations as they continue their educational journey.
Strong Foundations refers to guidance published by the Department for Education and Ofsted that highlights the importance of making sure every child in the early years and early primary stages (Reception and Key Stage 1) builds the essential knowledge and skills they need to thrive throughout their whole school life.
At its heart, this means:
Securing the Basics Early
It’s about ensuring that children have a really strong grounding in the fundamentals — such as communication, early reading and phonics, writing, maths, and social and physical development — before they are asked to do more complex tasks. Children need repeated practice and teaching of core skills so that they remember and can confidently use them later on.GOV.UK
A Clear and Coherent Curriculum
Schools should be clear about what children need to learn and when, and make sure learning is sequenced properly so that each new step builds carefully on what came before. Children benefit most when learning is structured, well-planned, and matched to their developmental stage.
Focus on Fluency and Mastery
Rather than rushing into more challenging work, children are supported to become fluent — that is, comfortable and confident — in key skills like reading, writing and number work before they move on. This supports confidence, later learning and enjoyment of school.
Helping All Children Succeed
The guidance highlights that strong foundations are especially important for children who start school with lower levels of knowledge or confidence, or who have had limited early learning opportunities. The aim is for every child to have the solid building blocks they need so they’re ready for the rest of their education.
So, when we talk about Strong Foundations at school, we mean:
✅ Teaching and reinforcing the basics in a way that makes sense to young learners
✅ Making sure children have lots of opportunities to practice and become confident
✅ Helping children feel successful and ready for future learning
✅ Planning learning carefully so each step fits with what children already know
This is not about “teaching to a test” — it’s about giving children a really solid start that helps them feel confident, curious and capable as they continue through school.
Please see below for further information on how we aim to embed foundational knowledge and skills here at Sherborne Primary School.
Across Reception to Year 6, children develop:
Achieve
- Confidence to try new things.
- Positive attitudes towards learning.
- Resilience when things feel difficult.
Belong
- Strong relationships.
- Respect for others.
- Feeling valued as part of the Sherborne Primary community.
Care
- Enjoyment for learning.
- Developing independence.
- Knowing they are supported and cared for.
Our explicit teaching of our behaviour curriculum starts from Reception and continues through to Year 6. This is reinforced in collective practices like Assemblies and communicated though school life in class lessons, newsletters and reporting to Parents and Carers. Every child learns what it is to be a citizen of Sherborne Primary School and why that is important in our community and beyond our school gates.
Reception
- Developing gross and fine motor skills.
- Moving safely and confidently.
- Developing coordination through play and physical activity.
- Building independence with personal care.
Year 1
- Refining coordination and control.
- Developing movement skills and teamwork.
- Understanding healthy choices.
- Building confidence in physical challenges.
Year 2
- Applying skills in different contexts.
- Developing stamina, agility and cooperation.
- Understanding the importance of wellbeing.
- Showing confidence and perseverance.
Our children in Year 3 and above go on to enjoy healthy competitive sports, a range of curriculum taught sporting skills and games, swimming proficiency in Year 3 and 4 and Bicycle Proficiency in Year 5 and 6.
Fine and Gross motor skills continued to be practiced for children across the whole school building essential confidence in daily routines and practices.
Our children’s wellbeing is always at the heart of all we do with a range of learning linked to our school PHSE and RSE curriculum -SCARF as well as further workshops, charitable enterprise led by the children and shared wellbeing days such as Antibullying, Odd Socks and Children in Need across the school.
Reception – Belonging
- Building positive relationships.
- Learning routines and expectations.
- Developing independence and self-care.
- Understanding kindness, sharing and turn-taking.
- Recognising feelings and managing emotions.
Year 1 – Building responsibility
- Showing respect and care for others.
- Developing confidence and resilience.
- Making positive choices.
- Working collaboratively.
- Understanding how actions affect others.
- First year of possibly becoming a representative for our School’s Council Committee
Year 2 – Showing leadership
- Taking responsibility for themselves and others.
- Demonstrating school values through actions.
- Showing perseverance when learning is challenging.
- Supporting others and contributing positively.
- Developing independence and readiness for the next stage.
As children embark on their KS2 (Year 3-6) journey at Sherborne Primary School we develop leadership skills in the following ways:
Sports Council
Senior Prefects
Head Prefects
House Captains
Sherbean Cafe
Random Acts of Kindness
SAST Youth Council
Reception – Developing number sense
- Counting confidently and recognising numbers.
- Understanding quantity and relationships between numbers.
- Exploring patterns, shape, measure and spatial awareness.
- Developing mathematical language through play.
- Solving practical problems.
Year 1 – Building fluency
- Developing secure understanding of number facts.
- Applying calculation strategies.
- Recognising patterns and relationships.
- Explaining mathematical thinking.
- Solving increasingly complex problems.
Year 2 – Reasoning and applying
- Developing fluency with key facts.
- Applying knowledge to solve problems.
- Explaining methods and reasoning.
- Making links between mathematical ideas.
- Developing resilience when tackling challenges.
These foundations alongside our White Rose Maths Scheme have been developed using a researched based programme by the Jurassic Hub called Mastering Number which focuses on building firm foundations in the first years of school. It specifically is designed to develop automaticity in core arithmetic, setting the pathway for further learning in Years 3-6.
Reception – Developing early writing
- Developing fine motor control and pencil grip.
- Writing names and meaningful words.
- Hearing sounds in words and representing them.
- Creating simple sentences orally and in writing.
- Developing imagination through storytelling and role play.
Year 1 – Building structure
- Writing simple sentences independently.
- Applying phonics knowledge to spell.
- Developing use of punctuation and sentence structure.
- Writing for different purposes.
- Beginning to edit and improve work.
Year 2 – Developing independence
- Writing longer pieces with structure and detail.
- Using expanded vocabulary and varied sentence structures.
- Applying spelling patterns and grammatical knowledge.
- Planning, drafting and improving writing.
- Writing confidently for different audiences and purposes.
As children progress through to Years 3-6 at Sherborne Primary School we continue to echo the teaching of writing embedded in Reception to Year 1 from our Read Write Inc Scheme called Get Writing taking the principles of holding a sentence, building vocabulary and practising spelling into our daily lessons.
Reception – Believe I can read
- Developing a love of stories, rhymes and books.
- Understanding that print carries meaning.
- Learning phoneme-grapheme correspondences through systematic phonics.
- Developing blending and segmenting skills.
- Retelling stories and talking about characters and events.
Year 1 – Becoming fluent readers
- Applying phonics knowledge confidently when reading.
- Reading accurately with increasing fluency.
- Developing comprehension through questioning and discussion.
- Building vocabulary through a wide range of texts.
- Developing independence and enjoyment as readers.
Year 2 – Reading with understanding
- Reading with increasing fluency, accuracy and expression.
- Developing deeper comprehension skills.
- Making predictions, inferences and connections.
- Discussing author choices and vocabulary.
- Reading widely and developing personal preferences.
A systematic and structured approach to early reading is central to our provision. In EYFS and Year 1 and 2, we use the Read Write Inc. (RWI) programme to develop early reading and phonics skills. This ensures that children acquire secure decoding, blending, and fluency skills, enabling them to read with confidence and accuracy.
Each week, children take home two books:
- A Storybook they’ve read throughout the week in class
- A Book Bag Book to share at home
As children progress into Key Stage 2, they transition to the Accelerated Reader programme, supporting comprehension and independent reading choices.
Daily reading is prioritised both in school and at home, with careful monitoring to ensure consistency.
Reception – Building foundations
- Developing confidence to speak with adults and peers.
- Listening attentively and responding to questions.
- Building vocabulary through rich conversations, stories, songs and play.
- Learning to express feelings, ideas and needs.
- Developing confidence to join discussions and contribute.
Year 1 – Growing confidence
- Speaking clearly in full sentences and adapting language for different situations.
- Listening respectfully and responding thoughtfully.
- Using new vocabulary across the curriculum.
- Asking questions to deepen understanding.
- Beginning to explain thinking and ideas.
Year 2 – Applying skills independently
- Communicating ideas confidently with increasing detail.
- Participating in discussions, building on others’ ideas.
- Using subject-specific vocabulary accurately.
- Explaining reasoning and making connections.
- Developing confidence as learners who can articulate what they know.
Our curriculum from Reception to Year 6 is rich in oracy and children continue to develop their foundational skills in a number of ways through enrichment opportunities including;
Public speaking in assemblies including Achievement Assemblies
Debate
Poetry Recital
Drama opportunities and Performances
Talk partners
Class presentations
Our Speech and Language Teaching Assistant is Elklan-trained, having received specialist training from speech and language professionals. This expertise enables us to enhance communication and language provision across our setting.
We follow the Shrec approach to developing language and take any opportunity we can to develop our pupils language and communication skills.
