At Cherry Tree Academy we have implemented 'literacy tree' as our approach to teaching English from September 2024. 

What is Literacy Tree?

Literacy Tree is a complete, book-based platform for primary schools, covering all Primary English curriculum requirements, training and support. Use it as a framework to build your curriculum or adapt it to suit your school, academy, or trust. 

We are a community of teachers, with a love of literature and a deep understanding of Primary English. Explore how we can elevate literacy outcomes in your classroom: 

Core Offering

Writing Roots: Our book-based planning sequences provide comprehensive curriculum coverage, engaging children to write with a clear audience and purpose. This forms the backbone of our Teach Through a Text pedagogy.

Spelling Seeds: Teach spelling and vocabulary in context through investigation and application. These sequences complement Writing Roots, using the same texts for additional short writing opportunities.

Literary Leaves: Enhance reading comprehension with sequenced activities that guide children through whole books, creating critical readers. These use novels, poetry collections, and high-quality non-fiction books connected to Writing Roots through Literary Themes.

Home Learning Branches: Extend learning to the home with resources for writing, reading comprehension, spelling, vocabulary, and further reading opportunities, often used for homework.

Our pedagogy

Literacy Tree’s writing resource and programme, Writing Roots, based around our Teach Through a Text pedagogy, embeds all National Curriculum requirements and places audience and purpose at the core. 

Literacy Tree’s primary focus through its book-based pedagogy is to motivate children to write for a range of audiences and purposes using high-quality, diverse children’s literature by significant authors. We do this by helping schools immerse children in a range of literary worlds and themes, heightening engagement and creating curiosity through process drama, discussion and debate. This allows them to see themselves represented, and also explore the lives and experiences of others. 

An English lesson at Cherry Tree Academy would include:

• Fun and engagement through high quality genres and texts;
• High expectations and challenge for all, support through appropriate scaffolding materials;
• Collaboration and reflection between peers;
• First quality teaching from all adults, with groups of learners supported in lessons.