Oracy

Using Makaton sign language to develop spoken language skills
Staff at Green Lane Primary School believe oracy plays a
critical role in their pupils’ language development, and that a
large part of their role is to help pupils improve their spoken
communication. The school works with a high proportion of
pupils for whom English is an additional language, and these
pupils often have limited development in their first language
when they arrive in nursery.
“When they come to school, we’re throwing them into a language that
is new to them really, so for those children we feel it’s really important
we help them catch up as quickly as possible, and immerse them in
the language. …But that is the majority of our children”
Lorraine Lee, Pupil Progress Leader
All the teaching staff at the school use Makaton sign language with their classes alongside spoken
English. Teachers say this gives pupils confidence as verbal communicators because it helps
them think through and formulate their speech. Staff attend weekly training sessions in Makaton
signing with the manager of the school’s Designated Special Provision, Angela Catterick. Senior
leaders and class teachers believe Makaton is used consistently throughout the school and that it
underpins pupils’ academic progress. One of the school’s nursery teachers explains it can initially be
intimidating to learn, but “seeing it in practice and seeing it work” in her colleagues’ lessons has
given her greater incentive to embed it in her own.
“It starts with having your basic needs met. Particularly
for our nursery children, we’ve found that since we’ve
started using Makaton a lot more that the communication
comes along a lot faster. That then builds to being able to
argue, being able to make your opinion known, being able
to access information”
Jane Townend, Deputy Headteacher
Other classroom strategies used across the school include:
• ‘Target’ vocabulary in each class, each week, which class teachers then return to and embed
throughout the year
• Modelling of both spoken English for the purposes of general communication, and also subjectspecific
language. Teachers speak in full sentences, and encourage pupils to do the same
• Scaffolding communication through, for example, Makaton, sentence starters, setting ‘rules’
for talk, and practising active listening in lessons
Angela says pupils’ development in spoken language is frontloaded, with pupils making most
progress between the nursery and year 3. After that “we’re looking at much finer tuning, and
developing at a more advanced level.”
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