At St Robert Bellarmine, the teaching of vocabulary is an essential component of our pupil’s education and fundamental in developing comprehension, expression, and critical thinking. It is important for students to develop a strong vocabulary so they may verbally communicate about their own or others' experiences and work.

Based upon the work of Mary Myatt, we strongly believe that children who have a rich vocabulary are better able to understand what they read, communicate their ideas clearly, and analyze and evaluate information effectively. Additionally, a broad vocabulary helps children to develop their creativity and imagination, as well as their ability to make connections and draw conclusions.

Vocabulary is a key component of our early years curriculum. It is regularly referred to throughout all interactions. We provide opportunities for the children to encounter vocabulary through high-quality texts, all conversations, during enhanced continuous provision and continuous provision activities, while being read to, during modelled writing, when listening to others, and encounters on trips and with experts.

We use a number of practical strategies to help children to develop their vocabulary

• Class shared texts: vocabulary can be discussed in the context of the text being read. Children are encouraged to apply this learning in a wide variety of activities; class and group discussions, role play, enhanced continuous provision and continuous provision.
• Class environment: we aim to develop a rich language environment using high quality interactions (EEF) and where appropriate displays; phonics working walls, labels and captions.
• Specific teaching: where the teacher identifies certain words and provides direct instruction in word learning strategies (definitions and synonyms).
• Scaffolds: we use sentence frames and sentence stems to support children in their use of new vocabulary
• Practice: children are encouraged to use new vocabulary accurately within full sentences in their speech.  Ambitious or new vocabulary used by the children is celebrated by the teachers through verbal feedback.

Overall, teaching vocabulary in the early years curriculum encourages children to talk (communication and language). It develops children’s ability to hold tools (physical development). It extends children’s experiences (understanding the world) and their ability to talk and understand the world around them (reading comprehension).