Question to the Department for Education:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Nash on 14 January (HL3982 and HL3983), where in any of the National Curriculum documents of recent years there appear Programmes of Study on vocabulary that provide the degree of informed and specialised detail together with clear guidance on progression accorded to spelling and grammar.

Vocabulary development is embedded with the information on grammar in the section of the National Curriculum framework document entitled ‘Vocabulary, grammar and punctuation’, which also sets out the terminology that pupils should be taught to use to discuss their writing.

The National Curriculum framework does not contain a separate programme of study for vocabulary, nor did it in draft form. Vocabulary development is instead emphasised and integrated throughout the programmes of study, and linked to reading, writing and spelling. Reading widely and often, together with reading for pleasure, is also reinforced throughout the programmes of study, and attention to the quantity and quality of reading will support vocabulary development.

The National Curriculum framework sets a clear expectation that teachers develop pupils’ vocabulary actively, building systematically on pupils’ current knowledge.