Fun ways to improve writing

Fun ways

of

improving writing

Cheshire Grammar network, 2006

Introduction:

This resource bank is produced by members of Cheshires Primary Grammar Network and aims to give teachers some practical ways for improving childrens writing at the sentence level. The practical ideas have been taught in a range of genres by members of the network, and examples of the impact on childrens writing are included.

In order to be effective writers children need to possess the following attributes:

A wide ranging vocabulary.

Phonemic and phonological awareness so they can recognise phonemes and syllables within words.

Be able to form the letters of the alphabet comfortably

Develop the skills to make consistent spelling.

Have a concept of writing: that writing conveys messages written in words and writers choose words and put them in order to form sentences; that sentences express ideas that can be linked together and expressed over a collection of sentences.

That particular effects can be achieved by writing and that readers can be influenced by these.

That they can talk about their writing to help them gather ideas, discuss their choice of words and sentences and evaluate what they have written.

That writing is a powerful and effective way of expressing oneself, of shaping things and achieving a range of purposes.

Understand the important features of book language how it looks and sounds in narrative, poetry and non-fiction. This process has been formulated into the core teaching sequences for reading and writing.

The implications of all this for childrens attainment and progress in writing are considerable. Writing flourishes in a stimulating writing environment with displays and celebrated examples of childrens own writing, purpose and opportunities for writing linked to activities across the curriculum; frequent use of writing to communicate (through notes, reminders, lists, etc); frequent access to and encouragement to use writing materials in the classroom or setting for a variety of purposes and demonstrate to children what they are doing (e.g. writing notes completing registers, making lists, completing forms, writing labels, captions, responding to childrens work.)

What is essential is that pupils are taught from an early stage to elaborate sentences as required. This is central to pupils development as writers and an area that the school can focus on with advantage.

In Foundation Stage and at Key Stage 1, the representation of ideas in sentences is a characteristic of written text which children need to be made aware of through reading and eventually learn to control in writing.

Written sentences are differently structured from spoken utterances which can rely on gesture, intonation and stress to fill out the speakers meaning. Techniques to help children include sentence manipulation: constructing, completing, expanding, manipulation, transforming, combining, reducing, investigating.

At Key Stage 2, the ability to link ideas within sentences by combining and sequencing clauses enables children to structure and connect ideas in a wide variety of ways, which create interest for the readers and make childrens writing more precise, varied, surprising and effective.

Beginning in Foundation stage and though Key Stage 1, children should draw from their reading an increasingly rich vocabulary, and learn to select words and phrases that add colour and precision to their writing, refine its meaning and are appropriate to its audience and purpose.

Some children pick up these features easily, but for many the nature of written texts needs to be carefully taught. This learning comes in three important ways: through reading, through oral telling sand retelling of stories explaining, instructing, recounting, etc., and thirdly, through shared and modelled writing where the teacher focuses attention explicitly on writing text, demonstrating how to structure, punctuate and join sentences, choose appropriate vocabulary, and make meaning precise and explicit.

This pack provides some fun ways of improving childrens writing and giving them the choices to expand their expressive range. The ideas are designed to be taught by teachers as part of the core teaching sequence as choices in modelled, shared and supported writing and as activities for guided and independent group work.

Contents:

Practical teaching strategies for shared, modelled, supported, guided and independent writing:

A burger sentences

B h,a,n,d, connectives

C click, click, clap teaching commas

D motorway sentences

E pizza phrases

F lollipop sentences

G The Crazy Zoo

H passive poems

I add, change, connect.

J b,a,s,h connectives

K o,w,l connectives

M. Poetry and grammar writing techniques (15 great ideas provided by David Horner)

N. narrative and non-narrative techniques (15 ideas provided by Alan Peat www. alan peat. Com )

O. Drama and grammar writing techniques (provided by David Harmer)

P. Evidence of the impact of these techniques in childrens writing. Examples are kindly provided by members of the Primary Grammar Network:

Alvanley Primary School

Gainsborough Junior School

Grange Primary School, Winsford

Helsby Hillside Primary School

Over Hall Primary School

Wimboldsley Primary School

Q. What big teeth you have, grammar resource pack

A. Burger sentences

This is a simple way of expanding after a noun.

Ask the children to imagine that a sentence is two bits of a burger the top bit of bread and the bottom bit.

(i)The grasshopper died.

(ii)The grasshopper

died.

(iii) add the filling:

The grasshopper, who sang all year, died.

The pattern can be developed when the children add two or three layers of filling: the footballer who played all season, who broke the record, resigned.

B. H,a,n,d,s; these connectives can be remembered easily: however, although, nevertheless, despite, subsequently.

To help children remember them, make a Monster poem up

My monster lives in a cave,

However, he really likes sunlight

Higher order connectives can be remembered on the other hand:

Thumb (Therefore), First finger (Furthermore), Middle finger ( Moreover), Third finger (Thus), Little finger (Likewise).

C. Commas click, click, clap. (comma, comma, full-stop)

Try the sentence structure:

My car, red and green, is the slowest in the world.

My football, muddy and old, has never scored a goal.

D. Motorway sentences; (sometimes called added action)

This helps children to start sentences with ing or ed words. Write a Motorway poem five days of the week, five vehicles, five ing words and five verbs:

On Monday, careering down the motorway, the taxi burst into flames.

Careering down the motorway on Monday, the car burst into flames.

Or: Finished with chips, the children chose fruit.

E. Pizza phrases

To expand before the noun, try Pizza Phrases. Take the word pizza and adding one word-at-a-time, build up different tastes, textures, sizes, qualities to it. See if you can get up to 7 or 8 adjectives.

The pizza

The amazing pizza

The amazing juicy pizza

Etc.

( the amazing, juicy, steamy, cheese-and-tomato, bought at the Coop, cheap and cheerful Big Pan pizza.)

Children have a go at writing their own pizza phrase using something precious to them (a football, a special present, a hairgrip a sparkly, pink-and-purple, plastic, bought at Marks and Spencers hairgrip).

F. Lollipop sentences

These help children to add advanced punctuation semi-colons and colons. Model this sentence and explain that what comes after the semi-colon is the same as what comes before, but expressed in a different way.

My lollipop is red and green; it is a rainbow in my hand.

Try the same pattern with animals (the elephant is huge and grey; it is a mountain in the jungle.)

To teach colons, follow the lollipop sentence, but add one word from the first sentence in the second:

My lollipop is red and green: it is a red rainbow in my hand

G. The Crazy Zoo: this idea teaches the hearts of speech; adjectives, nouns and verbs. The green goldfish gulped (add the adverbgreedily).

H. passive poem: this poem teaches children the wasby structure of the passive: The ant was bitten by the centipede

Children follow the awasb.byc pattern through the alphabet. Then show how you can cut half of the sentence off and it still makes sense (the ant was bitten.) but we hide the guilty party.

I. Add, change, connect a simple way to improve writing.

It was winter. The grasshopper died.

J. B,a,s,h, (simple set of connectives) because, although, subsequently, however. Displayed on a boxing glove, they are quickly remembered.

K. O,W,L: these are three sophisticated connectives;

Otherwise, What-/wherever and Likewise.

L. Storytelling techniques:

1. KS1 practical strategies: - the teacher tells a story, but misses out certain words, phrases and events and asks the children to put the missing bits in, perhaps connectives. This is a chance to listen carefully and to speak to make a better version.

2. The teacher tells a story in a monotone and asks the children what must be changed to make it interesting. (I.e. children tell you how to improve a poor reading). Discuss the points the children raise and make lists of the changes.

3. Lego story: write a story without connectives. Then write a couple of sentences from it in blue Lego, and then add the bridge as a connective to show how the sentences link up. Your favourite connectives can be because it works brilliantly! (I love my mummy because.)

4. Make a sentence of 6 or 7 words about Cinderella. Form them out of Lego, and then mix them up. The children have to put the sentence together again from the jumbled words. (Beautiful Cinderella went to the ball.)

5. Hand signals for sentence features: makes sense (circle of the hand); tells you something (point a finger), has a capital letter (the full hand with fingers spread out), and a full-stop (make a fist).

6. Hand signals for guided writing: Think (point to your face), Count the words (show your fingers), write it down (make a zigzag writing movement), full stop (make a fist).

7. Modelling sentences use this sequence to help the children remember what they have written

model the sentence

Count the words

Say the sentence.

8. traffic lights: ideas for writing paragraphs encourage the children to:

Stop [red];

Think [amber]; or

Go [green] start the next paragraph.

9. KS 1 & 2 strategies:

10. 11. At KS 2 children gain a great deal from writing one genre into the form of another they enjoy. (An advert into a narrative; a leaflet in to an argument, a diary into a travel brochure, etc).

11. Poster work at KS 2 can be liberating for children- to write a poster gives children freedom. It is stimulating and visual. When they can discuss the language structures in a poster they are discussing a persuasive piece of writing. Children can produce the same ranges of writing by producing a leaflet.

12. If connectives:

13. If I won the lottery, I would.

14. Children talk about the possibilities in partners, thinking of one sensible and one silly idea.

15. When poem.

When I feel scared, I sometimes

When I feel confused, I cant decide.

16. These are particularly useful in mixed-age classes, and allow differentiation by outcome.

17. Instructional Writing:

Instructions for using a Plug-it-in toy.

As soon as

If

It ought to

Once youve

M. Poetry and grammar writing;

These ideas were provided to the Grammar Network by David Horner, our visiting writer. David pointed out that repeated structures are the glue of writing for children, offering a supportive framework in which they can write. He shared the following models and structures using connectives:

1. the best at

The best at

mega at

loves

Leon is best at football.

Sam and Maggie are mega at drawing

Paula loves playing out.

2. The longest poem ever written (sometimes called The Wonderful Washing Line)

Youll need: big sheets of A3 white paper.

Divide the class into 7 groups, each group taking the name of a day of the week.

Children work in threes.

On Monday, Janice, Ryan and Annie

Saw

A skirt, big, red, little and old.

On Tuesday, Samantha, Leon and Sam

Saw

A big blue jumper on the (super-duper) washing-line.

3. Wants to... . structure.

Ask the children to think about what the hand, eye, head, feet and so on, want to do.

My hand wants to wave at a football match.

My eyes like to look at the stars

My head wants to lie down in a bed of petals.

Also, use the This handloves.

My hand loves painting pictures and sloshing in the mud.

My feet like stepping in puddles and walking in the sand.

The hand

Make a giant-sized hand and add these verbs, one to each finger:

Loves, hates, can, dreams of, remembers.

Then ask the children to use the verbs to write a structured poem:

This hand loves

Hates

Can

Dreams of

Remembers

4. What If... . (Years 4 & 5)

Tell the children that the human brain is formed in two halves. One half is reasonable and sensible. The other half is playful and imaginative.

Start of a line with a sensible thought What if

The add a playful idea: .the tiger was covered in spots.

What if a lion drove a taxi in Crewe.

What if the supermarket was underwater.

5. Good questionsbad answers. (attributed to Wes McGee)

Children ask questions about objects, places and people they knew in the past:

Wheres the rattle I had when I was two?

Lost in the garden

Wheres the friend I have when I was five?

Gone to live in another town.

Wheres the tin of marbles I had when I was six?

Sold in a car boot sale.

Etcetc.

6. This is the hand that

Build up a sequence of lines based on this structure:

This is the hand that waved goodbye /or: - that held the nail/ that made a cake, etc.

This is the mouth that kissed the stars.

These are the lips that spoke to the wind.

7. When I rule the world

Ask children to construct this poem using, for example,

Traffic

Food

When I rule the world

I will drive everywhere in a Ferrari.

When I rule the world

Therell be ice cream every day.

9. Using connective and

I opened the armadillo and... .

I opened the armadillo and out came a cucumber.

I opened the cucumber and out came a prickly porcupine.

I opened the prickly porcupine and out came an alphabet.

I opened the alphabet and out came a

9. The Magic carpet:

Using whiteboards or A4 pieces of paper, the children write My Magic carpet structures:

My magic carpet

I will go to see.

Next Ill see.

Then Ill travel

Afterwards Ill.

Last of all Ill

10. Snowballing:

Children work as partners, A and B. They tell one another stories, and then re-tell the same stories to another pair, C and D. The pairs of partners have to identify changes that have been made each time the story is told. (Are the changes in words, sentence structures or ideas and themes?)

11. Rules for speech children work out a set of ground rules for speaking in a group (See the Speaking & Listening bank)

12. Therefore

The connective therefore can be used in the following model:

I am Rain

Therefore I touch the sky.

I am fog

Therefore you cannot see your fingertips.

We are thunder and lightning

Therefore we rumble at night.

13. If only

Share this structure with children:

If only Mars was made of jam

If only my footprint was on the moon like Neil Armstrongs

And ask the children to extend the structure using the connective If only

14. So a secret poem of magical powers:

Offer the children some beginnings, using verbs expressing offering in some way - place, show, leave.

Then share the structure

I will place my secret in (a vase), so

I will show the secret. (To a magician), so...

I will leave my secret (under the stairs) so

Also, develop this idea by means of:

I want wings so

I want a fishs body so

I want an eye in the back of my head so

15. Although poems.

Choose a subject about which you can write a riddle. For example, a boat, then share the structure of a riddle using the word although.because

Although I carry people, Im not a car.

Although I transport things, Im not a lorry.

Although I go on the waves, Im not a surfboard.

Because I live near the shore I am a boat.

Recommended texts for writing poetry:

Sheep dont go to school by Andrew Fusek Peters. (Bloodaxe) ISBN 1852244089.

Wishes, Lies and Dreams by Kenneth Koch. Published in the USA but available in England from Blackwells Bookshop in Oxford.

A study of metaphor

Women, Fire and Dangerous Things G. Lakoff, published in the USA, but available from Blackwells Bookshop in Oxford.

N. Ideas provided by Alan Peat www. alan peat. com

Idea 1 Make a timeword poster. This is a precursor to early recount writing (a suitable Y2/3 activity)

When

who

where

what

Saturday

I

in living room

watching FA cup final on TV

Develop this by creating a timeword poster by adding

Words and phrases such as:

1 Last night

2 this morning

3 at the week-end

4 next week

In this way we are linking the language of time with early recount sentences, and the who, what, where, what are the first stages.

Idea 2

the animal game

gather the actions and qualities associated with particular animals. Present them in table form:

What it looks like

What it is

(ask this one first)

What it does

Where does it

furry

dog

eat a lot

in the kitchen

energetic,

noisy

play

in the park

chases the ball

in the field

The teacher can discuss the childrens responses.

Children can also make little flip books akin to this.

Idea 3:

Lipogram:

Ban a letter of the alphabet

Explain to the children that you are the president of Letter World and Ive woken up in a bad mood and banned the letter. As a result, we have to make a story about (choose something unusual, say a worm ) without using the letter o.

Develop the idea in some of these ways:

write lipogrammatic nursery rhyme: Humpty Dumpty without the letter o.

In lipograms the children will manipulate words and sentences, and also refer to their thesauruses to find suitable words.

You can also add the fine of an imaginary 5.00 is the children use a word containing the banned letter.

Stick to the vowel sounds.

Idea 3

Language graphs peaks and troughs. This technique links grammar and maths through presenting language preferences through a graph. The language graph work with any text:

You need: an A3 sheet of paper

What you do:

Draw a line down the middle of the paper in landscape.

Write the words Exciting zone at the top and Less exciting zone at the bottom, as follows:

Exciting zone

----------------------------------------------------------

Less exciting zone

Draw a line explaining high points (for interest), and low points for dull parts. Then children have to explain why the language has a high point of interest, and put a label next to it explaining why. The same applied to the less exciting parts.

You must link it with what the children have done earlier, explaining why a particular bit of language is or isnt exciting.

Idea 4:

Zoophabet [patterned use of language]

Make a 26 page book from A to Z. Imagine a monster and give it a name beginning with the letter a. Then add some characteristics, each of which starts with the letter a:

I am called

I eat

I live in

Draw the monster and add the childrens comments

I am called [Al]

I eat [ants]

I live in [Anglesey]

Idea 5

Two A sentences - two adjectives before the noun and two adjectives after:

Poor little Cinderella in the cold, old house.

Start by building up a character poster using the following categories:

Working with Cinderella

Words to describe characters

Who they are

What they do

Where they do it

Cinderella

sister

Cleans the house

In the kitchen

Buttons

footman

Cleans the shoes

In the kitchen

Idea 6

If children use and then too much, have a green postit with alternatives for them to choose. Children can use a green pen in their writing to show where they have used one of these alternatives to said. Similarly, have a red coloured poster with alternatives to get, and allow the children to use red pens in their writing to show where they have used the word of their choice from this red poster -

Or a purple poster with different sentence types.

Or an orange poster with adjectives.

These coloured words are important for the self-assessment opportunities

Try yellow posters for dilemmas, another set for connectives, another set for story endings.

Idea 7

Connectives poster

The haunted house was empty.

Move the children beyond and then ( blue poster with alternatives to and then

Ask children to finish off the poster

But..

So

During.

However

Children fall back on and then because they dont understand the meaning of but, so, during, however, and so on.

Idea 8

Boxing Clever (another idea for teaching narrative)

Beginning, middle. End - these are merely three words. Children need to know what these words mean.

We need to develop sequential understanding of narrative.

Boxing Clever is an idea designed to appeal to visual/ auditory and kinaesthetic learners. It is an idea that develops story sense and is valid at level 5.

What you do:

have a line of carrier bags or boxes. It takes 45 minutes in an after school in a three-form entry to make them. Have blank display place above the bags.

Put labels on the bags and pictures inside:

For example, a Victorian bag with pictures stuck above the bag.

Discuss whats in the box/bag.

box

label

pictures

Structured oracy notes

Box 1

Who?

Box 2

Where?

Box 3

Where next?

Box 4

Why?

Box 5

What goes wrong?

Box 6

Who helps?

Also include:

Box 7 where last?

Box 7 feelings

Take a picture out of the box- a character, then a picture where he lived a picture of a mansion, etc.

Number 2 question big, bigger, biggest, small, smaller smallest ask whats the biggest thing he can see outside his house/ whats the smallest things he can see? Etc.

Not so long ago there was a boy called Joe he had a stripy jumper and lived in a big house. He

Ask where next? For many children who dont have story sense, they just had a list of actions.

Take a picture out of the bag where was Joe going? Hes going to.and through.

There was a boy called Jo and .he was going through..a city. He could see the tall skyscrapers.

Perhaps the picture is blank - was he going to see someone or to do something?

Not long ago a boy called JOE..was going through a city [ what went wrong?] add more complex language make a note about the language of feelings

There is a huge storm on the picture.

[everyone stand up Its raining, its raining, what can I do? Ill put on my coat, and tie up my shoe.

Structure the story in terms of problem (P) and bad outcome (B).

PBPBPBG (problem, bad outcome, problem, bad outcome, problem good outcome)

Alternately,

PGPGPG (problem, good outcome, problem, good outcome)

Dilemma he didnt get to his grans house.

Build in imaginative thinking questions. I wonder what he did when he got there.

5-year old said he had a bath.

Why?

Because he was in a storm and got very muddy.

This is a superb example of a five-year old.

How did he feel? - really happy, and he built a snowman.

This has introduction, development, and conclusion.

It is a menu of possibilities that provide children with plenty of ideas to start and end stories.

Ask the children - how do you start a story? Add what appeals to the eyes, the nose, the ears. Start with teacher scribing, then move towards independence for the children.

Idea 9

Outward-inward sentence:

OI sentence: Outward, inward he smiled and shook the mans hands warmly. (this is an OI sentence).

Idea 10

List sentences and phrase sentences:

It was a stormy day

it was a stormy dismal day

start with s (stormy) = solemn, d (dismal) = dangerous, etc.

It was a stormy tempestuous day when he...

semi-colons (as a list): It was a bright, calm, clear and warm.

It was bright as a midday sun; calm as a millpond; clear as a newly polished window and warm as a trout.

Develop criteria-based self assessment sheets. When pupil finishes writing, they assess their own work against the sheet. One could be linked to sentence structures.

e.g. Have I remembered to use a 2A sentence?

e.g. Have I included at least one list sequence.

Alternately, a wall display with picture of a sun, with strips of writing that explain how to improve their work streaming out of the sun.

Idea 11

Teach the rules of paragraphing: (whole school approach). Explain that a paragraph is:

a change of (a) time and (b) place.

Avoid the change of idea method because it is the hardest change of all to grasp.

Time point to the clock; Place take a step sideways, and click your fingers shows a speaker.

1. A change of Time (first, then, after that).

Miss out a line, dont indent to show a paragraph because a line cant be refuted.

2. a change of place - build up a paragraph poster:

Rules of paragraphing

Are changes of:

Time

First, next, then, after, before

Place

(KVA- take a step sideways to show you miss out a line)

In the kitchenon the playgroundat the seaside, etc.

Change of speaker.

Use the catchy phrase Sixty six, ninety nine, new speaker, new line.

Change of idea (the hardest of all)

This is one of the hardest principles to understand).

Idea 11 Speech punctuation

Use the principle of comic transfer.

1. Take a simple comic strip with two characters

e.g. Batman and Robin. Draw these as stick figures.

2. Tippex out the speech bubbles and photocopy it.

3. ask pupils to write words in the blank bubbles (the method is open to abuse, so control carefully!!)

Batman said, bendy marks

Batman also works as the starting point for play scripts. This works better than going from story to playscript, because the technique starts in the visual (a comic picture).

Idea 12

Ending stories:Children need a menu of possibilities of how stories end before they start.

1. Triple question opening

2. write the title ; the haunted class.

3. then write

Is the haunted class the one with?

Ask the children to shut their eyes. Then ask them to imagine a haunted room, and something strange is in the corner.

E.G. A GREEN LIGHT.

Add adjectives, for instance a flickering green light.

Ask the children whats happening to the doors?

theyre rattling and banging.

Go back to the start of the story, and ask the questions:

Is the haunted class the one with the flickering lights, the one with the moving shadows, the doors that bang? No, its the one here that Im in now.

This is an easy way to teach to younger children some interesting ways of starting stories: three good things and three bad:

Youre on an alien planet where the rivers are made out of chocolate. One where money grows on trees. Where the mountains are pink.

Is this the planet where the rivers are made out of chocolate? Where money grows on trees? Where the mountains are pink? No. Its the one where

Idea 13:

Have you ever Story.

Have you ever been in a scary house? Have you ever walked alone? Have you ever been lost? No, but Ive walked alone on a dark moor

Idea 14

5 major plot types.

Especially for reluctant writers

genre transformation e.g. weve been doing science fiction for a few weeks. Change Shipwreck story to Lost in space and if its the wrong story, we need to change some of the words:

the space shuttle blasts off to the moon

a meteor storm

the shuttle is wrecked.

Most of the crew land on a deserted planet.

They have to be clever in order to survive.

In the class, the children have a plot skeleton- the hooks for the plot structure.

Ship

sails

To sea

Space rocket

thrusts

spacecraft

zooms

shuttle

Blasts off

Idea 15 staircase adjectives

She was beautiful

a

z

yobbish

a

i

r

youthful girl

O. Drama and grammar ideas provided to the Framework by David Harmer, visiting writer

What follows is a brief summary of a days training in a variety of Drama and Oracy strategies in Key Stages 1 and 2 and how they develop different genres of writing. Clear references are made to how these ideas might apply to the Foundation stage. The day is essentially practical, offering opportunities to walk and talk through a variety of strategies and approaches, combined with opportunities to discuss and issues raised. Time is also built in for collaborative writing and a chance to plan a model lesson.

My first objective is to teach drama strategies.

The school objective is to recycle opportunities for Oracy within the group. We work as a class, in groups and as individuals. I also differentiate so that more able pupils are given opportunities to take work in at their level and I encourage less confident pupils to develop their ideas more clearly.

My third objective is to provide a platform for subsequent planning and writing. I begin each session of drama by saying Were going to make up a story and I will tell you bits and you will make bits up as we go along. Then were going to work in groups to plan a story based on what we have learned in this piece of work. However, other genres of writing can be explored using the same drama experience just as effectively e.g. writing in role, scripts, letters, persuasive writing, newspaper reports and poetry.

Some of the drama strategies I use include;

Thought tracking; All the children speak out loud the thoughts of the villager they are agreeing to be. It allows the ice to break and confirms role.

Working in role.

Hot seating.

Mapping the story; a powerful tool, allowing the children to see where they all are at any point in the work and to provide an objective other, as Dorothy.

Heathcote named it; a thing that symbolises their story-telling, their context and their characters.

Mantle of the Expert; Another term from Dorothy Heathcote, which means giving indisputable expertise to the children.

Decision Alley; To help solve a dilemma two rows of children form a corridor through which a character walks. As that child moves, the other children speak their advice and offer a view on the possible solution.

Freeze Frame; Halting the action of the work and asking questions of the children.

Forum Theatre; Some if the class improvise as the others watch. The stage is a space between two seated lines of children. The others ask questions of the group. Again, this strategy develops commitment to the work and their underlying understanding of the themes being explored.

Health Warning

Nobody is expected to do some drama at an adult level! We simply work together to model some of these strategies and explore the ways in which they develop writing.

A great deal of humour may be involved.

Developing story writing from simple and oracy strategies

In both Key Stage 1 and 2, my work began with drama in the hall leading to story planning in the classroom. Whatever writing was done then, colleagues developed the written work with their class after I had left the school. What follows attempts to explain the work I did, bearing in mind that so much of the works quality was in the oral exchanges and symbolic thinking that came from the children as they entered in the drama with great enthusiasm, commitment and skill. That work, like all theatre, happened there and then and now has vanished. However, thanks to their teachers, the children went in to make strong narratives dealing with archetypal stories that have been around for many many year; stories of monsters, dragons and frightened villagers, the stuff of classic folk-tales.

Key Stage 2

My thanks go to the Heads and KS2 colleagues in the Thorne, Conisborough and Denaby schools (Doncaster) for allowing me the opportunities to develop these ideas.

My first objective was to teach drama strategies and to use drama to explore certain elements of Myth. I used Beowulf (very loosely) as a basis for my storyline. I was aiming to explore the magic of Myth, the notion of a vulnerable community protecting itself from great danger. Grendel visits darkness, havoc, violence, ruin and extreme terror upon Heolot. Grendel is chaos personified, a deeply symbolic figure representing the treat and fear isolated communities must have felt living in wild and dangerous times. The final element of Myth I introduced is that of the Hero, a magical warrior arriving to rid Heolot of Grendel.

The school objective was constantly to recycle opportunities for Oracy within the group. We worked as a class, in groups and as individuals. I also differentiated so that more able pupils were given opportunities to take work in at their level and I encouraged less confident pupils to develop their ideas more clearly.

My third objective was to provide a platform for subsequent story planning and writing. I began each session of drama by saying Were going to make up a story and I will tell you bits and you will make nits up as we go along. Then were going to work in groups to plan a story based on what we have learned in this piece of work.

Some of the drama strategies used included;

Thought tracking;

All the children speak aloud the thoughts of the villager they are agreeing to be. It allows the ice to break and confirms role.

Working in Role

The children were asked to take in the role of villagers. They were organised into families. The surname indicated their job. They used their real first names and I took on the role of David The Story teller who knew more about the villages past but who was rarely there. I was never in role for more than a few minutes.

A map of the village

This was introduced by my narrative Once, long ago, there was a village surrounded by mountains in a deep forest. There was a lake in the mountains but nobody ever went there. There was a road into the village but no road out and everyone in the village worked together. They liked living there. It was safe and comfortable. They never left the village, but helped each other exchanging work and goods as there was no money. Everyone in the village knew how to cook, clean, sew and hunt but the families in the village had their own skills that no-one else knew.

Mapping the story as it is made is a powerful tool, allowing the children to see where they are at any point in the work and to provide an objective other, as Dorothy Heathcote named it; a thing that symbolises their story-telling, their context and their characters. Each family chose where it lived and put a cross on the map and wrote their name. They also put a sign with their name on the wall. The working space was the village and we observed Aristotles unities of time/space and action. In other words everything that happened was seen and heard by us all and we were all in the same place at the same time. One group of children couldnt act as though they were in the mountains at the same time as the other were in the village.

A cooking pot for the centre of the village. The villagers sat round in a circle. It stood for fire, comfort, light, heat, security, food, drink and safety.

A wooden figure of a knight to suggest a hero, magic and myth.

Mantle of the Expert

Another term from Dorothy Heathcote, which means giving indisputable expertise to the children. The learning objectives here were to do with Oracy and Drama not historical accuracy regarding Vikings or Early Settlers.

Decision Alley

To help solve a dilemma two rows of children form a corridor through which a character walks. As that child moves, the other children speak their advice and offer a view on the possible solution.

Freeze Frame

Halting the action of the work and asking questions of the children. What are you doing? What are you lifting? Is it heavy? Etc etc. Some suggestions to expand this part of the work includes;

Freezing one group and asking each member to say one thing about the group and what it is doing/thinking/feeling.

Having other children ask the freeze-frame their own questions to develop all the classs understanding of what is being explored.

Asking the class for a title or caption to the picture, often contrasting the village at the start of the work (e.g. the happy village) with what happens after angry splits occur half way through the work (e.g. the divided village).

If the village splits apart in its reaction to Davids news, the two sided can form a freeze frame emphasising facial expressions and body postures that reflect how they feel. This can then be organised into a debate between the two factions.

Forum Theatre;

Some of the class improvise as the others watch. The stage is a space between two seated lines of children. The others ask questions of the group. Again, this strategy develops commitment to the work and their underlying understanding of the themes being explored. This is used to end the piece. I introduced the statue at this point, giving it to the brave villagers who went to the lake to see for themselves. They found a statue and other things too Once children are familiar with this strategy, they can be asked to join in the work or ask the actors to do something at their suggestion.

Narrative;

Simply, the teacher advances action and events by story telling. A week passed and the villagers were more fearful than ever.

Hot seating;

David The Storyteller sat here and answered questions about his news. He always told the truth but only answered the questions he was posed.

Posters

Often when the villagers are first reacting to the news of a possible attack from a monster, their reactions are discussed and shared with the whole group orally. Another strategy is for each group to draw their ideas in a large sheet of paper, or to write sentences or slogans detailing what they intend to do (or both), creating pieces of work which can be shared with all the village.

Back in class, I modelled a planning idea using the story we had made up in the hall. For Year 3 and Year 4 I drew a page on the board divided into four. The story had a beginning, a middle and an end. The middle was divided into a problem and some events. In Year 5 and Year 6, I used the following headings; Opening, Build up, Dilemma, Events and Resolution, dividing the first box into 2. Using a combination of sentences, notes, and sketches I planned out the story. The children worked in mixed ability pairs/trios. They had a sheet of A3, which they folded into quarters and labelled appropriately. I said the opening part of the story was just the same as my model. This information was still mapped out from the work we did in the hall and available to the class. However, the village now had a new dilemma/problem and the children had

to plan and events and ending as well as provide more detail as to the problem itself.

After talking the class through each section of the planning sheet I asked them to use one of the following ideas for their story. The first boxes would be the same as the one just discussed; there was however, a new dilemma requiring a new resolution.

Some Other Myths Of The Village

The Dragons Egg

Some villagers found a large golden egg several years ago as they looked for firewood in the forest. They heard tapping from inside. They didnt know what to do about it. If they let it hatch they might be attacked by the mother dragon or the baby itself. If they returned it to the forest, the baby might die. The rest of the story is lost in time.

The Magic Sword

This sword was found in the river by a villager. It was a magnificent sword with gems in its hilt and secret patterns cut into the blade. When the villager wiped it dry there was a bright flash of light and a warrior appeared and asked for gold. He said the village would regret finding the sword unless his demands were met. He said his rage was mighty and never to be seen. The villager didnt know what to do. Run away? Fight? Where was there any gold to give the warrior? How could the village get rid of this trouble? The story is lost in time.

The Dragons Teeth

Outside the village there is a circle of stones. They look sharp and are called The Giants Teeth. Many villagers believe that if they run round the stones at midnight when there is a full moon a demon will appear and give them a great deal of trouble.

Others believe a Spirit of Goodness will appear and cure all their illness and help the village become rich. Some villagers did try one night to see what would happen but.

In Year 3 and Year 4 I said that the new problem was the one of the dragons egg (see above). In Year 5 and Year 6 the children chose the new problem from the three suggested. Most classes got as far as planning their story and then telling it out loud to a friend. The telling out loud revealed gaps that they had to fill to complete the narrative. I also talked about first/third person storytelling and character description, both in terms of what people look like and what they say. How they say things and what their personality was like were also important. However, these elements of story writing can be introduced later. My main objective was to suggest a way of planning so that the childrens stories were clear narratives that moved through time coherently.

I emphasised strongly the link between the Oracy work done and this story, how the same characters faced a new dilemma and how we all knew who they were, where they lived, how they talked and what they did for a job. The whole story was firmly grounded in the drama we had just done. It was clear that I could have taken the drama work into other genres of writing, the most immediate being personal narrative; writing in role.

I scribed the story that we had just acted out and the children gave me sentences to write. I asked for whole sentences and when dialogue was suggested, I used the actual words and names of children that occurred in the drama that morning. By the end of the session up to break time, a whole story had been written and read out to each other. It was lively and pacy and used real sentences from real children.

These pieces of writing represented only some of the opportunities available at this stage. The children could well have written the whole story from their point of view, especially in Year 2, but including elements of description, character and dialogue, they could well have used a different middle to the story and had a totally different outcome. Using the power of What if? the children might have planned and written stories asking what if the footprint was that of a giant or a monster or another child and so on. What if they found two human footprints of different sizes? What if they found a lot of claw-prints? The possible permutations are many and varied.

P. Evidence of the impact on childrens writing. Samples are provided by the members of the Primary Grammar network. Colleagues were asked to supply the following details for each activity:

What I did as a teacher..

What worked well

What the children got from the activity

1. Favourite colours

What I did: At an after-school writers workshop we shared our favourite colours and our favourite associations (idea from David Horner)

What worked well: the simple structure of the task

What the children took from it: They were able to use their imagination but also include personal things that were meaningful to them.

2. Funny alphabet

What I did: At an after-school Writers workshop club, I modelled some ideas using the first three letters of the alphabet and reassured the children that all ideas were acceptable.

What worked well: The children responded well to the alliterative phrases.

What the children took from it: They enjoyed the open-ended nature of the task and the fact that it was fun!

3. Roman writing

What I did: I introduced a Year3/4 class to 2A (adjectives) sentences. We showed two thumbs up for a 2A sentence.

What worked well: Speaking and listening before any writing, experimenting with adjectives e.g. finding as many adjectives as possible to describe a pizza (Pizza Phrases, John Williams).

What the children took from it: Having practised using adjectives in a variety of contexts, the children were able to use adjectives in a piece of History work about the Romans.

4. Wheres your moma gone?

What I did: I used this rap to help with building phonic knowledge. I asked the children to give me words beginning with e.g. br or ending with st or with ee in the middle.

What worked well: The children responded enthusiastically to the rhythm of the rap and it encouraged less confident children to join.

What the children took from it: The class were learning in a relaxed and enjoyable way.

5. Reading a story in a monotone voice.

I tried out this idea with our Reception class. It came from one of

other teachers in the Grammar network. The purpose is to improve

speaking and listening skills.

What I did.

I went into the Reception class and said that I was going to read them a story and that I had brought the Literacy dragon, Sparks with me as he loves stories. A Teaching Assistant held the dragon puppet on her Knee.

The children were all paying attention and waiting for the story to begin.

I began to read The Hungry giant in the most boring, monotone voice that I could. The dragon began to snore. I asked the children why they thought that he had fallen asleep. Many hands went up. They said that I should change my voice and speak more loudly. This was exactly what I had hoped for. A little further on in the story I returned to a monotone voice and the dragon fell asleep again. Once again I asked the children what was wrong.

More children were eager to answer this time.

What worked well.

This was successful. The Literacy dragon helped because without him falling

asleep I think that the children would have allowed me to read on and on.

If their own teacher had read to them they might have responded more quickly as they would be more familiar with her voice.

Further development.

The puppet and the TA were very useful. The puppet and the children were the audience for the story.

Changing characters and missing parts out of familiar stories is another strategy for developing talking and listening skills.

6. Sandwich sentences and Burger sentences.

This idea is from was tried out in Year 5.

What we did.

A sandwich was drawn on the board. The grasshopper was written on the top slice of bread and went away. on the bottom slice. The children were told that a filling was needed to extend the sentence. The children suggested ideas.

eg. The grasshopper, who sang all summer, went away.

What the children did.

The children wrote sandwich sentences of their own on sandwiches taken from clipart.

They then used them in their writing. They colour coded them by underlining the bread part of the sentence in one colour and the filling in another. They discussed where and why to put in commas and found it easy to put a comma after each part of the sentence.

What went well.

The children enjoyed doing these activities and grasped the idea easily.

Burger sentences.

The next step was to progress on to Burger sentences.

What we did.

The idea of a filling in a sandwich was extended and the idea of a Burger with many fillings was introduced. Once again clipart

provided a great picture .A simple sentence was written on the

top and bottom of the bun. The children were then asked for

ideas for three fillings.

What the children did.

The children wrote their own sentences on burgers. These were displayed in the classroom. Most of the children were able to transfer their learning to their extended writing. When

redrafting they understood if they were asked to put in a burger sentence. They realised that a comma went after each section of their sentence.

What went well.

The children liked the idea of the burger and the teacher was

amazed at how quickly the children were able to write extended sentences . She said that she would definitely use this idea again and continue to reinforce and build on this idea throughout the year. However, it was pointed out that the children were learning a formula and still did not really have any understanding of clauses. The next step would be to explain what is meant by a relative clause, a way of expanding after the noun.

7. The Magic Carpet. Based upon an idea by David Horner.

This idea was trialled in Year 2.

Objectives.

To use time connectives to write a poem about a journey.

To use connectives but and so.

To use adjectives to describe people and places.

What we did. Lesson 1

Introduce .the idea of a magic carpet through class discussion.

Model idea of choosing a place or person to visit on our magic carpet.

Think, pair shares activity on who we would like to meet and where.

Model idea of giving a reason why.

What the children did.

.Using whiteboards write down two people and ..places they would like to see and feedback to the class.

Group writing tasks.

Group 1. Draw and write the names of five places and five people to visit.

Group 2/3 As group 1 but with 1 or 2 adjectives to describe people and places.

Group4. As group1 plus give a reason why you want to visit a person or a place and use a connective in a sentence.

Plenary.

Discuss/recap on time connectives used..

What we did. Lesson 2.

Recap on previous ideas for Magic Carpet journey.

Discuss use of time connectives.

Model writing a poem about a journey on a magic carpet, using time connectives for each place visited.

What the children did.

Group1 Used a writing frame, fill in time connectives and places/people visited to complete poem.

Group 2/3 orite poem to include time connectives and adjective for each person/place visited.

Group 4 Wrote poem to include time connective, and, a reason for each person/place.

What worked well.

The children came up with great ideas and produced good work

The differentiation worked well. The children wrote on a prepared writing frame according to ability. This, allowed each child to write and produce a finished piece of writing about a journey on a magic carpet .using time connectives.

Changes or improvements.

A real rug which the children have not seen before would be an excellent resource for this activity.

This idea could be developed in RE (prayer mats) and Art.(pattern)

Finished poems could be displayed on little magic carpets, painted or woven.

What the children took from this activity.

The children enjoyed this.

The children produced some great writing. They liked .the idea of a magic carpet and every child wrote something. They enjoyed sharing their ideas and listening to each other sharing their work.

8. Therefore Poems.

This was based upon an idea from David Horner.

This was trialled in Year 6 by P. Davis.

I Am Fog,

therefore you cannot see me

What we did.

The idea was developed by using night/darkness/spring etc.

The children suggested focused poems on seasons and feelings

(I am anger, therefore)

What the children did.

The children responded well to this activity and came up with a

range of ideas and produced some excellent work.

The less able children coped well, initially completing sentences

and then generating their own ideas.

The more able were able to develop the sentences to include

imagery and an additional clause.

What the children took from this activity.

For the majority of the group there was some evidence of the correct use of therefore in independent written work. The use of connectives seems to need continual reinforcement. This idea does this in a way that captures the childrens attention.

Using the Connectives Because, Although, So That, However

What I did.

Session 1. (Comparison of Skeletons/Speaking and Listening)

Before this lesson I introduced the connectives because, although, so that and however as BASH. We had established that however and although were the hardest to use.

I linked this sentence work with the Year 4 QCA Science unit on Growth. Children were comparing human skeletons with that of other animals.

Children were grouped in mixed ability pairs.

Each pair had a computer and used the following website: www.hitchams.suffolk.sch.uk/skeletons

I modelled sentences in speech

Children spent time making comparisons and using connectives in speech

Session 2 (Composition)

Children spent a short amount of time reviewing their thoughts from last week

I modelled sentences using Word.

Children composed sentences using Word moving back to the website when needed.

What Worked Well

Mixed ability pairs supported reluctant writers

Use of a word processor supported reluctant writers.

Cross curricular link brought work to life!

What the Children took from it.

Using a ready-made comparison meant that the children found it easier to use these connectives successfully. They learned that theses connectives imply comparison.

Most of them used these connectives successfully within this context. They are now a little more prepared to handle them in different contexts.

How to Expand It.

Children need further work to secure accurate meaning.

We need to look more at However and whether it should begin a new sentence each time.

9. Using Poetry to Reinforce How to Use Although.

What I Did.

Children were sorted into pairs and chose a favourite animal.

Pairs used the collaborative strategy Think/Pair/Share

Each pair prepared words that described their animal, recorded these on paper

and shared some with the rest of the class

I modelled the poem with my own favourite animal.

Children then went to compose their own poems, in pairs, using Word.

Borders and clip art were added at a later date.

What Worked Well in my opinion

Providing children with a choice helped to motivate.

Think/Pair/Share meant that they had to feed back they were accountable.

Think/Pair/Share helped them to gather their ideas

Use of computers helped to re-draft as we went along.

Use of spell checker gave instant access to correct version of words.

What the Children took from it.

Enjoyment!

Use of the connective although in a different context. They are continuing to build up how this word makes sense in a sentence.

An opportunity to practice their word processing/importing/spell checking skills

How to Expand It.

Because of their enthusiasm, I missed a perfect writing opportunity, especially with the lower ability writers.

10. An Introduction To Sandwich Sentences

What I did.

This was part of a unit of work based on The Wreck of the Zanzibar by Michael Morpurgo. (a diary)

We had previously read most of the diary entries in the book.

We made a list of all the nouns encountered so far and made a collection of simple sentences about each one. This formed the bread of the sandwich

Eg. Billy travelled around the world

I demonstrated how to include the filling(in red)

Eg. Billy, who has a twin sister, travelled around the world.

The children worked in pairs to produce their own sandwich sentence

We shared these with a critical but positive eye!

The children produced their own using the list of nouns from the story.

Some children worked in pairs for extra support.

What Worked Well in my opinion

Basing the work on a book meant that the children had an extensive bank of factual information to draw from.

Using whiteboards first gave children confidence to apply the skill.

What the Children took from it.

This acted as a taster session. It was the first time children had experienced this type of sentence structure. Some children went on to apply this knowledge but others will need considerable re-visiting.

How to Expand It.

Using a visual image of a sandwich would have helped with basic understanding.

This is only one form of sentence structure. It could be used once within a paragraph but should not be overused.

11. Using BUT, SO and BECAUSE

What I did

This session was linked to the worked being carried out in science. (Living Things and Moving)

In pairs, the children took it in turns, naming a living creature. (30 seconds)

The children were then asked to visualise a creature that has something they would like to have.

The children took it in turns to tell their partner all about their creature. (30 seconds each) The listener then thanked the speaker by saying, Thank you, I really liked the bit about the ..., to show that they had listened.

Using the following sentence beginnings, I modelled how to use the connectives BUT, SO and BECAUSE. (Each sentence referring to different features of different creatures.)

1. I want the (body part) of a (name of a creature) so .

2. I would like the (body part ) of a (name of creature) because .

3. I dream of having the (body part) of a (name of creature) but .

What worked well in my opinion

By lengthening sentences in this way, the children were encouraged to give reasons for their choice.

What the children took from it

The children are now equipped with three simple connectives and are encouraged to use these in their daily work.

Using BUT, SO and BECAUSE

What I did

The children were asked to visualise a really special secret.

They were asked;Where would you keep the secret?

Who would you show the secret to?

In pairs, they shared the answers to the questions above, WITHOUT telling what the secret was.

Using the following three sentence beginnings, and BUT, SO and BECAUSE, the children wrote about their secret, giving reasons for their choices.

1.I will hide my secret ...because ...

(WHERE?)

2.I will show my secret to so

(SHOW TO WHOM?)

3.I will leave my secret but

What worked well in my opinion

The children selected which connectives were most appropriate to their reasons.

The children enjoyed keeping their secrets but sharing the special secret places and people they would tell.

What the children took from it

The children were equipped with three alternative connectives instead of using and and then.

12. Improving Sentences: CHANGE, ADD, CONNECT

What I did

A selection of short, simple and rather boring sentences were selected from own reading.

We identified the boring words and collected a selection of alternative words.

eg. It was a cold day.

cold bitter, perishing, chilly day morning, evening

We then added more detail to the sentence.

eg. It was a perishing morning at the beach.

Finally, a connective was chosen to connect another sentence, to either make the new sentence compound or complex.

Eg. Even though it was a perishing morning at the beach, I still swam in the sea.(complex)

What worked well in my opinion

When sharing their sentences, the listeners could easily recognise which words had been changed and added. They could also identify the connective used.

All children were able to improve the sentences, sometimes using a combination of two from CHANGE, ADD, CONNECT

What the children took from it

The children are more aware of the purpose of writing - for an audience. They now think about selecting appropriate vocabulary and write using more detail.

13. Joining two sentences using connectives)

What I did

Previous work researching the life of William Shakespeare.

As a class, we manipulated a selection of simple sentences and joined them using the following connectives. (when, because, even though, although, as)

We discussed whether the sentences made sense and tried joining the same pair of sentences using different connectives. We then changed the order or sentences to see how meaning was affected.

The children then shared what they knew about Shakespeare, his life and works.

I gave the children the pairs of sentences below. They read them and tried joining them using the connectives listed above.

The children then read their compound sentences to a partner to decide whether the made sense.

What worked well in my opinion

Drawing on the factual information already learnt, enabled the children with the reading of the sentences.

Giving the sentences, allowed the children to concentrate on the meanings and application of the connectives.

What the children took from it

The task equipped the children with a selection of connectives to join sentences, rather than relying on and and then.

The children were encouraged to use these connectives in their extended writing.

14. Sentence Beginning and Endings

What I did

We had previously researched about Henry VIII and his 6 wives.

We shared a text containing a variety of compound sentences.

The children identified the connectives that had been used and we took them out of the text.

We then discussed what effect this had on the reader and that by taking out the connectives, caused the reader to STOP more often.

The remaining pairs of sentences were written in different colours to show that there are now two sentences, instead of one.

The children then decided where the new sentences began and ended and used capital letters and full stops.

Finally, capital letters and full stops were underlined using colour, (a different colour for each sentence).

What worked well in my opinion

Once the children had identified which words connected two sentences together, and took them out, they were able to clearly see the two sentences within the compound sentence.

When a connective was taken out, the children were quick to realise that both a full stop and a capital letter were needed.

What the children took from it

The children are more consistent in showing where sentences begin and end.

They pause for longer when reading a full stop.

By underlining the beginning and ending of each sentence, the children were able to see that a capital letter is used with a full stop.

15. Similes and Metaphors - poetry

What I did

I asked the children to think of a creature that interested them.

They sketched this creature in the centre of their page (5 mins)

Around the outside of the picture, the children labelled the main features that are important to the creature.

For each feature, the children used their imagination to write a simile

eg. Claws like razor sharp daggers

Ears like icicles

Some of the ideas were changed into metaphors

eg. Claws are razor sharp daggers

Ears are icicles

The children were then asked to think about the movements of the creature and these were noted.

Using the following writing frame, the children manipulated their descriptions into a poem.

Feature

Feature

Feature

Movement

Feature

Feature

Feature

Movement (repeated from end of first stanza)

Finally, the children thought of a title suitable to their poem.

What worked well in my opinion

Using the sketching plan helped the children to formulate their ideas and use their imagination.

The structure offered flexibility but enabled the organisation of descriptions.

What the children took from it

The children understood that by using similes and metaphors, this helped create images in the readers mind and allow them to use their own imagination.

The children were able to change similes into metaphors and vice versa.

16 Time Connectives to Sequence Events

What I did

I previously shared the Story, Rosies Walk

In pairs, the children were given several pictures to represent the different events in the story. The children manipulated the pictures and put them into the correct order.

One child retold the story to their partner (from the foxs point of view).

The second child then retold the story in their words.

It was identified that the connectives and and then were overused, and so a list of alternative connectives was collected.

The children used the word bank of time connectives and rewrote the story from the foxs point of view.

What worked well in my opinion

The children practised using time connectives in their speech, (without really trying,) when reordering the pictures of events.

Working with a story that was well-known to the children enabled them to heavily focus upon using the time connectives.

What the children took from it

The children were no longer limited to using and and then to show the passage of time within a story.

17 Writing task Year 5

January 2006

Sandwich sentences and burger sentences

V.P. sandwich sentences. C de W burger sentences.

colour coded the bread and filling.

The class built up a bank of connectives.

Drafting;

The children underlined the connectives, which they used. They checked their work and if they found that they were repeatedly using the same connectives they checked with the list and chose a suitable alternative.

It took two lessons fore the children to become competent in using Burger sentences. They were able to transfer their learning to their writing and understood if they were advised to add a burger sentence.

The children enjoyed this work. Both teachers agreed that they thought this had been successful and are creating a display showing the childrens work in the classroom.

Concerns:

the children do not yet understand clauses and are only working to a given formula.

18 The following samples of writing emerged from a whole-school focus on the book Wish You Were here by Martin Selway. The sentence level work revolved round connectives, with some astonishing results. The children have written home explaining that they dont want to stay at the school camp. Here are some replies:

18. This is a persuasive letter emerging from a geography trip with cross-curricular links in Year 5. The class developed the topic to include the theme of disability, especially blindness, and how we might help blind people in the community. In Literacy work, the teacher focused on letter writing, persuasive features and connectives even though, because and so.

18. The teacher followed the core teaching sequence to link reading and writing in the topic of plants and animals. The connectives taught were because, so, and if.

19. This Dragon Writing emerged when the teacher used the core sequence to teach the features of invitations to Y2/3 children. Here one dragon invites another to a party. The teacher focused on h,a,n,d, and middle finger (moreover) connectives:

Q. What big teeth you have, grammar resource pack.

The ideas, games and activities in this pack aim to help children to write in interesting, varied and increasingly complex sentences. The Assessment Focus for Sentence structure and punctuation is a useful reminder how improving sentence structure is a major key to improving writing.

STRAND: SENTENCE STRUCTURE AND PUNCTUATION

ASSESSMENT FOCUS:

Vary sentences for clarity, purpose and effect

Write with technical accuracy of syntax and punctuation in phrases, clauses and sentences

EXAMPLES:

-Different kinds of sentence structures

-Use of connectives

-Words and phrases expanding nouns and verbs

-Sentence demarcation

-Punctuation of phrases and clauses

-Choice of verbs

1) Remake jumbled sentences from a story.

2) Remake split sentences from a story. Make new sentences using words in the book.

3) Play twisting sentences, changing statements into questions and questions into answers. Play the game, Whats the question to this answer?

4) Link simple sentences with connectives, and change connectives.

Use the fingers of one hand to remember these connectives:

h = however; a = although; n = nevertheless; d = despite.

5) Arrange sentences in sequence. Match pictures with sentences describing events in a story.

6) Create new plots for old by changing or adding to the sequence.

7) Order sentences which outline a process or experiment and use this as a framework for elaborating the sequence.

8) Order jumbled instructions, for instance, for a recipe or for making something.

9) Exploring the excitement of words: make words, both real and nonsense using the same onset and rime (in the word top, t- is the onset and -op is the rime; change the onset with the word rope, we find rop and tope).

10) Devise crosswords using plastic letters and then provide clues for each word.

11) Find words within words and make compound words. (e.g. super market, corn-flakes, sweet-corn.)

12) Make a personal alphabet place-mat.

13) Complete the alphabet from four key letters a, j, m and z by placing each letter taken from the bag or box in its related place until the alphabet is complete.

14) Make word banks of familiar words in alphabetical order.

15) Collect particular words beginning with a specific letter, such as a vegetable, a toy and an animal all beginning with c.

16) Create a parallel plot in a story.

17) Make up a play about a story.

18) Make a folded concertina book based on a Guided Reading text.

19) Make a Big Book version of a story.

20) Take a favourite character on a journey and speculate how they might behave, for example, What might it be like if Mother Hippopotamus came to school?

21) Create a time-line for events in a story.

Reading and writing strategies.

22) Match one spoken word to one written word.

23) Move from left to right across the pages and words and demonstrate a return sweep at the end of the line.

24) Make links from the known to unknown to solve problems in reading and writing.

25) Ask the children to start a class book about families. They could listen to the parts written earlier by adults before attempting their own contributions.

26) Make a collection of logos from the local supermarket for the children to identify the ones where they shop.

27) Collect labels and wrappers from common foodstuffs for the children to identify.

28) Allow the children to write shopping lists use memo-pads, note books, memo-boards and a range of paper styles.

29) Ask the children to make up the words for their own class chant or rap I buy coffee, cakes and more. I go shopping to the superstore.

30) Make up tongue twisters, the sillier the better.

31) Let the children make their own Opposite s book with whole pages given to particular words. For example, hard and soft, slow and fast, full and empty, etc.

32) Ask the children to group toys or pictures toys that are soft, toys that move, toys that we can play with outside, toys that need batteries, toys for babies.

33) The children could practice splitting up long words into syllables, or work with simple word jigsaws: cu cum ber: sa lad: car rot: to mat to: ra dish.

34) Encourage the children to make sentences When it rains. When it is fine

35) Collect words from poems like pitter, patter as a starting point. The children could collect words which reflect the sounds of rain, such as plip. plop, drip.drop, splash and splatter.

36) Make a list of things to do on a rainy day at playtime in school. Make two charts of clothes worn when it is fine and add labels to make a label-matching game.

37) Ask the children to collect their own rules for making, choosing, playtime, walking to assembly, writing, reading, shopping, etc.

38) Ask the children to describe the hair, clothes or shoes of the person sitting next to them.

39) Sentence making. Have the children make up sentences about their shadows I can walk over a I can walk through a I can walk down a I can walk under a

40) Ask the children to write sentences in a continuous account of their favourite food as a report to the class. Which words do they use to join up sentences? E.g. I am Victoria. I like chips, I like ice cream. I like apples.

41) Let the children write a birthday or Christmas list for a favourite character, e.g. Think of a birthday list for a witch.

42) Ask the children to write about a chosen occupation. E.g. Give them a sentence starter (or writing frame).

When I grow up ..

I would like to do this because .

43) The children could be shown some information from food. Why is it there? What does it tell us? How does it encourage us to buy the food?

44) Make lists of healthy food and fun food.

45) Collect food words, such as eat, drink, chew, bite, munch

46) Make up new words containing a rime pattern -est, nest, best, rest, pest, etc.

47) The children could make up riddle stories using sentences such as I have two eyes, I have a nose, I have long ears, I live in a burrow, What am I?

48) Have a variety of genres in the classroom travel information, letters, postcards, indexes, Yellow Pages and so on. Encourage the children to add their own ideas to it.

49) Read to different audiences dolls, teddies, use puppets (make a play script for them). The children pretend they are the teacher.

50) Make a class book for reading Big and little Books for individual and shared reading.

Have a word bank for easy access when the children are writing their invitations, letters and so forth.

51) Little Red Riding Hood.

Have blank invitations for the children to write to characters in the book. Consider Goldilocks invites Little Red Riding Hood to her party/ the Three bears, etc.

Relate lists of different genres registers, menus, price lists, etc to the story.

What did little Red Riding Hood take to Grandmas?

52) Recording stories the children have read, writing stories they have seen.

53) Display messages hidden around the classroom message in a bottle, message in the water tray.

54) Teacher emphasises the literary features of story emphasising elements such as speech marks, full stops, capital letters while investigating characters in the stories.

55) Look for opportunities with big books phrases, words, sentences, environmental print, the structure of written language, point out high frequency words.

56) Look at the blurb on the back of books. Can children make their own blurb for their own stories?

57) Look at contents page, index, explore what kinds of information are obtained in the front cover.

Look at word families with big books puzzles, rhymes, onset and rime.

58) Children make their own books and understand the left-right movement of texts.

59) Devise a high-frequency word list. Language detectives find high frequency words.

Explore childrens literature from the past. Greek tales, Hand Christain Anderson, nursery rhymes, etc.

Ideas for speaking and listening Language exploration.

60) Use role play what language do we find at the doctors surgery, post office, dentists, garage, grocers etc. Make collections of different kinds of words and sentences.

61) Encourage the children to interview one another, record the event on tape and write out the conversation. What differences are there between speech and writing?

62) For gl--- and chthe children guess what the rest of the word looks like.

63) Encourage class discussion and group talk about:

Onset and rime {c/p/m/s/f/r/b} + at.

Word bank idea keep the words the children have learnt in a jar.

Children should use action rhymes to draw letters.

Teachers explore sentence structure with children.

Children make sentences each week Johns sentence is

Use the Magic Stone/ magic key idea to encourage children to talk.

64) Time and distance letters to and from the past.

Children explore how to put what they say into words and pictures.

65) Children plan to bury a time capsule in the school garden as a historical document. They discuss and plan what sorts of things they should include (S+L component of the National Curriculum). Ask the children to include in their discussion how their collection of materials might be interpreted by future generations.

66) Make class poems using certain words beginning with tr. The children could base their poems on lists.

67) The children write a note to parents, brothers, or a sister to tell them what they have done in school today with pictures.

68) Devise school posters safety/ rules, information, etc.

69) Have a friendly monster on the wall for the children to write letters to. The monster replies for the children to read.

70) Arrange pen pals for the children from another school.

71) Discuss the basis of letter writing envelopes, stamps, etc.

72) Encourage children to write in a variety of contexts based on The Jolly Postman (Ahlberg) postcard writing finish the message to a character in the story.

Children write letters in sand, in the air, on one anothers backs.

Use post boxes to send letters round school.

Make sentences regularly with the teacher.

The children make their own alphabet books.

73) Tape record the childrens stories. Write news reports.

74) Encourage the children to find the same word in different books.

75) Write down sentences with that word in so it is clear what it means.

76) Write news, daily events, weekly events.

77) Use breakthrough sentence maker in groups.

78) Construct a shop in the corner write signs, prices, lists and so forth.

79) Make ZIG ZAG books.

80) To help children use connectives, ask them to remember the letters in the word hand h however, a although, n nevertheless, d despite. These important words can be remembered on the fingers of the hand.

On the other hand, f first finger furthermore, th thumb, therefore, m moreover, third finger thus, small finger, so.

Independent Group activities for years 5 & 6.

1) Older children study young childrens pre-early writing looking for some specific sentence features, e.g. sentence length, the logic of spelling errors. How does writing develop?

2) Children research their own and/or published writing looking for data on e.g. words per sentence. Can they produce examples of sentences going from 1 to X words? Give them Fog (from the opening of Dickens Bleak House) as a starter.

3) The group invites parents, friends and a range of babies and toddlers to record their speech. By means of interview/ listening/ tape recordings, the group builds up a series of sound portraits to show how oral language develops over time. They could research a particular infant, or have an adult keep field notes for them.

4) Children write an illustrated / cartoon pamphlet for younger children on some parts of speech. Make it a family? A gang?

5) Complex sentences: to help children write in complex sentences, introduce the idea of When?, What?, How? sentences.

For example, write a Motorway poem using the frame:

when?

what?

how?

On Monday

the van roared down the motorway

blaring its horn.

On Tuesday

the car chugged down the motorway

screeching its brakes.

On Wednesday

the taxi whizzed down the motorway

overtaking everyone.

On Thursday

the lorry rumbled down the motorway

flashing its lights.

On Friday

the motorbike tore down the motorway

taking a great risk.

You could use the same model for describing characters, places, ideas and creatures - in fact anything at all.

On the second day, the Iron Man chewed his way though the junk yard, looking for his ear.

At this time of year, the starlings begin to migrate, flying south for the winter .

In the twentieth century, the age of flight was born, beginning with the Wright Brothers.

Notice how different parts of the sentence can change places, for instance,

Overtaking everyone, on Wednesday, the taxi whizzed down the motorway.

5) Make a Language Bank

Ask children to bring in as many different types of writing as they can find. This will be the basis of their language bank. It could be sweet wrappers, bits of newspapers, comics, crisp bags, shopping lists, anything which appeals to them. Children have to classify the language according to whatever categories they choose. How would someone know to which category a piece of language should belong? What rules can they create for others in the class to operate the bank? What is the audience and purpose for each piece of writing?

Make a Users Guide to our Language Bank by categorising the different types of language, their purposes and structures.

Type?

Why?

What?

Kind of language

Its purpose

Its structures

Bounty Bar advert

To persuade us to buy it

Short sentences.

Imperatives

Large writing

Colourful

Special topics

Genie, Helen Keller, the Wild Boy of Aveyron, etc. How would you teach these children to talk? What words and structures do they need most? Which words do they need least? For a 20 minute group session, write the 10 most useful nouns, 10 most useful verbs, adjectives you think they will need. Explain why you have chosen the words you have. Read Nina Morgans book Helen Keller in the Life Stories series published by Wayland (ISBN 07502 04788).

Playground games

Make a collection of playground rhymes before you start. This collection will come in useful over and over again for language activities. Write the rhymes out for the group (see Opies Lore and language of school children if you have difficulty).

Ask the children to answer the following questions: what are the games about?

What structures are repeated most often? What effect does the repetition have?

Make collections of the most repeated language structures in nursery rhymes, and in the outside environment in writing and in speech, on news broadcasts, in plays, in adverts, etc. Display them as a chart to contrast the frequency with which these structures are used.

Doing words.

Fast breaking news story Word Disaster. Words have been destroyed in a great train crash. We wait to find out which words have been destroyed (verbs describing movement, or s, or adverbs, or be and have. What newspaper reports might the children write without these words to call upon?

New words found in a treasure chest. Where were they found? What do the word archaeologists think? Why were they buried? What are the words? Headline for a newspaper report; New words make old words obsolete.

Look at the picture of a kitchen from 1990, and a picture of a kitchen from 1900. What new gadgets are there? Use dictionaries to find out where these words come from for these gadgets. What rules do the new words follow? What other words might we have if we did not have these? Make some up using the rules the children have discovered.

Charlie and the Language Factory

A project where children make a conveyor- belt system for creating new words. They will need a dictionary to show the common constructions of new words and the resourcefulness of the language (e.g. what rules apply to these new words; television, telescope, teleprinter, computer, aerosol, microwave, ROM, RAM, transistor, megabyte, etc.). Imagine a new product has been made perhaps a machine for walking a dog, or for getting up in the morning. What new words might you invent in the language Factory to describe the invention and its processes? Create a checking system for words dont behave themselves (i.e. words commonly confused where, were, their and there, its, its, s, and so forth). Ask the children to collect buzz words. How are they chosen? How are they constructed? What patterns can the children identify?

Language under pressure

A multi-million pound contract has been awarded to your firm to invent a new advertising campaign. However, there is severe limitations on the number of words you can use (billboards are too small to have lots of words or there might be a managing director who wants a picture of the product as the man feature, and so he cuts down on words. Alternatively, words might be most expensive in the advertising campaign. Whatever the reason, you are limited to a handful. What do you choose? If you are paying, say 100, 000 a word, how do you make words work hard for you? Look for similar adverts in the locality. How do they work? What patterns do they follow?

Message from the past.

A bottle is washed ashore somewhere on the coast of England. You are the lucky one who finds it. On opening it, however, you find that only part of the message can be read. You have to make up the rest from contextual clues. Children in groups can prepare messages for other groups in the class. How much of a message can be omitted before it fails to make sense? Which clues do you rely on most to reconstruct the message? Which bits give greatest difficulty? If the letter was from 500 years ago, the language might be very different. What constructions were used