Teach-Primary-Issue-19.2

3 steps to clear writing 1 What? The curriculum will guide you with what pupils should learn at each stage, but it may be that a previous year’s learning is not quite embedded, so don’t just plough on regardless. 2 How? Less is often more – have a clear focus for a writing task and don’t be too ambitious. A whole story is often too unwieldy and will result in rambling rather than quality writing. By asking children to focus on, for example, a story ending , with a focus on sentence lengths, you are setting them up for success. 3 Why? If children feel there is real purpose to their writing or an audience will see it, they become invested. The stimulus matters, too; find a text which excites them (and you) or a situation they will be engaged in and want to write about. Laura Dobson is a deputy headteacher at a large primary school, and a former T&L consultant specialising in English and assessment. Jess Blake is English lead and Y6 teacher at a large primary school, and is part of the moderation team for English in her local authority. chapter ending. Providing a simple structure of one problem for which pupils need to find one resolution allowed them to create a suspense-filled scene. Success with Shackleton – Y6 Children love disaster and drama, so what better way to hook them in than with a staggering real-life story of survival – Ernest Shackleton and his failed expedition to Antarctica? Powerful, real footage, shocking facts and photos and a brilliantly accessible parallel text ( Ice Trap by Meredith Hooper) really bring this learning journey to life. This three-week unit consists of three short pieces: a blog post, an informal letter and a journalistic report, but the opportunities to write for a range of purposes and audiences using this hook are vast. In our letter-writing unit, the children needed to use an informal tone to reassure a loved one. For pupils to achieve true authorial tone, they need to feel as connected to the piece of writing and audience as possible, which is why in our class, all children were recruited as crew members on board Shackleton’s ship, Endurance. From stowaways and chefs to biologists and artists, pupils were offered the opportunity to ‘become’ their character, and it was this, relatively small, decision that captured their attention and fuelled their excitement. If we’re being honest, it’s rare to be able to say that a learning journey engages all learners – boys, girls, reluctant writers, children with SEN – but this removed barriers easily and effectively. Writing a recount to a loved one in an informal style and tone is accessible; it removes the need to use (though doesn’t prevent the use of) overly challenging, technical vocabulary and allows children to write in a conversational manner. For their letter, we tasked pupils to recount the events on board Endurance from the point of departure to where the ship became stuck in pack ice – a catastrophic moment in the story – which allowed the children to attach their letter to a specific event. In doing so, ‘working towards’ and ‘expected standard’ writers could focus on using the correct tone, while ‘greater depth’ writers had the opportunity to highlight and research their specific role in relation to the incident (e.g. a meteorologist using the time to collect and collate data about the weather and environment). Once the children had planned their letter, we moved swiftly on to a spot-the-difference lesson exploring informal and formal language, before beginning to write. Throughout the writing process, we used a variety of scaffolds to support lower attaining writers, such as prompts, structure grids and word banks created using The Noun Project ( thenounproject.com ) . For all, regular pitstops to model were crucial, particularly when shifting tense throughout the letter from past to present to future, and demonstrating the use of more advanced punctuation. TP 70 | www.teachwire.net “Pupils were offered the opportunity to ‘become’ their character, and this decision fuelled their excitement”