Teach-Secondary-Issue-14.5

hearing and further develop their thoughts on the ideas, characters and events being conveyed. See fig. 2 for a list of questions you could utilise when reading (or indeed listening) to fiction versus non-fiction texts. Reciprocal teaching Reciprocal teaching is a wonderful way for students to showcase what they’ve learnt and understood – be that a particular historical event, a new formula, or an application of a theoretical approach to the wider world. So how can we make reciprocal teaching effective? 1. Give students the autonomy to deliver a 10- to 15-minute presentation from a list of topics you’ve prepared in advance. 2. Present the students with a clear success criteria of what needs to be achieved. 3. Encourage your presenters to draw on a range of resources in order to demonstrate what they’ve learnt (and perhaps even incorporate some new learning in the process). If you’ve been teaching the ColdWar in history, for example, and you’ve come to the end of a unit of work, divide the class into small groups and give them each a topic to focus on. Possibilities in this instance might include Potsdam, the start of the ColdWar, satellite states, American foreign policy or the role played by Hungary. You could then give each group a list of key terms you’d like to see them include in their presentations, as a way of measuring how successful their understanding has been. Flipped reading Give students key readings to study at home (perhaps by revisiting your collection of articles, blogposts and book extracts from earlier). In the readings, highlight any keywords that are particularly important for students to know, and then refer back to these during the lessons that follow. Encourage the students to read their texts aloud with parents, carers or guardians, and perhaps couple this with sending home letters or correspondence to ensure they’ll be able to provide appropriate support. Word play This year, I’ve been seeing a lot of benefit in playing literacy-based games to help our lower ability students gain confidence with using words. FromBoggle to Bananagrams, we’ve used games to build resilience, boost word confidence and create a community built around the sharing of words with each other. Boggle 1. Write a selection of 12 letters on the board. 2. Allow students three optional lifelines (if you want to): a) students get to add ONE letter of their choice; b) students can switch ONE letter for another; c) students can create a duplicate of ONE letter only. 3. Set a timer, and then award the student who can create the most words out of the final selection of letters, and the student who manages to come up with the longest word. At the end, write the lengthiest words on the board, describe what they mean and explain how they could be used in a sentence. Over time, you’ll see students progress from smaller words to much lengthier words (though do encourage them to check their spellings). Bananagrams ( for 2 to 4 players, full kit available from online retailers ) 1. Give each player a selection of 20 letter tiles from the 144 supplied in the kit; place the remaining tiles in the centre of the table. 2. The students then use their letters to create as many words as they can, arranging their words left to right horizontally, or top to bottom vertically. At this stage, the students can change any of their words any time. 3. As soon as a player places the last letter on their grid, they shout ‘Peel!’ They, and everyone else playing, then has to take another letter. 4. When the number of tiles left in the centre is fewer than the number of players, the first player to successfully use all of their letters in a connected word grid is declared the winner of that round. 5. You can play for as many or as few rounds as you wish, and potentially assign students specific keywords that they’ll need to ensure appear within their Bananagrams. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Meera Chudasama is an English, media and film studies teacher Fiction • Who is the main character? • What has happened so far? • Who do you think will….? • How did you feel when…? • What do you think will happen next? Non-Fiction • What does the opening reveal to the reader? • What do you expect will happen when…? • What do you think motivated [X] to do [Y]? • When did...? fig 2 35 teachwire.net/secondary L I T E R A C Y TEACH SECONDARY SPECIAL LITERACY