Warm up your
brains
Welcome!
Lower Key Stage 2
English Curriculum
Evening
Overview of Coverage
Reading
Writing
SPaG
Speaking &
Listening
SPaG
Spelling
Punctuation
Grammar
Importance of SPaG
The SPaG element of the curriculum was
brought in a couple of years ago by the
government as a way of testing Year 6 on their
understanding of grammatical knowledge.
Focused SPaG lessons
English lesson starters focused on this
Phonics/Support for Spelling
High expectations within lessons and in marking
of books
Coverage
Please take a copy of the SPaG
expectations.
SPaG is taught discretely and also
within units of work alongside other
objectives.
For example a lesson focus might be
giving clear instructions and within that
we would address imperative verbs.
SPaG Questions
You can find a lot
of useful resources
online.
Spelling lists
The new
interim
assessment
document for
2016 states
that in order
to meet
national
standard
children must
be able to read
and spell all of
these words.
Spelling…
• Weekly spellings – it
is important to
support your child.
Be aware of what
rule they are learning
so you can point out
the spelling patterns
when you hear them
read.
Learning the rule
for spellings allows
children to then
apply to a range of
words and
therefore gives
them more skills
for later life.
Spelling…
• www.theschoolrun.com/teachers-tricks-makespelling-easy
• This is a really useful website for providing
you with a range of strategies for learning
spellings at home.
• Remember that we are focusing on the rules
and patterns within the English language
rather than just a test of memory.
Reading
Read every night for 10-15 minutes and tick
on the calendar. Please aim to add a comment
once a week.
Ensure you are asking good comprehension
questions.
Reading
It is still vitally important for your
child to read every night as although
they may be able to read all of the
words on the page, there may be some
gaps in their understanding.
Dictionaries and thesauruses are a
useful tool in aiding children’s
understanding of words.
Reading
Although children can be competent
readers in KS2, it is still important
for children to have stories that are
above their reading level read to them.
This is so that they get advanced ideas
for their writing and also to hear how
to adopt a story telling voice. In
addition this assists comprehension.
Reading
Ensure your child reads a variety of
genres, use our library and the local
library.
In the reading diaries there is a grid
for them to record what genres
they have read
Reading Model
Comprehension questions
Just because your child may be a
fluent word reader, does not mean
they are ‘good’ comprehenders.
It is important to make sure you
are testing comprehension via
meaningful and worthwhile
questioning.
Comprehension questions
Comprehension questions
Understand, describe, retrieve
Which word
is used to
describe
how Mrs
Twit went
into the
garden?
Deduce, Infer, Interpret
What kind of
person is Mrs
Twit? What
makes you
think this?
What
evidence can
you find to
prove this?
Structure and organisation of text
What do you
notice about
how the
dialogue is
presented?
Explain and comment on the writer’s
use of language?
Why do you
think the
author used
a variety of
sentence
lengths in
the last
paragraph?
Purpose and viewpoint
Who’s your
favourite
character and
why?
Now it’s your turn!
Government expectations
Year 5
Year 5
Writing
It is essential that teaching develops pupils’
competence in transcription (spelling and handwriting)
and composition (articulating ideas and structuring
them in speech and writing). In addition, pupils should
be taught how to plan, revise and evaluate their
writing. These aspects of writing have been
incorporated into the programmes of study for
composition.
Year 3 and 4 cover the following
areas:
 Narrative- which includes play-scripts, myths and
legends, stories from other cultures, traditional
stories and stories with flashbacks.
Non Fiction- which includes instructions,
explanations, reports, diaries, recounts and
persuasive texts.
Poetry
In order to be a ‘good’ writer they have to be
able to write in all these genres and use the correct
features.
Writing cycle
How do we start?
We start with a stimulus, and this
might be:
• A book (fiction or non-fiction)
• Poem
• A clip from a film
• A photograph or painting
• A piece of music or an object
Inspiration
https://www.literacyshed.com/divinggiraffes.html
Potential Activities
Write a news report of the event.
Describe the giraffe in detail.
Use show not tell throughout, describing
all that happens as if it is a human and
then reveal at the end that it is in fact
a giraffe.
Write through the eyes of the giraffe.
The link between reading and writing
Children cannot write a certain text type without
having experienced it first. Therefore, writing is
always preceded by:
•
Reading a text that will support their writing
•
Looking at ‘good models’ of the text
•
Using this as a tool to teach reading
comprehension
•
Collecting helpful words or phrases
•
Magpie ideas from others and discussions
Writing
Before children are expected to write a piece they
will go through a process.
•Modelled writing, shared writing, paired writing,
group writing.
•By this point the children are very much
prepared to produce a piece of writing of a high
level.
•They will have learnt new words and phrases,
worked on punctuation and sentence structure,
interlinked SPaG and studied ‘good’ examples of
texts.
The whole process is covered over
several weeks.
It will be documented in various
forms in their books and children will
be confident in what they will be
doing!
The final process of our writing cycle
is a chance for children to show that
they can apply the skills taught over
the unit independently and write a
further piece of writing in that
genre style.
We encourage VCOP in all
writing!
Display photo
Ask your child about VCOP!
V-
VOCABULARY or adjectives!
C-
CONNECTIVES/CONJUNCTIONS –
O-
OPENERS – connectives, -ly words, -
P-
PUNCTUATION
once, after, besides, however…
ing words
Some adverbial
phrases
Some variation in
sentence length.
Simple and compound.
Clear narrative
progression.
Using paragraph
structure.
Some elaboration of
nouns and a varied
choice of verbs.
Capital letters
inconsistent.
Some errors in high
frequency words.
Not using cursive.
Most sentences are simple
or compound using ‘and’ as
a connective.
Capital letters and full
stops used throughout.
Varied punctuation.
Range of time connectives
used.
Opening and closing
signalled.
Relevant and interesting
ideas.
Words used for specific
effect.
Strong sense of writer’s
viewpoint.
Spelling is mostly accurate.
No cursive.
Opening sets scene and
establishes main characters.
Style is appropriate to the
genre.
Connectives used
effectively.
Paragraphs used to
organise.
Expanded noun phrases and
adverbials.
Characters are fully
developed.
Vocabulary choices
emphasise characters’
emotions.
Variety of sentence types
including complex sentences.
Accurate spelling
throughout.
Maintains purpose
consistently.
Structure is clear,
supported by
paragraphs.
Variety of sentence
structure through
conjunctions.
Vocabulary is inventive
and used with
precision.
A range of punctuation
used: commas to mark
clauses, inverted
commas and brackets.
Spelling is generally
accurate with a few
plausible errors.
Use of high level
conjunctions, though
not fully accurate,
Government expectations
How to help your child to write
Copy some sentences from a book and get them to underline
either the main or subordinate clause.
Write down some unpunctuated sentences for your child to
punctuate correctly.
Call out a word and ask your child to tell you a synonym (a word
that means the same) or an antonym (a word that means the
opposite).
When writing letters or emails, encourage your child to add an
adjective or adverb to a sentence (e.g. ‘Thank you for
my wonderful birthday present’)
How to help your child to write
If your child asks you a question, ask how they
would rephrase it as a command (e.g. ‘Can you
make me a drink?’ becomes, ‘Make me a drink!’)
Make writing part of everyday life!
Encourage your child to read a variety of texts –
fiction, information books, comics, newspapers,
magazines, etc – to broaden their vocabulary.
Use the questions in their reading journals to illicit
information.
Encourage your child to learn a poem
off by heart – this develops speaking
and listening and recital skills.
Make their own
poems/stories/adventures.
Writing…make it real!
• Thank you letters
• Lists- Christmas
and birthdays.
• Postcards
• Pen-pals
• E-mails to friends
or relatives
• Keep a diary
• Blogging
• Letter of
complaint
• Website
• A sport report
• Newspaper or
newsletter
• Holiday brochure
• Recipe
Try to keep it fun!
If it isn’t working, abandon it
and try again another time!