Independent Writing - My Happiest Memory

In our recent writing session, pupils had the chance to engage in independent writing by first drawing a picture of their happiest memory. This illustration served as a fantastic stimulus for their creativity. As they drafted their work, they referred to a recount writing checklist to ensure they included all the necessary elements. Using the past tense, the pupils effectively employed time connectives and enriched their writing with relevant details, making their recounts come alive. It was heartening to see their individual voices shining through as they wrote with such enthusiasm and reflection.

Using Speech Marks! “🗣️”

The children had spent time exploring the idea of dialogue when they watched the video ‘The Bridge’ from The Literacy shed. This video told the story of four animals who quickly found themselves embroiled in an argument about who should cross the bridge. The story did not contain any words and the children first thought about what the characters might be saying. They then went on to develop their awareness and use of speech marks through a variety of practical activities.

- Correct the missing punctuation on the IWB.

- Use macaroni pasta as speech marks and insert into sentences.

- Sort sentences containing speech marks into correct and incorrect.

- Create their own dialogues for characters and animals.

📝 ✨ Comma’s in a List! ✨📝

The children have been learning about the use of comma’s in a sentence. They searched for them in their reading books and recognise that they are there to provide a short pause. The children worked on how to use comma’s when writing a list. Some of the activities the children carried out included,

- writing words on whiteboards to create a sentence and then inserting the comma’s.

- Using macaroni pasta and adding it to a sentence strip.

- Working with a partner to choose the correctly punctuated sentences on cards.

- Creating a shopping list and writing it as a sentence with comma’s.

- Writing a thank you letter to Santa and listing our favourite gifts.

Recount Writing: Problem Solving

In our latest writing activity, pupils had the chance to enhance their recount skills by engaging with a variety of cards that were linked to the key elements of ‘who, what, where, when’. They embraced the task of sorting the cards into the correct categories. Once they had organised the cards, each group was encouraged to create a title for each category. The pupils then used the cards to construct a recount sentence. For example, one pupil crafted, "The boy jogged in the forest on Saturday." After writing their sentences, they took the time to read aloud and check for accuracy, making sure to use capital letters, full stops, and correct spelling. This process solidified their understanding of sentence structure and detail in recount writing.

Christmas Themed Literacy

✨Past Tense Verbs✨

The children have been preparing for their end of term recount writing task by practising how to change verbs in a sentence.

To begin with they searched for verbs in their vipers text ‘How to Hide a Lion’. They decided whether these were written in the past or present tense.

Then the children worked on adding -ed to a variety of regular past tense verbs and also thought about how some irregular verbs would change. They played lots of interactive matching verb games on the interactive whiteboard, searched for verbs in their reading books to change to past tense, matched verb cards, sorted verbs into past and present and completed sentence strips with the correct verbs. 

✨ Phonics ✨

Each week P3A are engaging in lots of wonderful practise of their new sound, their spellings lists and are continually revising their knowledge of previous sounds. Some of the fun activities they have been participating in include:

• Race to the sound.
• Race to build a target word.
• Splat the correct sound.
• Number the letters to build a word.
• Woolly Words.
• Build words using magazine cut outs. 

A favourite activity this week involved the children competing against each other in pairs. One pair tried to throw a Pom Pom into a cup. The other pair had to decode and read the word aloud. If the throwers could correctly spell the word they took the point. 😃

📚 High Frequency Words 📚

The children practised their knowledge of high frequency words while engaged in fun activities. They played the game ‘Sighties’ on the iPad which allowed them to hear a target word said aloud. They then had to match it to the correct word on a T-shirt. As it was Halloween they wrote their HFW’s as ghost words using white crayons and revealing them with highlighters. We also wrote the words on the LCD pads and with play dough stampers. 

🍁 Nouns Hunt 🍁

We have been learning about sentence structure and the types of words that make up a sentence. The children went on a common nouns hunt around the school looking for nouns in the categories of person, place or thing. They then added some of their own ideas. As places like the ‘Rainbow Garden’ were visited we discussed how nouns with specific names were called proper nouns. We will be working on expanding our noun phrases in the coming weeks to improve our sentence writing. 

Guided Writing - Instructions 

P3A enjoyed participating in a guided writing lesson focused on making a Halloween themed treat. First Mrs Flanagan shared an image of a Halloween treat (mummy themed biscuit) on the Interactive Whiteboard. The class then worked in pairs to predict how to make the Halloween treat. Each pair recorded their ideas into the following sections: title, ingredients, equipment and steps. The girls and boys then worked in small groups to make the Halloween treat. The next day the pupils wrote their version of the instructions for making the treat.

🎩 The Black Hat 🎩

In Literacy we explored a new short film called ‘The Black Hat’ which tells the story of an orphaned boy who finds a mysterious black hat in the forest. Beautiful birds and creatures that emerge from the hat are kept by the boy before he comes to realise that he must set the creatures free. The children were so engaged in this film and it generated lots of discussion and debate. To develop literacy skills we used words found in the film and grouped these into nouns, verbs and adjectives. The children also generated their own words to add to our working wall. We will begin to explore each of these types of words further in the coming weeks. 

🔡 Letter Recognition and Alphabetical ordering 🔠

The children spent lots of time securing their knowledge of which lowercase letter corresponds with the uppercase letter through a variety of practical activities. They then spent time ordering these letters alphabetically. Once they had a clear knowledge of their letters we began to put word cards in alphabetical order, order a random set of plastic letters and play games on the interactive whiteboard to really challenge ourselves. 

Practise of target sounds!

The children enjoyed using digital tools to carry out practise of their skills in segmenting and blending words containing their target sounds this week. Some of the children worked in pairs and used the Pic Edu App to create posters of words containing the digraph ‘ar’. While another group of children enjoyed using the Blu Bots; programming it to move to the correct squares needed to build target words. 🖲️📱

Shared Writing - Instructions 

P3A enjoyed participating in a shared writing lesson focused on making Top Hat buns. Mrs Flanagan shared a range of ingredients and equipment with the class. The children worked in small groups to create written lists of the items. Next, the children worked alongside Mrs Flanagan to make Top Hats buns. First we melted the chocolate, next we added melted chocolate to a bun case and placed a marshmallow on top. After that we added a smartie to the top of the marshmallow. Once we had finished making the buns we left them to set for 1 hour. We had a great time making the Top Hat buns and an even better time eating them! They were delicious! P3A are fantastic chefs! The next day Mrs Flanagan led the children through a shared writing process to create a set of written instructions for the recipe of Top Hats.

Literacy Writing - Familiarisation - Instructions

Today we identified and used ‘Bossy Verbs’. First, we recapped the meaning of nouns, verbs and adjectives. Then we took part in an activity where we searched the room for word cards. In pairs, we recorded the words into the correct column of  a noun/verb/adjective table. Next, we took part in a discussion on the difference between a verb and a bossy verb. We completed sentences by adding a bossy verb. To end the lesson we worked in small groups to create a poster by organising the bossy verbs into the following categories: craft, cooking, exercise, direction.

Vipers - A Cloudy Lesson ☁️

The children were completely enthralled by the Literacy Shed’s video ‘A Cloudy Lesson’. It really appealed to their imaginations as they discussed the moving images of a Grandfather and his Grandson using a make believe tool that could create different shaped clouds just by blowing through it. We decided to link our work on instructional writing into this lesson. The children had a go at making their own cloud blowers using pipe cleaners. Once complete they used imperative verbs and time connectives such as ‘First bend the wire’ to give a set of instructions on how to make one. 

Digraphs - Two letters, one sound! 

The children have been working on their ability to recall and build words containing the digraphs ch, sh, th, ng and qu through a variety of hands on activities. One activity they particularly enjoyed was painting their target spelling words and ensuring they demonstrate the segmenting of sounds needed by using different paint colours. 

One Letter, one sound!

Some of the children have been carrying out wonderful practise of their CVC word building. They have been working on stretching out the sounds they hear in words in order to achieve accurate spelling. 

Literacy Skills - A Squash and a Squeeze 🏡

The children have been actively engaged in our first shared text ‘A Squash and a Squeeze.’ They have enjoyed opportunities to recall the events of the story in the correct sequence through both directing and acting out the story in the rainbow garden. We definitely have some budding actors in P3A! 🎭 They have worked in groups to explore the emotions of the story characters and how these change as the story progresses. Lots of fantastic descriptive words and phrases were also use to describe the character of the little old lady. 

Fun with Phonics!

The children have been working on revising their recall of the single letter sounds they learnt through the Jolly Phonics programme and how to apply these when building and decoding CVC, CVCC and CCVC words. The children thoroughly enjoyed using our laptop time to not only improve their laptop skills but also to complete word building tasks. They also spent time using practical materials such as magnetic letters, coins, lego and buttons to make their words in a playful way that would help them to remember them more easily.