Weald Rise Primary School Writing Workshop Reception, Year 1 and Year 2 parents November 2015

Everyone is a writer!

Through writing I have… ‘heard’ words from music described creatures in the Wilderness Woods made pictures on wall paper come to life made my Aunty smile! met a dragon remembered what to buy at the shop! been an evacuee re-written the ending to well known stories – my version!

Writing contexts letters stories diary Non- chronological reports report – newspaper Instructions Persuasive poetry

TTo understand how we teach writing at WRPS TTo have a better understanding of the stages your child goes through when learning to write. TTo have some ideas of how you can help your child at home. Our Intentions

 Before children can learn to read and write they need to develop their understanding of the English language. For all of us, this happens through talk.  Through talk we learn new vocabulary and the knowledge of how to structure sentences.  In school we encourage the children to talk in a variety of situations.

What can you do at home?  Speak to your child in sentences.  Have regular discussions with your child  Introduce new words and explain what the words mean.

We focus on pure sounds not letter names. For example: e is sounded as ‘eh’ not ‘eee’ f is sounded as ‘ffff’ not ‘eff’ Once the children are happy using the sounds they can begin to build words within their reading and writing.

What can you do at home? UUse letter sounds and not letter names WWrite in lower case letters EEncourage your child to recognise letters in their environment; street names, signs, packets, brand labels. HHelp children learn their spellings that are set as homework

How we teach writing at WRPS  Starting with an exciting stimulus -children then respond to it with a letter, postcard, list etc.  Writing within their child initiated play -adding in another element and taking it a step further.  Using different resources to write with and on -such as chalk, paint, whiteboards, foam, sand, felt pens etc.  Writing on different scales -such as large writing on the playground, writing in the air, writing on post it notes etc. First stages of writing

Early Learning Goal – end of Reception expectation Children use their phonic knowledge to write words in ways which match their spoken sounds. They also write some irregular common words. They write simple sentences which can be read by themselves and others. Some words are spelt correctly and others are phonetically plausible.

First stages of writing Writing  Gives meaning to marks they make.  Hears and says the first sound in words.  Can segment the sounds in simple words.  Links sounds to letters.  Uses some letters correctly in writing.  Writes own name and other things such as labels and captions.  Attempts to write short sentences in meaningful contexts.

What can you do to help? First stage  Encourage and praise all mark making  Ask questions like: Which sound does it begin with?  Support your children in writing in lower case not CAPITAL LETTERS as this will help them identify the sounds.  Model your writing with your child so that they can see its purpose; shopping lists, to do lists etc.

What can you do to help? Moving on to sentences…  Ask your child to decide what they want to say before they write.  Check where they are starting to write and prompt them if they forget.  Remind them to leave a space before beginning to write the next word, otherwise it will be one big word and nobody can read it  Encourage them to say the sentence again – deciding what the next word.  Check where they take the sentence when they reach the end of a line  Ask them to read the whole sentence. Did it make sense? Did they miss any words out? Put a full stop at the end.

Your child can now write a sentence! Once the children can write words we then focus on developing the vocabulary, introducing different connectives and openers and how to use punctuation. This is called VCOP. Next stage of writing

The cat went along the wall. Ban Boring Sentences We help the children develop their sentences by using VCOP.

VCOP superheroes can save us from the boredom of boring sentences!

The cat went along the wall. Violet vocab adds adjectives to describe and changes dull words for interesting alternatives! The fluffy ginger cat prowled along the red brick wall.

The fluffy ginger cat prowled along the red brick wall. Captain Connective adds more detail or action to the sentence by adding a joining word The fluffy ginger cat prowled along the red brick wall because he was spying on a juicy bird.

Whilst licking his lips, the fluffy ginger cat prowled along the red brick wall because he was spying on a juicy bird. The Incredible Opener changes the beginning of the sentence to grab your reader’s attention!

Whilst licking his lips, the fluffy ginger cat prowled along the red brick wall because he was spying on a juicy bird. Dr Punctuation makes an impact using different punctuation. Whilst licking his lips, the fluffy ginger cat (who had sharp teeth) prowled along the red brick wall because he was spying on a juicy bird!

The cat went along the wall. Whilst licking his lips, the fluffy ginger cat (who had sharp teeth) prowled along the red brick wall because he was spying on a juicy bird! We went from: To: Using VCOP! What a wonderful way to improve our writing!

End of Y1 expectation

End of Y2 expectation

What can you do to help?  Encourage and praise all effort when writing  When talking with your child, introduce new vocabulary and use it within context.  Ban boring sentences - ask your child how they can improve them.  Don’t try and target all of VCOP all the time as children will lose motivation.  Have a word of the week at home – a WOW word that everyone tries to use in their speaking and writing.