1. Gosforth Park First School Literature Works in the Primary Classroom: Talk for thinking

2. Objectives –To use extended pupil utterances through reasoning (causal connectives) and justification of opinions and choices with references to the text/different parts of the text – To discuss what pupils understand, think and feel in relation to the text –To improve pupil engagement and understanding of the text through strategies which enable pupils to predict, clarify misconceptions, question and summarise key points from the text.

3. Success Criteria Pupils: are able to effectively engage with text(s)using specific strategies of prediction, clarification, questioning and summary. make extended contributions giving reasons for views and choices to talk with enthusiasm and understanding in relation to texts/subject matter

4. Getting Going Attended Meeting ‘Before’, ‘During’, ‘After’ Literature Works approach identified the use of specific strategies Planned focus/enquiry

5. Identifying and planning the enquiry Whilst I have lots of excellent ‘technical’ readers in my class, I also have many children who don’t (or didn’t), seem to really engage with what they read. My class love to talk, and enjoy reading, but I wanted to give them the vocabulary they were lacking to be able to talk about the texts they read, in order to demonstrate the depths of their understanding.

6. Aims My aims for the children were threefold: to give them the skills and language to help themselves to become better readers to give them a positive view of their ability and potential as readers Most importantly, I wanted my class to love reading in all its forms!

7. Establishing a ‘baseline’ First we identified the different opportunities we had in class for reading. My class talked about how they liked ‘Quiet Reading’ time, but close inspection revealed that they were not really reading a great deal, and definitely NOT quiet! Something had to change! We also carried out a survey, to identify the children’s feelings and attitudes around reading. These revealed some really interesting thoughts about what it means to be a ‘good reader’. I videoed the children reading in pairs too, to try to gather evidence I could show the children about their approach to reading together.

8. An example of the reading survey questions

10. Taught strategies My main teaching input has been working with Guided Reading groups to introduce the skills of Reciprocal Reading and assigning children a role within the group: Questioner– thinks of any questions as we read which will help the group to understand. Clarifier – spots words which are unusual or sentences which don’t make sense. Predictor – uses clues in the text to predict what might happen. Summariser – recaps the important information. Over several weeks, groups have been introduced to the different ‘Reading Roles’, as the children have named them. In addition to these 4 aspects, there is also a ‘Big Boss’ who is in overall charge of the group. Through teacher modelling, the children have an understanding of what the roles involve and are keen to take on these roles themselves!

11. Linking Literature Works Many of our activities have stemmed from or have lead onto work around our current text, The Secret Seven, and provided a lot of scope for cross-curricular work. We have o Made signs to advertise our secret clubs o Written notes to invite friends to meetings o Made ‘fruit tea’ from jams o Worked on summarising each chapter as we read it o Developed our understanding of characters using drama

12. Success The children are able to take responsibility for organising their own learning, taking on roles and making the most of opportunities to read together. beginning to understand the importance of these aspects and that as a whole, they combine to create a more successful reader. using these skills more independently in their individual reading. more confident when talking about what they have read and can justify their opinions, often giving extended responses. are more enthusiastic about discussing what they have read. more confident to read aloud in whole class sessions, particularly the less able readers.

13. Reading together Quotes from the children : ‘ I think we need to clarify that.’ ‘ I can predict what will happen next!’ ‘I know that….. because…….’

14. Aims for the future Reading will continue to improve as children learn and refine the reciprocal reading techniques. The children respond to what they read with confidence and independence because they understand that this is a sign of a great reader! All of this will inevitably leads to better quality writing, because the children are so much more aware of why specific words are chosen by the author, e.g. which words create suspense and mystery. A follow up survey may show some different attitudes towards what makes a good reader. We present some of our work to parents at our class assembly! We begin to teach other classes / teachers about our approach.

15. Final thoughts The follow up survey has shown that children really enjoy both child and adult led Guided Reading sessions and would like to continue these in Year 4. The survey also shows that many children still associate good reading with ‘being on a high stage’. Some children mention that being able to talk about the story is important too – “I know I have read well if I know what happened.” Some groups, particularly the more able readers, now prefer to read without the structure of the reading roles, yet are actually performing all of the roles independently and collectively as they read together. Children really enjoy whole class reading sessions using our latest whole class text (still The Secret Seven!!) These sessions enable less technically capable readers to discuss and respond to the text too.