After hours of reading and PD on Pie Corbett’s Talk4Writing, I decided to plan my English lessons around his style of teaching. The idea behind it is fun filled, active and different so my children and I absolutely love it! Included: *4 day, detailed lesson plan. *Power Point of the story. *‘Theseus and the Minotaur’ text resource (color coded). *‘Box-it up’ planning frame. *Hot Seating Questions which allow the children to get into the mind of the Minotaur. I have put a lot of detail into the lesson plan, so it can be easily followed to apply this style of teaching to your ENglish lessons. The idea behind it is: Week 1= Imitation Phase. In this week, children need to learn off a text to fully immerse themselves in the style of writing, structure, language etc. This is done through actions and also text mapping (drawing pictures). Only when children fully understand a text type, should they begin to write. The writing of a myth will be done in week 3. (This resource is only week 1). By the end of the week, your children should fully understand the features of a myth, and should be able to recite a whole myth using their text map. It’s lots of fun and a fantastic scaffolding for children to understand before they write. Give it a try!

A weeks worth of planning and resources for kennings. This weeks plan involves immersing children into poetry by getting them to identify the features of a kenning and to create their own by the end of the week. To make it more interesting, I have included a research day for children to collect facts for their kenning about one of Africa's top 5 animals. (lion, buffalo, leopard, elephant and rhino). At the end of the week when they are writing their kenning, they will write it on a background of their chosen animal. I have included powerpoint presentations also. These lessons also touch on alliteration. The kennings produced at the end of the week are beautiful and colourful also, they make a great display! Please review this resource and also check out my other resources if you get a chance: https://www.tes.com/teaching-resources/shop/Morrisr9

Needing some inspiration for my reading corner, I created this display in order to show case the children’s reading books. The idea behind it is that the book templates will be printed out for children to fill in whenever they complete a book. They can draw the front cover and fill in the blurb on the back and the teacher can laminate the books and hang them from a string underneath the heading. It’s a super cute idea to show off all the books that you’re class have read and let’s face it, it looks really colorful in your reading area. Included: *The display name: “Books we’ve Read” *Book templates to print out. (See cover photo for a clearer idea).

OBSERVATION LESSON: Today was my observation and it was day 1 for us, engaging with Persuasive Writing. The children had to identify the features of a persuasive text using the AFOREST technique. (We used this support mat and it was EXCELLENT! This resource includes: a very detailed, differentiated lesson plan, which allows you to follow it step-by-step (just like I did). Links to the texts I used. Key for annotating. Advertisements for Lower Ability pupils. To start: children will try to persuade their teacher to allow them to go for break 5 minutes early. To you (and the observer, this will show their prior knowledge of persuasion, which should be little at this stage). Main: Using a key, children will highlight and annotate a piece of persuasive writing using a key to spot the different features. There are 3 different persuasive texts for high, middle and low ability children so that they can all access the content. Plenary: Children will be placed into mixed ability groups of 4/6 and asked to SELL you a random object from the class (e.g. a pencil case) in a dragon’s den type fashion. This will show the observer (and you) the progress made since the start of the lesson as the children apply the techniques that they have learned. Please let me know your thoughts on this lesson plan.

A wonderful week of planning, resources and presentations to engage children in writing playscripts. As our topic was on Ancient Greece, the playscript that children will be writing will be based around Ancient Greek Gods. I found that this motivated the children more as they already had previous information on the topic. Children are introduced to playscipts by picking out the features in pairs and also gathering an understanding of what a 'myth' is. As the week progresses, children will then create a hero/heroine for their own playscipt by filling out a job application for that particular character. There is a planning/drafting day included also, with resources, to ensure children fully understand the layout of a playscript, along with using features of a Greek Myth. By the end of the week, children will produce an interesting Greek Myth play using the features correctly and effectively. This resource includes notebook presentation, differentiated resources, very detailed planning which points out explicitly what needs to be taught and how the lessons are to be differentiated, and also a success criteria for children to follow. I have tried these lessons myself, and my children really enjoyed them. Please leave a review and check out my other resources if you get the chance: https://www.tes.com/teaching-resources/shop/Morrisr9

I created this playscript for my Year 5 class to perform this year. We spent a number of weeks on persuasive writing, so I thought it would be a fantastic way to show off the techniques they had learned in persuasive techniques. I based it around the TV show Dragon's Den. The Assembly has 4 dragons in which the contestants must persuade to buy their products using persuasive techniques. There is a narrator role also, which explains what's going on throughout the play. This playscipt is easy to adapt and was really funny to watch as well as show off what the children had learned. Please leave a review and check out my other resources: https://www.tes.com/teaching-resources/shop/Morrisr9

A pack of resources to support you in teaching report writing! As mentioned on my blog (click here), I use Pie Corbett’s Talk 4 Writing strategy to teach English. Children are completely immersed with reports from day one and engage in many different activities to keep writing lessons fun, purposeful and content rich. In this MONTH worth of lessons, children will: Act out a text to familiarize themselves with the language needed. Make playdough birds based off their research to help the facts stick in their head. Research a bird of their choice to write a report about. Work in mixed ability pairs to create a bank of useful phrases/vocabulary that they’ll need in their report. Discuss how author’s generally present their reports and the EFFECT it has on the reader. Following this, they will plan how to present their report in a double page spread (see cover photo). The best part about these lessons is that they are easy to adapt. If you do not wish to write a report about a bird- change it! I have saved the lesson plans as a word document, so they will be easy to change. These lessons are suitable for 2-4th as the elements of report writing are the same, the expectation will just be higher/lower depending on the age group/ability of your children. If you’re from Ireland, these lesson plans align with the Primary Language Curriculum as their is a MASSIVE focus on oral language/language learning! Can be used in other curriculums too, not specific to Ireland. This pack includes: 4 detailed WEEKLY lesson plans (Yes, 20 days) outlining how to immerse children in reports and spark an interest for them to write in this genre. Resources needed for each week. Sample photographs from my own classroom to support the teacher. 2 quality examples of a report to use as a model text. Links to sites to show children how to present their finished piece in a double page spread (see cover image). A ‘How to use’ document and credits page. Please leave a review and let me know how you got on.

An editable book cover hunt. Children will follow the clues on the reverse side of each book cover and hunt around the school for some hidden treasure. They must write down the names of the book covers that they come across too and aim to read at least one of them that week. Just something a bit different during Book Week to engage them with different books. For more information of activities that we did during Book Week, check out my Instagram: Rebecca.the.irish.teacher.

This is a 4 day plan focused on Tanka Poetry. Tanka poems are 5 lines long and contain 31 syllables. They are normally about nature, love, sadness or other strong emotions. As my children have studied the Vikings this year, I have based this planning for children to imagine that they are a Viking leaving their lovely homeland and family. Children spend the week researching about the Vikings leaving their homes and also using similes, metaphors and adjectives to describe their feelings. My children really enjoyed these lessons and were surprisingly good at writing Tanka poems. Powerpoint, lesson plan and activities included.

A 6 day plan on formal arguments, encouraging children to think about moral dilemmas. Children will be introduced to the idea of moral dilemmas and arguing for and against both in a balanced argument. This resource involves teaching children how to write a balanced argument in a progressive manner. Children will initially watch clips on how to argue in a balanced style. As the week progresses, children will be gathering information needed in order to write a balanced argument for themselves. There is a planning period as well (with resources) to allow children to properly plan their argument, as to ensure it’s balanced. This also gives children the opportunity to edit and correct their small errors. There is elements of arguing/debating orally also, which taps into speaking and listening. By the end of the week, my class were excited to write a balanced argument on whether it is a good idea or not to keep a giant bag of cash that you found at the bottom of your garden. They were even more excited about turning it into a debate, which can easily be achieved. This resource is saved within a ZIP file. INCLUDED: *A 6 day detailed lesson plan, explaining how to carry out each lesson. *A detailed, colourful notebook file to encourage discussion and to show expectations. *A powerpoint to show the structure of a balanced argument. *A success criteria to allow children to self-assess and peer-assess the written task. *2 differentiated planning sheets. *Moral dilemma scenarios to cut and distribute for discussion. *A notebook file on how to use connectives. Please leave a comment on your thoughts of my resource and check out some of my others: https://www.tes.com/teaching-resources/shop/Morrisr9

I created this document to hand out to my parents at the beginning of the school year. It’s a short snippet of activities that parents could engage with with their children. There are 7 pages, including: *Some sample questions to ask children while reading. *Rate out of 10. To allow children to form opinions on what they’ve read. *Re-tell the story. To allow children to order parts of the story. *Change the ending. This allows children to take their understanding to another level. *Strategies for parents when reading with their children. See my preview for a clearer idea of this resource.

Chapter 1 of the BFG with comprehension questions. My class love the BFG so I decided to create a comprehension on each chapter. Looks at deducing, inferring and spotting similes.

This is a follow on lesson that I used to establish understand of possessive apostrophes (could be used as an introduction also). This package contains a powerpoint, a lesson plan and a resource that is differentiated. The activity is related to Horrid Henry which my children love.

COMPREHENSION BASED ON THE SONG ‘This is me’ FROM THE MOVIE THE GREATEST SHOWMAN. SOme inference questions based off this song because: It’s something different We all love the song! The children loved listening to the lyrics and try to understand/deduct what the meaning was behind the lyrics. Word Document and PDF included of Verse 1 and Verse 2.

A comprehension based on the story of ‘Who killed King Tut’. (a report) Children are encouraged to use their inference skills and comment on why the author has used a certain structure to help the reader. Children will use a range of reading skills and strategies when answering this comprehension.

An editable powerpoint presentation for a workshop to give to parents in supporting their children’s reading at home. It’s 20 pages long and covers: *How to support your child in comprehension *Activities to engage with while reading *How long to spend reading with your child *Links to websites for further help It can be used from 5 y/o to 12 y/o children.

Each week, I like to give my children a new comprehension to 1) check their understanding and 2) immerse them to different text types. While studying poetry, I discovered that many children found it difficult to decode the meaning behind poetry. This resource contains: *A poem. *Questions to check understanding. *An answer sheet. The poem chosen is one of my favorites as it’s about bullying so it can tie into other lessons/discussions that arise in the classroom. It’s written by an Irish author, so there are 2 or 3 phrases included that children may not understand. This is a fantastic opportunity for them to use their reading skills to read back over the sentence and try to work out what the word means. A really enjoyable poem and it can also be sent home as a homework activity. Overall, children will gain an understanding of the meaning behind the poem and they will be encouraged to form opinions on a poem, which is something a little bit different. I hope you enjoy this resource as much as we did!

I’ve added these key terms (in yellow) here for you to create a working wall for your English display. These headings can be kept up all year round, even when you change genre. All you need to do is to change the work around it, accordingly. See my blogpost on my blog to see how exactly I use this display in my class. (Note: only the headings in yellow and the clouds are included).

FREEBIE! This freebie contains a book review for both fiction and non-fiction texts. It’s a sample from my recent resource: [https://www.tes.com/teaching-resource/the-super-book-of-guided-reading-activities-11926213] Check it out for 25 pages of superhero themed activities.

I created these bookmarks to laminate and have in my children’s English books as they struggle to spell these words. By seeing them spelt correctly so often, they got better at spelling them themselves. Easy to edit also.