This is a unit of work that I created for use with Years 3, 4, 5 & 6. It spans six sessions, although it can run for A LOT longer if desired! Although I am a musician, it requires no musical knowhow whatsoever to teach! I was very conscious of this as I was sharing the resource with teachers who lacked confidence in their musical knowledge and skills. This unit focuses predominately on listening, appraisal and understanding, but there are also opportunities for composition and performance included. KS2 Music Attainment Targets Covered: • Pupils should be taught to listen with attention to detail and recall sounds with increasing aural memory. • Appreciate and understand a wide range of high quality music drawn from a wide range of high-quality live and recorded music drawn from different traditions and from great composers and musicians. • Develop an understanding of the history of music. There are also optional links to Science within each lesson, which enable you to cover the statutory requirements for teaching sound: • Identify how sounds are made, associating some of them with something vibrating. • Recognise that vibrations from sounds travel through a medium to the ear. • Find patterns between the pitch of a sound and features of the object that produced it. • Find patterns between the volume of a sound and the strength of the vibrations that produced it. • Recognise that sounds get fainter as the distance from the sound source increases. As a Maths Specialist I also couldn’t resist throwing in a few sorting opportunities in the form of Venn and Carroll diagrams! Overview • The topic starts with an informal baseline assessment and ends with an informal end of unit assessment. • Each session focuses on a specific family of the orchestra. • Pupils enter the classroom each session to an example of music featuring that particular family, giving them the opportunity to appraise music and develop their own taste. • Pupils learn what each orchestral instrument is called, what it sounds like and how it produces sound. • Pupils become familiar with the terms pitch, timbre, vibration, dynamics and tempo. • Children conduct research and learn through activities; however, notes are included for classrooms where ICT/books are not readily available or where pupils lack sufficient research skills. • Activities are fun and active - with low entry and high ceiling for differentiation. • A wode range of activities, e.g. rapping, sorting, poster making, ‘Happy Families’, interactive whiteboard games, mind-maps and guessing games. • Very little marking is required, as the activities lend themselves to being carried out in a group and outcomes can often be photographed or filmed for evidence. Planning, powerpoint and all paper resources are included. I hope you enjoy!

**Update: I have recently changed the skeleton file as some people fed-back that it wasn’t printing as it should as a Publisher file. It is now an A4 PDF file, but can be enlarged to A3 in order to get the same size of skeleton that I used on my display (or it could be scaled down to A5 for cute mini skeletons!) This interactive display invites the pupils to arrange the skeleton and label each bone correctly. I enlarged the skeleton, cut out each bone, laminated it and then stuck a bit of blu-tac to the back; however, if you are lucky enough to have a skeleton in school you could just label that! The display also includes questions and answers about the skeleton and bones and fun facts. I have included a picture of the finished display once it was moved to the school corridor (and, therefore, wasn’t being used interactively any more). I have changed the font to Comic Sans as the one I used isn’t often installed as standard, but each file is provided in Word as well as PDF so you can fiddle with the font and wording.

Supports the CPA approach to teaching mathematics (concrete, pictorial, abstract). Ready to go classroom display aimed at helping pupils to articulate what they have ‘done in their heads’ when adding and subtracting mentally. Encourages pupils to try different strategies and choose the most appropriate strategy for the calculation they are presented with. The resource includes nine thought bubbles with pictorial representations of the strategies and nine text boxes with the strategies in writing, as well as the title. PDF version is included and also fully editable Microsoft Word version (font is Sassoon Primary but can easily be changed). Suitable for use in both KS1 and KS2. This resource can also be bought as part of a package of mental addition and subtraction activities.

This was a mini topic that I did with a Year 5/6 class but it would work throughout Key Stage 2. It spanned two afternoon sessions and could easily be lengthened to create more of a topic. Pupils discover the key features of Aboriginal art and then go on to explore and record their own ideas before producing a final Aboriginal-style piece. Plenty of opportunity is given to evaluate their own and others work. The resource includes: Teaching plans for two lessons PowerPoint presentation (15 slides) Simple pupil planning sheet Aboriginal symbols reference sheet The topic provides good coverage of the 2013 National Curriculum for Art and Design (links are highlighted in bold on the planning). Planning and resource sheets are Word documents and fully editable. Makes for a lovely display at the end!

This was a PowerPoint presentation and handout that I put together for a staff meeting in my role as subject-leader. It introduces ideas from the Mathematics Specialist Teacher programme and aims to develop mathematical reasoning. It discusses the importance of reasoning, outlines the mathematical skills required to develop reasoning and provides ideas for activities to develop reasoning. The activities can be adapted to suit any age group and any mathematical concept. Many of the activities could also be adapted across the curriculum. They are self-differentiating, with a low entry point and high ceiling and are very quick and easy to set up. The activities are a great option for lesson starters, mental maths activities or time-fillers. The notes under each slide provide an explanation of the activity and some ideas on how it could be adapted. The handout is provided in both PDF and Microsoft Word format.

Ideal for starter activities, stolen moments, morning task , finisher’s activities or mental maths lessons. These are all ready to go activities that have a low entry point and high ceiling, making them self-differentiating and accessible to pupils across KS2. Each activity is designed to develop pupil’s reasoning skills and make rich connections across mathematical ideas. The activities range from 5 minute fillers to investigations that can be extended to span a whole lesson. There are 37 activities, but these can be very quickly and easily adapted to provide hundreds of activities. These are all activities that I have done with my pupils throughout the year; I have simply collated them onto one Powerpoint. Each slide includes explanation beneath and ideas to support/extend learning. Thank you for looking.

Guided reading planning for Y5/Y6 more able readers based on the text ‘Journey to the River Sea’. Six sessions of planning are included, although in reality it could spread over a much longer period of time if you wanted! The other files included are pictures of the Amazon used in lesson one. The planning includes teacher discussion prompts (each linked to AFs) and a follow up reading activity. In my class I had four groups and ran guided reading over four days. Each group had one session with me and three independent days. The pupils followed this cycle over the four days: Pre-reading in preparation for Book Club. Preparing answers for Book Club. Children had a preview of some of the more complex questions and wrote their answers in their reading journals. This had the benefit of me being able to ‘pick on’ any child without them being flustered, but also meant I had some written evidence for all pupils every week (I was finding that some weeks I hadn’t written any notes for some pupils during the Book Club session). Book Club with teacher. Follow-up task. Each group knew which day of the week was their follow-up/Book Club/prep day. On the fifth day I heard individual readers and the pupils did free reading of their own books/magazines. I sometimes used this day to catch up if we had missed a guided reading session earlier in the week due to special assemblies etc. (often the case!).

Reports should obviously be very personal to each individual child, so I am in no way suggesting that you will just cut and paste comments from this resource. However, from experience, I know that your mind can go blank after a while (particularly on the 27th report!) and it can help to have a bit of inspiration. This resource includes: Tips for report writing from my experience - particularly useful for NQTs. Lots of example statements that I have taken from previous reports I have written, grouped into categories like, ‘Poor presentation’ and ‘Struggles with friendship groups’. Examples of personal statement sections (high-achiever, middle-achiever and SEND). I have also thrown in some examples or generic statements that I wrote for core subjects (maths, reading, writing and speaking & listening) differentiated from Level 4 - Level 6. The statements might not be true to your cohort but I have included them just to give an example of the kind of generic paragraphs that you might write at the beginning of the report writing process. This allows you to cut and paste the level that best suits the child in question and then edit the paragraph to make it more accurate and personal and also to give it a better flow. The statements are all taken from real reports and are perhaps most applicable to Key Stage 2 pupils. I have included the resource in PDF version and Word version. PDF is probably the best to print as it will keep the original formatting, but I have included a Word version as this enables you to copy, paste and edit more easily. The I hope that you find this resource useful and time-saving…writing reports really is the worst!!

This is a unit of work for music originally planned for Year 4, but I have used to great effect across KS2. It focuses on teaching pupils how to record their ideas more formally on paper, but also provides ample opportunity for children to listen carefully to well known pieces of music - mostly classical. It was originally planned in 2011, but has been updated to cover all aspects of the current musical curriculum. • Use and understand staff and other musical notations • Play and perform in solo and ensemble contexts, using their voices and playing musical instruments with increasing accuracy, fluency, control and expression. • Improvise and compose music for a range of purposes using the interrelated dimensions of music. • Appreciate and understand a wide range of high-quality live and recorded music drawn from different traditions and from great composers and musicians. • Develop an understanding of the history of music. • Listen with attention to detail and recall sounds with increasing aural memory. Key musical vocabulary covered includes: timbre; pitch; tempo; dynamics; rhythm and pulse. This resource includes: • Planning – linked to the current Music National Curriculum. • Presentation – in both Smart Notebook and Powerpoint format. • Videos – hyperlinked within the presentations. I was unable to upload this as a zipped folder so I am hoping that the hyperlinks work despite the fact I have had to upload the files separately. If not they will be quite quick to switch to manually. • Example of a simple graphic score produced by my class. • Blank 16 bar graphic grid for pupils (ideally photocopied onto A3). • Lesson 1 acts as a baseline assessment. In order to add a cross-curricular element, Session One can be easily adapted to suit current affairs or class topic, and Sessions Four and Five can be adapted to suit a text being studied in Literacy or Guided Reading (details given in planning). NOTE: Once downloaded, please save the video clips/music extracts and the PowerPoint in one folder together so that the hyperlinks on the PowerPoint can find the clips! **Musical instrument cards mentioned in Lesson 1 are not included in this resource and are not essential for the lesson (instruments can be allocated by the teacher or chosen by pupils rather than using the cards for random selection). Instrument cards are available to purchase separately from my shop if it is something you would like. ** Thank you for looking :)

This display was used in a corridor between two Year 6 classrooms and was a real talking point amongst the pupils. It includes famous groups and duos that they will most probably be familiar with and descriptions of different types of relationships. It also has prompt questions to get pupils thinking and talking about their own relationships. Would also work well on display in the classroom, a quiet space or assembly hall. The pictures and questions could also be used as a prompt for discussing relationships during Circle Time or assembly.

This display was used whilst teaching the IPC ‘Brainwave’ topic to a Y6 class. It covers: The different kinds of intelligence. Interesting facts about the brain. Labels for different parts of the brain. I painted a large brain and put it in the middle of the display with the text added around it. For those that don’t have time to paint (!) I have added an image of the brain to the last page of the resource that can be scaled up to A3 or you could ask your pupils to draw one.

A ready to go worksheet and PowerPoint of problem solving questions that require pupils to convert between litres and millilitres, kilograms and grams and metres and centimetres. I have also put the questions on to a simple PowerPoint so that you can do a bit of whole class marking, model solving a problem, discuss the different strategies used by pupils or gather a group who are struggling together and work through as a team (annotating on the interactive white board as you go). All four number operations are covered and some of the questions are two step problems. I used this with a Year 4 class, but it could be used across Key Stage 2 for different groups of pupils. For example, I have used this activity in Year 6 as a quick revision activity and a baseline assessment. Comes complete with teacher answer sheet and answers on the PowerPoint are below each slide in the notes section. As well as PDF, the resource is provided in Word format so that it can be edited to suit your pupils.

This resource is comprised of 22 ready-to-go 'Always, sometimes, never?' investigations. A really easy option for lesson starters, morning tasks mental maths sessions, revision, homework, displays, or early finishers' task. Pupils are presented with a statements and have to determine whether it is true all of the time, some of the time or never. Most importantly, they need to support their decision with enough examples to convince others. This is great revision of lots of mathematical ideas, including properties of shape, properties of number and algebra and develops pupils ability to reason and justify. All of the activities have been tried and tested with my Y6 class and some Y4 pupils too. I would say they are most useful for upper KS2 pupils but could be used lower down. I found them particularly helpful as quick revision activities for SATs.

This display is all about the author Michael Morpurgo. Information is taken from the website michaelmorpurgo.com and consists of interview questions and answers. I used this in a Year 4 reading corner as he was a favourite author amongst this class. The resource also includes a picture of Michael Morpurgo and posters of some of his most well-known novels. The display is provided in Word format ready for you to edit and also PDF.

This PowerPoint is for a unit of work that took a week with my Year 6 class and looked at the features of discussion texts. Persuasive techniques are also revised. The texts are taken from The National Literacy Strategy ‘Argument Unit’. Children read and analyse a persuasive text ‘Should mobile phones be banned in schools?’ as a class and come to define the key features of discursive writing. Pupils then analyse a different text based on the circus and highlight the key features that they have previously identified. Pupils then prepare for a debate. Taking the story of the Pied Piper, pupils are assigned roles and have to prepare a persuasive speech to argue their point of the debate. We then hold debate and discuss the value of debates in real life. Pupils finish the week with two lessons to write a piece of discursive writing on whether pupils should be able to write on laptops in schools. Pupils are provided with the arguments for and against, but must do the rest of the work on their own. This then forms an assessment piece. National Curriculum Links: Year 5 & 6 Programmes of Study discuss and evaluate how authors use language, including figurative language, considering the impact on the reader plan their writing by: identifying the audience for and purpose of the writing, selecting the appropriate form and using other similar writing as models for their own. Through debate the pupils also hone their speaking and listening skills and this also provides a good opportunity for assessment.

A sheet of questions to give to pupils when they enter Year 6 or Year 5 in September (or at the end of the previous year) to assess strengths and weakness and to inform planning. Comes with answer sheet and assessment tracker. Mathematics Covered: Read, write and order numbers to 3dp. Order mixed set of numbers to 3dp. Use tables to work with decimals. Use multiplication facts to devise square numbers to 12 x 12. Explain place value to 3dp. Add and subtract decimals to 3dp. Multiply and divide decimals by 10/100 and integers to 1000. Compare fraction by cancelling common factors. Work out simple % of whole numbers.

This was a bank of ideas that I put together for a very able Year 4 writer. It includes lots of techniques that pupils can use in their narrative writing to make their fictional characters more believable and three-dimensional. Perhaps most suitable for Upper Key Stage 2, but could be used with talented younger writers and with pupils in KS3 also. Resource is provided in PDF format and also Word format so that you can edit it. I have also provided it in black and white and full colour. Ideas for use: Provide pupils with a black and white A4 version to stick in their exercise books; when they have tried a technique in their writing they can colour in the bubble. At the beginning of a piece of writing encourage pupils to decide on a characterisation technique that they will try to include. Enlarge to A3 an display on working wall. Laminate and position in literacy toolkit or table trays; encourage pupils to go and grab it when they want to improve their writing or are struggling for ideas. Provide pupils with a black and white A4 version in their reading journal; when they spot that an author has used a particular characterisation technique they can colour in that bubble.

Guided reading planning for Y5/Y6 Middle to Higher ability readers based on the text ‘The Invention of Hugo Cabret’. Five sessions of planning are included, although in reality it could spread over a much longer period of time as I must admit that I struggled to fit it all in to five 30 minute sessions! The planning includes teacher discussion prompts (each linked to AFs) and a follow up reading activity. In my class I had four groups and ran guided reading over four days. Each group had one session with me and three independent days. The pupils followed this cycle over the four days: • Pre-reading in preparation for Book Club. • Preparing answers for Book Club. Children had a preview of some of the more complex questions and wrote their answers in their reading journals. This had the benefit of me being able to ‘pick on’ any child, but also meant I had some written evidence for all pupils every week (I was finding that some weeks I hadn’t written any notes for some pupils during the Book Club session). • Book Club with teacher. • Follow-up Task. Each group knew which day of the week was their follow-up/Book Club/prep day. On the fifth day I heard individual readers and the pupils did free reading of their own books/magazines. I sometimes used this day to catch up if we had missed a guided reading session earlier in the week.

Ready-to-go ideas for developing pupils’ ability to add and subtract mentally and to reason about number. These activities link strongly with the CPA (concrete, pictorial, abstract) approach to teaching maths. I created these activities for a research project I was conducting in school as part of my Maths Specialist Teacher qualification. They are all aimed at improving children’s mental addition and subtraction by developing a broad range of strategies and encouraging them to reason about number. We had found that children were entering KS2 with only a handful of (often cumbersome) mental strategies, e.g. partitioning into tens and units, using number bonds to ten only or counting on/back in ones, and weren’t always applying them appropriately. We used the activities with Y3 and Y4 children, but it can be used from Y2 upwards as it links very strongly with the Y2 curriculum. The resource includes differentiated activities with written descriptions and accompanying interactive whiteboard slides and paper resources where applicable. Slides were originally in SMARTboard format and this is perhaps the best software to use if you have it as the slides can be interacted with this way; however, I have also copied the slides over to a PowerPoint presentation for those without SMARTboard software. Also included is a wall display, which shows visual representations of different strategies for mental addition and subtraction. The activities can be adapted for all year groups and abilities and you will find a lot more mileage in this resource once you get started and the impact on the classes studied in terms of both their confidence and ability in mental maths was phenomenal. National Curriculum Links Pupils should partition numbers in different ways (for example, 23 = 20 + 3 and 23 = 10 + 13) to support subtraction. Recall and use addition and subtraction facts to 20 fluently, and derive and use related facts up to 100 Add and subtract numbers using concrete objects, pictorial representations, and mentally, including: a two-digit number and ones; a two-digit number and tens; two two-digit numbers; adding three one-digit numbers. Show that addition of two numbers can be done in any order (commutative) and subtraction of one number from another cannot Recognise and use the inverse relationship between addition and subtraction and use this to check calculations and solve missing number problems. Pupils practise addition and subtraction to 20 to become increasingly fluent in deriving facts such as using 3 + 7 = 10; 10 – 7 = 3 and 7 = 10 – 3 to calculate 30 + 70 = 100; 100 – 70 = 30 and 70 = 100 – 30. They check their calculations, including by adding to check subtraction and adding numbers in a different order to check addition (for example, 5 + 2 + 1 = 1 + 5 + 2 = 1 + 2 + 5). This establishes commutativity and associativity of addition.

Labels of thirteen prefixes and suffixes commonly used today, which were derived from the Ancient Greek language. Provided in PDF format and also Word so you can edit or add to. Ideas for use: Add to working wall (some could go on maths working wall) with slips of paper and challenge pupils to add words that include these suffixes and prefixes. Lesson starter - how may words with the prefix ‘geo’ or ‘tele’ can you think of in 1 minute? Use as part of a spelling lesson to introduce the concept of prefixes and suffixes and the meanings that they convey. Provide as a stimulus for pupils when writing their own Ancient Greek Myths and Legends - can they use these suffixes and prefixes to inspire their character or place names? Build on this to explore prefixes and suffixes derived from Ancient Rome or Latin. Words included (with translation): geo hex hydro mega micro octo pente phone photo poly scope techne tele