Transcript The Literacy Lesson

Session 3
Continuing to Raise Standards in
Writing.
Focused Teaching through
Guided Writing.
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Let’s get into the mood……
,
“”
!
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Start a sentence with……..
Unfortunately,…..
Despite his appearance,…
With a glint in her eye,..
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Aims of the session.
•To share recent success.
•To revisit Guided Writing.
the why, the when and the how!
•To audit whole school practice.
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Identifying slow moving pupils in
English.
While not wishing to stereotype ……the children making less than
expected progress in English tended to share characteristics…
• They were often boys.
• Generally well behaved.
• Positive approach to learning, to school and to
teachers
• Described by teachers as ‘invisible’ children,
with the girls especially undemanding of any
attention.
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• Often bubbly, lively and keen to answer questions
without time taken for reflection.
• Persevered with routine tasks lacking challenge.
•Lack self help strategies – depend on friends to
support rather than show initiative
•When stuck – put their hands up and then happily
wait for attention
Personally…..
Their test results surprise us.
Marking their work often disappoints us.
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Obstacles to Progress
“I get mixed up when someone interrupts me”
“It’s hard to concentrate, I forget which word I’m on”.
“Writing long pieces is hard….I use all my good ideas at
the beginning”.
“Sometimes I have a sentence in my head but by the
time I’ve worked out how to spell a word…I’ve forgotten
what I was going to say”.
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Reading
•Limited range of strategies
•No higher order skills
Writing
•Difficulty in combining different
elements of writing
•Restricted opportunities for oral
rehearsal
•Limited access to guided writing
•Limited amount of useful feedback
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Speaking and Listening
• Didn’t recognise as a skill
• Limited direct teaching
• Unable to describe progression
And …
•Low level targets
•Limited opportunity to apply targets
•Dependent on TAs
•Teachers unaware of progress and
expectations
•Unsystematic intervention
•Infrequent review of progress
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One solution…..
GUIDED WRITING
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What is Guided Writing?
1. An essential part of a balanced writing
curriculum.
2. An additional step towards independent
writing.
3. Carefully targeted sessions towards groups
of children according to their needs or
targets.
4. Time taken to embed specific writing skills
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Activity:
What might Guided Writing look like in:
Foundation Stage
Year 2
Year 6 ?
When might it take place?
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When do we do Guided Writing?
Time to work with a guided group is scarce so it
must be clearly focused. Guided Writing can
take place at any stage of the writing process.
Before writing to support children’s planning
and drafting of their work
At the point of writing
After writing – feedback sessions
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Planning Circles
Shared reading:
•decoding
•understanding
•text analysis
Phase 1
Phase 1 to 2
•
Phase 2
Phase 2 to 3
Phase 3
•
Gathering ideas and
content:
Visual literacy, drama,
speaking and listening,
• Short writing
opportunities
•Planning,
•Shared writing,
•Independent and guided writing:
•Creative outcomes
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Why use Guided Writing?
• Familiarises pupils with the management of the
writing process
• Enables pupils to be active participants in writing
conferences – obvious links to successful AfL
strategies.
• Encourages pupils to be analytical and reflective
about writing
• Provides a forum for pupils to discuss what makes
effective writing
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•Supports EAL pupils confronted with the
demands of writing in the English language.
•It provides the bridge between shared and
independent work – an opportunity to practise
writing in a supported group context.
•The teaching focus and teachers intervention
can be tailored in response to particular needs
•Its flexibility allows for individual, paired or
collaborative group work – children can learn to
share and problem solve aspects of writing.
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The Guided Writing Cycle
Rehearse
Write
Share
Reflect
Revise
Share
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For example, with the teacher, the children have
rehearsed joining two simple sentences with a
connective and have written their own.
Share:
Share ideas and connectives
Reflect:
Take a look at one of the sentences and dissect it.
Revise:
Look at your sentence. Is there anything you would
like to change?
Share:
Share revised ideas.
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Watch these clip showing a Year 1 and a
Year 3 example of Guided Writing
Can you see a
clear structure
to the session?
Does the teacher
support the
children through
key questions,
constructive
comments,
teaching at the
point of writing?
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What challenges might there be for teachers
in implementing guided writing?
• Classroom management/time
• Analysing writing and framing targets
• Subject knowledge
• Understanding progression in writing
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Audit of Current Practice.
• Is Guided Writing a feature of teaching in
your school?
• Is the purpose of GW clearly understood
by all teachers and TAs?
• Do GW sessions have explicit
teaching/learning objectives tailored to the
needs of the group by the teacher?
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In the school monitoring of writing – is
there evidence of specific writing skills
being taught systematically?
Are all your staff confident in teaching
writing skills to children and do they
understand ‘where next’?
Are there any immediate CPD
implications arising from this session
today?
How can
I help?
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Other materials to support
guided writing:
• Excellence and Enjoyment: Learning and
teaching for bilingual pupils in the primary
years – teaching units to support guided
sessions for writing – ref:00068-207FLR-EN
• I can email to you: Planning for ‘Precision
Intervention’ in writing – using GUIDED
WRITING as an element
[email protected]
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What the children need generally
• A repertoire of self-help strategies
• Coaching in exploratory and analytic work
• Teaching that focuses on ‘deep’ learning that gets to
ideas, concepts and true understanding
• Improved oral work to help them think things through and
become articulate and ‘ready to write’ or solve
mathematical problems
• Planning aids
• More group coaching such as guided work
• More direct support from the teacher rather than the
teaching assistant
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What the children need in mathematics
They need…
• more open activities to talk and think about
• more paired discussion to shape their ideas
• to be shown how to explore different approaches to
solve a problem
• time and teacher support to explore and explain their
methods and thinking
• to keep mental calculation strategies fresh through
regular use
• more freedom to make their own decisions on how to
record their work
• to be taught how to use number lines more flexibly
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What the children need in English
They need…
• a range of reading strategies to tackle unfamiliar texts
successfully
• to see reading as pleasurable and meaningful
• help with writing as they write
• planning strategies to help them with extended writing
• to be given high value targets to improve their writing
• to use focused talk to think through their ideas
• to be explicitly taught the conventions of
speaking and listening
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Discussion
Consider your schools and the ‘slow moving children’
and ‘children falling behind’ for mathematics or English
• What do the children need to do to address this issue?
• What do the teachers need to do to address this issue?
• What support and professional challenge could
Headteachers and senior leaders provide?
• What are the implications for LA support and challenge?
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