Basic Skills Evening

Miss Scott-1,2,3 Team Leader

Mrs Hehir- Maths Subject Leader

Aims of tonight:

·To familiarise you with the demands of the New National Curriculum for Spelling, Grammar and Mental Maths

·To help you understand how we are supporting children with meeting these demand in school

·To give you some ideas about how you can help your children at home

New Curriculum:

·This is the first year that all children have been taught using the new national curriculum.

·The new curriculum places an increased demand on children's reading, spelling and mental maths skills

·Skills which were previously taught later have been moved into the KS1 and Year 3 curriculum.

English:

KS1 curriculum places a big emphasis on children learning to write accurately in terms of spelling and basic punctuation.

The curriculum is broken down into transcription (spelling and handwriting), grammar and composition

It is hoped that by the time children leave Year 2 they will be able to:

·Spell a large range of high frequency words accurately (see list)·Spell words containing the spelling patterns taught accurately (see hand out)·Spell other words using a phonetically plausible attempt·Write sentences which accurately use full stops, capital letters, question marks, exclamation marks,commas in lists and apostrophes for contraction and possession·Write sentences using when, if , that or because to link ideas·Name the different parts of a sentence (verb, noun, adjective, adverb)·Add more excitement to their sentences using adjectives·Edit and improve their own work by noticing errors·Write with a legible joined script

Year 3- Once children have secured these basic skills they then work on using increasingly complex sentence structures and punctuating them accurately with commas.

They are taught to use add information in prepositional phrases (where phrases)

The spelling patterns they are taught become increasingly complex

The government have published a list of statutory words which all children should be able to spell by the time they reach the end of Year 4

Why is it so important to secure these basic skills?

·Fluidity of writing

·Confidence

·Enjoyment

·Enabling complex sentence structures to be understood later in the school

What is our approach in school?Spelling

·Children in Year 1 have daily phonics sessions.

·They are introduced to a new sound each week and use this for reading and writing

·Children use the Read Write Inc cards to learn new sounds-these are available on big sheets for the children to use in the classroom

·Key words and phonic sounds are up in all classrooms for the children to access.

·Children are taught explicitly how to orally segment a word and then blend it back together

eg play - p..l...ay

·Children in Years 2 and 3 have 3 x weekly spelling sessions

·They will revise the phonic sounds learnt in Year 1

·A new suffix/ prefix or spelling pattern is introduced weekly and investigated together and a set of rules for the pattern are established

·Children will have some application work to do in at least one session

Years 2 and 3

What are our expectations for the children applying their spellings?

·Children are expected to use the sounds they know in their written work

·We look for phonetically plausible attempts eg A Year 1 child might spell Rain- rayn A Year 2 child might spell science sience

·As the children progress through Year 2 and into Year 3 it is expected that spellings will be increasingly correct

·Children are expected to spell key words such as when, what etc correctly in their work once they have been taught

·Some, but not all, incorrect spellings will be picked up in marking comments

Punctuation and grammarPunctuation and grammar are taught within

English sessions

Every three weeks the children learn a new text. These 'Talk for Writing Texts' include examples of the grammar and punctuation children are expected to use

Children will regularly be exposed to the language of grammar and punctuation and expected to use and understand it themselves

What words do they need to know?VerbNounAdjectiveAdverbPluralContraction- eg didn'tApostropheTenseAnd for Year 3- clause, subordinate clause, preposition (a where or when phrase) and conjunction (connecting word)

Handwriting·Handwriting is taught regularly throughout Years 1,2 and 3

·It is recorded in books twice a week

·Children begin by working on letter formation

·They will begin to be taught how to join as soon as formation is secure

·We teach a non- cursive style so tail letters (g, y etc) are not looped

·It is our aim that all children will be joining their handwriting by the end of Year 2

What can you do to help?·Help your child when they are learning their spellings.

·Spellings will link to what we've been learning in school

·It is important to look at them regularly

·Look at the patterns with your child- eg ay is only at the end of a word, ai is always in the middle- write a list of these rules together

·Encourage your child to write their spellings in sentence so they see them in context

·Particuarly with Year 1 children, encourage them to orally segment the words- eg night- n.. igh..t before writing it down

Look at spellings in indepedent writing but don't over correct unless they are on a spelling list- phonetically plausible is good enough!

Some methods/ games which might help with spelling

·Write the spellings out with the key sound/ spelling pattern in a different colour.

·Look, cover, write, check

·Creating mnemonics for trickier words- eg Big, Elephants, Can, Always, Understand, Small, Elephants

·Use flash cards and look regularly at the words

·Use scrabble tiles to make the words then add up the amount that each word is worth

·Write the word with the letters scrambled- can they unscramble it?

·Play hangman with spelling words

·Word ladders- start with a word, change or add one letter each time- how far can they get?eg mop, hop, hope, cope, cape, caper

·Boggle- with a grid of letters- how many words can they find?

·Words within words- with a long word- how many smaller words can they spot within it?

Strategies/ games to support accurate punctuation·Encourage your child to spot full stops in

their reading books.

·Encourage them to speak in full sentences as much as possible.·Encourage children to read their own writing aloud. Can they correct their own punctuation?

·Sentence tennis- take it in turns to say a word. The first person to end the sentence accurately and put in a full stop wins a point.

·Sentence stacking- start with a noun, add a verb, add an adjective, add an adverb, add a preposition and another noun etc e.g. the dog, the dog ran, the brown dog ran, the brown dog ran speedily, the brown dog ran speedily towards the cat.

and finally...

Handwriting.

·There are a series of letter formation and joining sheets on our 'Help at Home' section on the website.

·Encourage children to write on the line

·Focus on letters being evenly sized

·For younger children- forming letters in sand, paint, glitter may help