I am a fully qualified primary teacher who has experience of teaching in both the private and state sectors in Scotland, London and Tokyo.
All of my resources have been tried and tested in classrooms, and I am passionate about making learning as enjoyable and engaging as possible for children.
I am a fully qualified primary teacher who has experience of teaching in both the private and state sectors in Scotland, London and Tokyo.
All of my resources have been tried and tested in classrooms, and I am passionate about making learning as enjoyable and engaging as possible for children.
A simplified version of Pie Corbett’s story mountain, this poster focuses on three main paragraphs within a creative writing story:
Beginning
Problem
Ending
I have suggested to children that they should imagine their story taking place over the space of a day, the beginning of the story taking place in the morning, and the ending at night. Starting the story with the word “as” allows for an immediate simile and description and it seems to give children a starter for ten when faced with a blank sheet of paper.
The mountain also mentions including senses to describe the setting, speech between characters and description of characters feelings.
A big old download full of resources for teaching reading comprehension! The resources follow the “reciprocal reading” method. Contents includes:
Question description cards:
Meet the comprehension super heroes who each tackle their own individual question type. Together they will help children to:
Predict
Clarify
Summarise
Visualize
Answer literal questions
Answer inferential questions
Question badges:
Use the badges for group work, where each child is in charge of writing or answering a specific question type. If anything, the badges are an excuse for a trip to Ryman (not so guilty pleasure) for lanyards, plastic covers and so on!
Comprehension template:
Allows children to record their predictions before reading, write their questions during reading and summarise the text after reading. The summary box is deliberately tiny to stop any budding authors from rewriting the entire text.
Sorting activity:
A selection of questions to be sorted according to their question type (literal or inferential). I used these the other day without laminating and when asked to ‘tidy up’ my lovely student proceeded to crumple the entire pack of questions into a ball. I was fine about it. Just half an ink cartridge, 20 minutes of cutting before the lesson and a completely ruined resource.
Totally. Fine.
Question spinner:
Heavily ‘Twister’ inspired, this wheel can be used during reading time to help children practice asking and answering different types of questions. Note – you will lose the pointer to the wheel. Like socks in a washing machine, it’s just life.
This handy resources (pun intended) is a great way to teach reading strategies to your pupils. Useful to have at hand (I can’t stop) during reading time, where you can choose one strategy to focus on,
Strategies included:
1.”Robot talk” the tricky word – encourages speedy readers to slow down and chunk up tricky words.( It’s also quite amusing to have a classroom full of Daleks).
2.”Look at the picture for clues” – don’t rely on others to tell you the answer! This is a good strategy for encouraging independent reading.
3.”Slowly stretch out the tricky word” – again, encourages speedy readers to really slow down. Can also help teachers see if there are any phonics issues.
4.”Skip the word and try again at the end of the sentence” – it’s ok not to get it first time! Sometimes by reading to the end of the sentence, children will be able to have a solid guess at the meaning of the word based on the context of the story.
“Does the word make sense?” – stop for breath. Take a minute. Does that word fit into the sentence/story?
Ideal for use in KS1, this interactive Powerpoint helps children to count in 3s from 0 - 30.
Slides include:
Counting forwards and backwards from a given number
Finding the missing number in a sequence
Ordering numbers correctly
Colourful rhyming posters to help children to identify odd and even numbers.
Uses the characters Odd Todd and Even Steven and acts as a handy visual aid during lessons.
A super resource encouraging children to use characters’ personality and appearance.
This presentation includes:
personality word bank
appearance word bank
popular children’s tv and film characters as examples
practical activities for children to complete either as a class, in groups or independently
sets an independent activity to help children apply their knowledge
This game has been differentiated three ways, making it ideal for all children in your class!
Level 1 - halves and quarters
Level 2 - halves, thirds, quarters, sixths
Level 3 - halves, thirds, quarters, sixths and eighths
Rules of the game:
Take it in turns to roll the fraction dice (also included in the pack, but feel free to save the trees and use your own dice!) then use the tasting toppings to cover the correct fraction of pizza.
The winner is the person who manages to ‘top’ all of their pizzas first.
A Maths assessment focusing on addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.
Encourages children to highlight key information and show their working
Involves numbers to 100 as well as addition with carrying and subtraction with decomposition
Mr Men themed!
A ‘one stop shop’ resource to help your children add more detail to their writing.
This resource includes:
A poster outlining the 5 W’s that can be used to add detail - who, what, when, where, why
Flashcards showing the 5 W’s
A set of simple sentences that children need to stretch out using the 5 W’s. Can be cut into flashcards and made into a simple game ideal for group work
A writing frame to encourage children to use all 5 W’s to stretch a sentence.
This Powerpoint presentation focuses on the ‘SAD’ strategy for story writing. The idea is, that children choose to open their stories using one of the following:
S – a description of the setting
A – describing the actions of the characters
D – opening the story with dialogue between characters
This resource uses scenes from children’s favourite films, and works towards putting ‘once up a time’ and weather description starters to bed!
**Samples of Year 2 children’s writing when using this activity **
Using action to open Monsters Inc: “Hopping everywhere, Sully was bouncing, trying to get out as the miniature baby stood up, fascinated”.
Using dialogue to open Moana: “Oink oink!” shouted the satisfied piglet. Moana was so fixed on the sea she could not move her eyes as Maoui shouted, “Land ahead!”
Using setting to open “Up”: “The machine was pouring into tubes as she sucked up the medicine like a hoover. The flowers were fascinated at the movements the wife and her wrinkly husband made”.
Using setting to open the BFG: “A pitch black sky swirled around like a cup of cappuccino. As the black sky lay on the clouds like a blanket, the 50 metre tall, towering, tremendous BFG stood as silently as a mouse”.
A series of 5 writing and comprehension lessons that can either be printed or used online.
The lessons include:
“Say it, don’t show it” emotions
Cartoon strip story writing
Guess the story setting
Shades of meaning vocabulary
Adverb game
“Beat the teacher” story writing challenge
Character personality and appearance
A series of 5 lessons lasting approximately one hour each. Ideal for online learning or slides can be printed and used at home.
This pack includes activities on:
story writing
comprehension (fiction and non-fiction)
how to add a problem to your story
speech marks
setting descriptions
similes
Games included:
weather simile game
emoji emotion game
emotions 4 in a row
‘guess my monster’ adjective game
This pack also includes a story mountain visual aid and independent homework challenges.
Based on the 7+ exam, this resource has been used to successfully prepare children for entry to the top prep schools in the UK.
This paper includes:
Comprehension exercise
Creative writing task
A detailed marking scheme allowing teachers and parents to see exactly what assessors are looking for
Tried and tested by 7 + candidates
Mimics real 7+ exam conditions
Written by experienced primary teachers and tutors
Carefully leveled to boost confidence and banish anxiety!
Based on the 7+ exam, this resource has been used to successfully prepare children for entry to the top prep schools in the UK.
This paper includes:
Comprehension exercise
Creative writing task
Written by experienced primary teachers and tutors
A detailed marking scheme allowing teachers and parents to see exactly what assessors are looking for
Tried and tested by 7 + candidates
Mimics real 7+ exam conditions
Carefully leveled to boost confidence and banish anxiety!
This pack contains three games that are focused around the Year 3 and 4 statutory spelling list. The list includes 107 words, but we recommend focusing on 20 at a time with your child before moving on to the next set.
Games included:
• ZAP! – Cut the spelling words into flashcards, including the ZAP! cards, and place them into a container. Take turns to select a word from the container and either spell it aloud or write it down on paper or a whiteboard. If, however you pull out a ZAP! card, all of your cards must go back into the container. Use a 10-minute timer and whoever has the most cards at the end is the winner!
• Race and write – Before playing this game, we re commend popping the race and write sheet into a poly pocket and your child can write their spelling words using a whiteboard pen. Fo r each round, they will then rub off the words to start wi th a clean sheet. Using the spelling flashcards, choose one word from the top of the pile, read it carefully then turn it over. The race is now on to spell the word correctly, writing it on the windshields of all the cars on the page. Whoever finishes first (and has accurately spelled the word!) is the winner. As a further incentive, the children can remove the poly pocket and colour in their cars as a reward for completing the game.
• Roll and write – using the spelling flashcards, choose a word then roll the dice. Each number corresponds to a different method of spelling the world. An exciting game with a multisensory approach.
5 complete, interactive lessons for Letters and sounds phase 3 set 6.
The animated Powerpoint includes lessons covering:
j , v, w, x and a revision of all phase 2 tricky words.
The lessons follow the Letters and sound structure:
Revisit and review
Segmenting and blending
Teach
Practise
Apply
A ‘grab and go’ resource, this resource covers all the sounds that children need to know in set 6. Perfect for EYFS stages and ideal for whole class use.
A Powerpoint presentation with 20 sentences based on the Year 3 and 4 statutory spelling list. Ideal use for 7+ and 8+ exam preparation.
Each slide includes an audio file, where each sentence is spoken twice. After your child has written their sentence, they can reveal the correct answer on the slide.
Maths vocabulary cards that can be separated into four categories: addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.
Ideal for children who are confident in simple ‘question and answer’ situations, but struggle with questions in a word problem format.
These flashcards allow for sorting activities to take place, offering a more hands on approach than a poster on the wall.
Once flashcards have been sorted into piles, children could create their own word problems.
These flashcards can also be used as a quick warm up activity, where children need to call out which operation each flashcard matches to.
To help children to solidify their number facts, this homework pack was sent home for children to work on, and when they felt confident enough they would come into school and try and earn one of their stars. The scheme worked like this:
Bronze star = “I can say the story of X”
Silver star = “I can say the story of X backwards”
Gold star = “I can answer questions on the story of X in any order”
Once all stars were earned, the children could then move on to the next number story!
Five formative assessment ideas that can be implemented straight away in the classroom. Great for instant feedback and quick assessment!
This pack includes:
Formative assessment dice poster - children can take it in turns to roll the dice and answer the corresponding question.
Fist to 5 poster - allowing you to assess how challenging children found a lesson and who needs additional support
‘Thumbs up, thumbs down’ cut outs - these can be placed on children’s desks and used throughout lessons to check for understanding.
Mobile phone exit cards - laminate these and ask children to fill them out at the end of a lesson. A good way to see how children are feeling after a lesson.
Traffic light labels - attach these to 3 marking trays and the children can file their work according to how difficult they found the task in hand.