This is a lesson that I created for all year 7 teachers upon our first meeting with students - it’s a great project to try out with KS2 or KS3 pupils. It will help you to really see who they are, how they think, what their team skills and confidence are like, across different subjects. In a nutshell: there’s a mix of speaking and listening tasks, amidst the introduction of P.M.I (plus, minus and interesting.) At the beginning of the lesson, we model a task, via the example: ‘what if money grew up on trees?’ - Pupils have to really consider the realistic positive, negative and interesting outcomes. This isn’t so much about getting the ‘right’ answers (though one laptop or ipad per group will certainly help with research), but more about engaging students in thought-provoking, curiosity-based discussion. The P.M.I topics here bring up some really interesting ideas and debate, whilst students develop their teamwork, research and presentation skills too. Included here is: ppt. slides for the full lesson, slides to hand out to groups (different scenarios for each group), a blank P.M.I grid to support note-taking and group research/ideas, an assessment grid to judge presentations and a full walkthrough of the lesson.

Here are 10 different teamwork-based scenarios which pupils (preferably in teams) can discuss, before teamwork gets underway. Each group is given a specific problem and has to discuss together how they would resolve the situation and encourage the team to work together. They then feedback and we discuss as a class. If I have time and students are keen to add some drama, I’ll ask them to act our their scenario and resolution as a role play. As a teacher of life-skills, I saw teamwork as a discreet skill-based subject, as well as linking this in throughout other subject areas. These scenarios are based on the situations that just seemed to happen again and again. I find it extremely useful to use something like this BEFORE teamwork begins - things seem to run a lot more smoothly afterwards. Inevitably, you may still have some problems within groups, but you can refer back to these scenarios and how the class chose to solve problems. I’ve also thrown in a ‘Top Ten Teamwork Tips’ sheet, which students can use alongside this activity and keep in sight to support any partner/group based task. For strategic advice, ideas, lesson plans related to Inclusive Teamwork - ideas that fit nicely with this discussion-based task, go to https://skillswithfrills.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Published-Optimus-magazine-pull-out-Inclusive-Teamwork.pdf for my 4-page pullout in Optimus Educations’ ‘Special Children’ magazine.

These slow writing prompt cards provide your KS2/KS3 writers with an opportunity to be independent, whilst also using a scaffolded approach. Children can shuffle and select from the 16 cards before including this in their writing, leading to a much more structured piece of work. Examples are included with each card to support understanding. I’ve used these cards with a range of different topics and I’ve had a lot of success with this approach, particularly with struggling writers, SEND students, and those who just generally lack confidence in their own skills and techniques. Slow Writing does take time and patience, but what students lack in speed, they more than make up for in the quality and progress of writing. See my blog from a while ago discussing successes with the Slow Writing approach and SEND students - https://wordpress.com/post/skillswithfrills.com/1340

I used this with my SEND group who were in year 8, but working at KS1/2 level. We watched a clip from Youtube (Just search: Harry Potter & The Goblet of Fire: Hungarian Horntail Task.) Then we worked in pairs to put the pictures in order at first, and then match the correct sentence below and stick this in. One higher ability pair had to change their sentences as an extra challenge. This became the plan of our Harry Potter diary - we were completing a topic about Dragons - so students had all the events and information, and only needed to transform this into a diary style. This topic is suitable for KS2 and KS3 pupils and is easily adapted for different ages, abilities and needs. It’s very simple just to take out the sentences either in part or altogether and ask students to create their own from scratch.

At the end of a unit of work based on various Mr. Bean clips, my KS3 SEND students watch the clip from youtube of Mr. Bean, waking up late for the dentist. Here’s the link - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VumrpkL6RS0 Firstly, they cut out the pictures and in pairs, put these in order and discuss the events of the clip and how we might describe this to someone who hadn’t seen it. We split the clip in half and I show them my own slow writing from the first half of the clip. Then, their independent writing task is to complete the slow write for the second half of the clip. I’ve taught this to whole classes in year 5 and 6, and to small SEND groups in year 7 and 8. It’s always a hit, and I’ve found that the slow writing technique has made a big difference to the quality of writing that we’re producing.

A behaviour and consequences flow chart that you can use after an event with pupils to discuss what they did and what they could have done. I find this useful in that it encourages SEND pupils, including children with Autism, a logical approach to explaining an emotional reaction. I allow children to draw their answers if they’re not comfortable in writing them. I have used this in detention so that pupils are at least thinking about why they’re suffering consequences - because of their own choices.