Alternatives for "Very" Whole Lesson

This lesson looks at ways of improving writing through expanding our vocabulary. In this lesson the focus is on alternatives ways of saying “very” in our descriptions of nouns and verbs. The lesson encourages students to use singular, more ambitious vocabulary to emphasise extent, rather than repeatedly using “very” coupled with a more mundane descriptive word.

The lesson bundle contains both a presentation which can be worked through and a collection of accompanying worksheets.

Presentation
The bulk of the lesson can be structured and delivered using the presentation. The presentation is interactive and engaging throughout, allowing students to take an active role in their learning. The presentation is moves through 4 parts to allows for scaffolded teaching:

• Learning intentions, keywords covered, context
• Worked examples
• Application to sentences and writing
• Activities

Throughout the lesson there is opportunity for students to work through examples interactively, answer questions, and complete short tasks all of which leads to a final application task at the end.

The presentation is structured clearly with simple colour and animation used throughout to engage and aid memory.

Worksheets
2 worksheets are included in the worksheet pack. Learning intentions are typed onto both worksheets. Each worksheet looks to target real-life skills and application.

1. First worksheet is a word bank creating activity which can include thesaurus skills if desired. Students are given a table with simple descriptive phrases involving very and are asked to provide alternatives without using “very”. This can serve as a useful word bank that they can refer to when writing in future.

2. Second worksheet is a written sentence application task. Students are given 4 brief descriptions with “very” phrases underlined. They are asked to re-write the descriptives with alternatives for the very phrases. Each description covers a real-life applicable topic. An extension task is provided for students to expand their learning out to writing their own brief description on a recent day out.

Quiz
The lesson can be completed with a quiz. The quiz includes 30 questions in total, organised into 4 rounds. The idea of 30 questions is that in a typical class of 30, every child can answer a question. Having 4 rounds means the whole would need not be completed in one sitting.

Each round covers a slightly different style of questioning to help keep the children engaged. Answers are provided for every question at the end of each round.

All questions are multiple-choice to enhance accessibility for all children.