I completed my PGCE at The Institute of Education in 2011, staying in London to start my career at a primary school in Hackney. I taught across KS2 in four years, while also co-ordinating Spanish and Science and receiving brilliant CPD training across a range of specialisms. In 2016 I moved to Lancashire, where I have been supply teacher for a range of local schools. I love creating engaging & purposeful resources to bring education to life and to give teachers their weekends back!
I completed my PGCE at The Institute of Education in 2011, staying in London to start my career at a primary school in Hackney. I taught across KS2 in four years, while also co-ordinating Spanish and Science and receiving brilliant CPD training across a range of specialisms. In 2016 I moved to Lancashire, where I have been supply teacher for a range of local schools. I love creating engaging & purposeful resources to bring education to life and to give teachers their weekends back!
Here's a resource I've enjoyed using over and over, as it gets the kids to do most of the learning! The best way for children to understand the features of different Literacy texts is for them to explore and compare different examples. This worksheet focuses on the features of persuasive texts, which children would look out for in different examples, tick or cross whether they could spot them, and evidence by including an extract (e.g. if they have ticked that a text uses a rhetorical question, they need to note it on the sheet). This task promotes clear investigative, reading and literacy skills which could be completed independently, in partners or even together as a group!
Suitable for Y3-5, and differentiated, this resource allows children to put into practise their understanding of synonyms and the skills of using a thesaurus by up-levelling words in a given sentence.
As part of the children's cross-curricular studies about the Black Death, I linked my Art by learning about Masks. The class had previously studied the Egyptians, so this linked well with their knowledge from that.
This is a simple presentation which will allow you as a class to discuss what masks are, who wears them and why, and to compare different examples from cultures around the world. I haven't included a specific activity, but from this we went on compare/contrast the examples, and then over future lessons focus specifically on Death Masks before the class designed and made their own. Can easily be adapted for a different topic which features masks!
Here is a lesson presentation and writing plan based on Teacher's TV 'spooky graveyard' short film. I enjoyed using this English/Literacy across all KS2 classes to develop children's descriptive writing (setting, atmosphere) in the form of a recount. This is especially good to use around Halloween time!
Resource includes lesson presentation (Notebook) and planning sheet.
This lesson models to children how to read the time on an analogue clock using the following Success Criteria:
* I know how many minutes are in an hour
* I know the minutes that each number on a clock face represents
* I know when the time is at quarter past / half past / quarter to the hour
* I can identify what hour the time is currently in
Challenge: I can say times according to the approaching hour (e.g. ten mins to six = 5:50)
It is contains a balanced mixture of partner talk questions, teacher modelling and independent activities, along with helpful links to resources to support the objective. It even has a challenge plenary at the end, asking pupils what is wrong with the given analogue time (answer: the small hand is too close to the next hour when the minute hand is only on quarter past).
I cannot include worksheets for this lesson as I would be copyrighting other people's resources, but I have included links on one page to analogue clock resources. Or you could just Google it - plenty of free ones come up! Enjoy!
A pack of engaging Science lessons (made by a school Science co-ordinator) put together in one handy bundle linking to forces and motion.
I love making Science as interesting, informative and hands-on as possible for children in order to develop their understanding of various concepts.
This resource helps children to consider the progression of time chronologically and the duration of different events. The lesson objective is to be able to create a daily routine using time facts
Success Criteria:
* I can order events chronologically
* I can use vocabulary linked to the time of day
* I can identify what time activities start and end
* I represent times on an analogue clock
Challenge: I can state how long activities last
The lesson starts with a discussion about what key events would be included in a daily routine, with children thinking of their own personal examples. It then moves on to a teacher model of how time would be considered in a daily routine, from the start and end times to knowing the approximate duration of activities (i.e. they would know that brushing your teeth takes 5 minutes rather than 50 minutes).
Children then independently create their own daily routine plan on the worksheet provided, which has been differentiated to challenge different learners.
This lesson would suit KS1 and LKS2 classes and is easily adaptable. Enjoy!
This lesson models to children how to solve problems involving time using the following Success Criteria:
* I can identify the key words in a problem
* I can identify the calculation needed to solve a problem
* I can add time by counting on the number of minutes
* I can count across the hour
* I can find the difference between times using subtraction
It is contains a balanced mixture of partner talk questions, teacher modelling and independent activities, along with helpful links to resources to support the objective. It even has a challenge plenary at the end.
I cannot include worksheets for this lesson as I would be copyrighting other people's resources, but they are easily available via Primary Resources or a quick Google!
This resource consists of three sequential lessons focusing on the understanding of perimeter. Suitable for KS2 (previously used in Y3 & Y4 but easily adaptable to extend higher year groups), it consists of a lesson notebook for all three days, differentiated worksheets for the first objective and a further worksheet for the second objective.
The objectives and criteria for all three days are:
L.I.: To understand perimeter
Success Criteria
* I know perimeter is the distance around the outside of a shape
* I know perimeter is a measurement of length
* I know perimeter can be measured in mm, cm or m
* I know we need to use addition to calculate perimeter
L.I.: To be able to calculate perimeter
Success Criteria
* I know perimeter is the distance around the outside of a shape
* I know perimeter is a measurement of length
* I can count squares around a shape to calculate perimeter
Challenge: I can add the sides of a shape to calculate perimeter
L.I.: To be able to solve problems involving perimeter
Success Criteria
* I can read the question carefully and identify key words
* I know perimeter is the distance around the outside of a shape
* I can add the sides of a shape to calculate perimeter
* I can include the unit of measurement in my answer
The objective for this lesson is to understand the measurement of time and comes in two parts. The first gauges children's prior understanding of the following success criteria:
* I know how many seconds are in 1 minute
* I know how many minutes are in 1 hour
* I know how many hours are in 1 day
* I know how many days are in a week and year
Included is a worksheet for children to complete, with extra challenges on the notebook board for your higher abilities to be extended.
In the second part of the lesson I wanted to challenge and extend children's knowledge of time, so I linked in a TED animation about how time is linked to both Maths and Science. It explains the concept of time measurement using flip book animation, which children can relate to. From this, I challenged children to make a short flip book of their own, using one of the two examples modelled in the video. My kids absolutely loved this lesson, and even made longer and more detailed flip books at home afterwards using different time criteria!
Simple but fun Christmas-themed word search and crossword to entertain children in the run up to Christmas. Available in PDF, Pages and Word formats!
The words to be searched are:
BAUBLE BELLS CHRISTMAS ELF HOLLY MINCE PIES PRESENTS REINDEER ROBIN SANTA SLEIGH SNOWFLAKE TINSEL TREE
The crossword clues are:
ACROSS
2) These three people followed the star to Bethlehem
3) Vegetable used to make a snowman’s nose
5) Noise that bells make
7) Decorations made by folding and cutting paper
10) Gold items from the fifth day of Christmas
11) Breed of bird associated with winter
12) Traditional Christmas tree decoration
DOWN
Type of pies eaten at Christmas
Species of animal that Rudolph is
Abbreviation of ‘Christmas’
Animal swimming on the seventh day of Christmas
Area where Santa lives
Green, spiky plant used in Christmas decorations
This resource gets children to independently research information about Celtic traditions using ICT.
The worksheet gets the children to visit a BBC website and research the answers to nine questions (three examples shown) with space below each to make notes:
1. How many years before Jesus Christ did the Celts live in Britain?
2. Where do the Celts live today in Europe?
3. What were Celtic roundhouses made of?
This lesson uses brainstorming, questioning, exploration and matching to challenge the objective: To understand that plants make food in their leaves
The Success Criteria is:
I know the seven life processes
I can explain why plants have leaves
I know what the leaves of a plant need to make food
I can label a diagram to explain this process
Included is extensive flip pages helping children to understand the photosynthesis process and lesson activities to display their understanding.
This lesson links with others in my resource shop, as a whole topic bundle about Plants.
This lesson uses brainstorming, questioning, exploration and matching to follow the objective: To understand the different parts of plants
The Success Criteria is as follows:
I can name the main parts of a plant
I can label the main parts of a plant
I can describe the functions of plant parts
Included is a page listing different accessible and engaging activity ideas (as the items I used are copyrighted).
This lesson links with others in my resource shop, as a topic bundle about Plants.
This lesson (or two lessons if you want to make it really well!) allows your class to make an engaging and stimulating display about their Plants topic.
Included is photographs of the display I completed with my Year 3 class, a flip of different group activities and clip art which can optionally be used.
This lesson links with others in my resource shop, as a whole topic bundle about Plants.
When developing my children's comprehension skills, I don't like using photocopies from text books and meaningless expectancy sheets. I prefer to use purposeful, educational and REAL LIFE examples to engage and inform them, while still challenging them and looking for those reading skills.
Therefore a lot of my comprehension challenges are based around interesting newspaper articles. In this example, taken from the BBC News website in April 2017, a new species of reptile is discovered in Spain, linking to crocodiles and the dinosaurs.
Included in this pack is a copy of the article and linking comprehension questions suitable for KS2.
Enjoy!
This resource can form a lesson, informing children about the importance of General Elections (like 2017) and why we have them.
This Powerpoint presentation allows children to learn about what 'government' is, how it is structured, what different major parties form our current government and what their current policies are (which I have sourced as independently as possible using various news outlets and party pages, barring any U-turns!) This then goes on to allow children to discuss the policies presented to them and to think about what matters / appeals to them the most, with the aim of encouraging freedom of independent thought and debate. Due to the complex wording of some policies, this resource would be most appropriate for UKS2 and KS3, and possibly LKS2 with detailed supporting verbal explanation of key issues provided by teaching staff, such as Brexit.
The class can then go on to hold a Polling Station to vote, with polling cards included in the resource pack, before votes being counted and the results being displayed on the slide in both percentage and pie chart form.
'The Playground' starts with the opening line: Everything stopped, everything a statue all around me. Frozen in time.
This lesson resource gets children to brainstorm and write the rest of the story using their own imagination, using the above opening line and a playground photograph as stimuli. The objective and success criteria are:
To write a complete story
Success Criteria:
* My story has a beginning, middle and end
* The events of my story flow and make sense
* I can engage the reader using description / feelings / varied sentences
The lesson presentation is in Smartboard format with detailed, engaging slides which promote talk partner discussion, teacher modelling, an independent white board task, clear objectives and plenary.
It can easily be adapted for different KS2 year groups and a different writing focus other than story structure, e.g. tense, sentence starters, grammar or vocabulary.