As it is hot topic in the news at the moment, I took one of the articles about the poppy / FIFA debate from the BBC and made it into a reading comprehension exercise to give children a purposeful activity in their reading time and something that could later be discussed in PHSE/circle time. In this pack is a PDF copy of the article (which is still available online) and linked questions suitable and easily adaptable for all KS2.

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 2013, a new map of Pangaea, the supercontinent from 300 million years ago, shows where modern day countries would have been located in the ancient land mass. Included in this pack is a copy of the article and linking comprehension questions suitable for KS2. Enjoy!

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 2013, a huge blizzard brought much of the north-eastern US and eastern Canada to a standstill, leaving about half a million homes without power. Included in this pack is a copy of the article and linking comprehension questions suitable for KS2. Enjoy!

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 Telegraph in 2013, a new species of tarantula roughly the size of a dinner plate is discovered in a Sri Lankan village. Included in this pack is a copy of the article (still available online) and linking comprehension questions suitable for KS2. Enjoy!

I used this lesson to revisit time connectives to improve the flow of my class' writing. The lesson itself starts with a recap of what time connectives are, why writers use them, and the brainstorming of different examples. It then moves on to challenging the children to use time connectives when recounting the events from the funny short film, 'The Black Hole', before they go on to independently complete a piece of writing - either recounting the events of the film or by writing their own story featuring a mysterious black hole.

'Hunted' is a short animation film which starts with a young, naive, native tribesman wandering into a hunter's campsite. The comedy and animation effects really draw in children and I have found it a brilliant resource to use to develop their writing description. This resource contains a full lesson and planning worksheet for the children. It focuses on developing the children's description of the setting, characters and their feelings as events progress. It can easily be adapted to challenge a different Literacy skill or to suit your class. Enjoy!

I made this lesson to help my class develop their variation of sentence starters. My lesson notebook models different examples using the helpful poster (which can be made into a dice) and then gets children to apply their understanding by recounting the animation of George and The Dragon (as our Literacy topic at that time was Myths and Legends). This can easily be adapted to link with a particular theme or year group.

This individual lesson teaches children how to structure lines in poetry to make them rhyme. I have linked this lesson to our Science work on the body, but this can easily be adapted to suit any cross-curricular theme or year group. Included is a whole lesson presentation, which allows you to model skills to the children and to challenge them to have a go themselves, and a worksheet for children to brainstorm their vocabulary ideas and structure before writing their poem up neatly into their books. Enjoy!

This lesson introduces children to Limerick poetry and gets them to try writing one of their own. I used this as a one-off lesson, but could easily be extended across one or multiple weeks. I made a cross-curricular link with our class topic, water, and again, this resource could easily be adapted to suit your topic or year group. Also included is a planning worksheet for your class to brainstorm their ideas before writing their poem neatly either on the sheet provided or independently in their books. Enjoy!

Lesson presentation introducing acrostic poetry. Can be used as a theme opening lesson or as a stand-alone lesson. I made a cross-curricular link with our 'pirates' topic theme, but this can be easily adapted to suit a particular class theme or year group. Also included in this pack is a worksheet for your class to brainstorm their vocabulary ideas and practise writing their poem before writing it up neatly into their books. Enjoy!

Carrot Crazy is a fun animation widely available on Youtube. This resource is made up of two worksheets; screenshots ordering events from the animation to guide children, and a planning sheet to help children recount the events of Carrot Crazy using lots of description.

Pigeon Impossible is a hilarious animation easily available on YouTube. It is about a detective, Walter, who, despite his top-level job, becomes amusingly thwarted by a....pigeon! Children love describing Walter, especially his traits which lack expected 'detective-qualities', and the mischievous pigeon, who only has an eye on getting one thing. This pack includes a full lesson presentation and planning worksheet. It can easily be adapted for different year groups and a particular Literacy focus, e.g. tense, person, grammar or vocab.

I made this resource based on Sainsburys' 2015 Christmas advert. Judith Kerr's 'Mog The Cat' is brilliantly brought back to life in animation form. He is found having a bad dream in his family home, which caused a series of unfortunate events, ultimately causing the fire brigade to arrive! Christmas seemed like it was ruined for the family, but the village quickly came together to help and to make Christmas a happy and united occasion. My class last year loved this recount. In the first of the two lessons provided, the focus was on recounting the events from the animation, with use of adverbs to describe, but this can easily be adapted if you have a different Literacy skill that you want your class to develop! The second lesson in the pack gets children to edit and improve their writing. Look out for my other Christmas-themed Literacy resources!

I made this resource based on John Lewis' 2012 Christmas advert. It is about a snowman and snowwoman who are made by some children in their garden, but overnight, the snowman disappears. He is seen making an epic journey across mountains, rivers, city centres, and eventually he returns...with the little girl finding that he had bought his snowwoman some christmas presents. I wanted to use it to develop children's inference skills and to develop their description; both of the characters and the various settings that the snowman travelled through. Each KS2 class I've taught have loved this recount. Look out for other Literacy resources I am uploading based on the other John Lewis adverts!

I made this resource based on John Lewis' 2011 Christmas advert. It is about a boy who shows his frustration of having to wait for Christmas Day throughout the video, which most children can emphasise with, until you learn at the end that he was desperate to GIVE his parents their Christmas present! I wanted to use it to develop children's inference skills and to convert the recount of an event into first person; showing their understanding of the character; with of course the description you would expect to bring the story to life. Each KS2 class I've taught have loved this recount. Look out for other Literacy resources I am uploading based on the other John Lewis adverts! UPDATE: The lesson presentation is now available in both Notebook and Powerpoint format in this download.

Nelson Boles' 'Little Boat' animation is surprisingly powerful - taking a simple boat through a range of settings which sees it become more and more damaged by human life, storms and war, but with a surprising and heartwarming ending. This Literacy lesson challenges children to image they are the boat themselves and recount it's story in the first person, describing what it can see, but also what happens to it, and its consequential feelings. Lesson pack includes writing plan for children and full lesson notebook! Enjoy!