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.

Saint Andrew's Day is celebrated in Scotland and other countries on November 30th. This resource consists of an information text about the day, it's meaning and how it is celebrated both in Scotland and other countries, along with linked comprehension questions to challenge children's understanding of the text. Includes pictures in the information text to make it more interesting and engaging. Suitable for KS2 and easily adaptable. UPDATED 29/11/2017

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?

'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.

A simple but fun Chinese New Year-themed word search and crossword puzzles to help children to embed their knowledge of the festival. Available in PDF format. Words featured in both puzzles are: DOG, DRAGON, FESTIVAL, GOAT, HORSE, LANTERN, LUNAR, MONKEY, PIG, RABBIT, RAT, ROOSTER, SNAKE, SPRING, TIGER

This short burst English topic presents or revises different types of poetry before focusing on the topic of key Black History figures and creating nominal poems about them. The objectives covering four days are: Day 1: To compare different types of poetry * I know the purpose of poetry * I can identify the structure of different poems * I can identify use of description in different poems * I can explain how a poem makes me feel Day 2: To be able to perform poetry Success Criteria: * I can compare how authors read poetry * I can speak confidently and clearly * I can use punctuation to identify the flow of a poem * I can emphasis key words in a poem Day 3: To be able to plan the content of a poem Success Criteria: * I can research key personal information about an individual * I can find out why they became a key Black History figure * I can brainstorm adjectives that describe their personality * I can brainstorm adjectives that describe their appearance Challenge: I can predict the feelings of an individual at key points during their life Day 4: To be able to write a nominal poem Success Criteria: * I can write the first letters of the persons name down the left margin * I know the first word for each line starts with the given letter * My poem tells the reader why the person is celebrated during Black History Month * I can include descriptive language to make my poem emotive This resource pack contains the Notebook presentation for the four days, which includes examples of all types of poetry, links to poetry being performed, talk partner questions, opportunities to take notes from children's feedback and task outlines for each lesson, along with worksheets for the third and fourth lessons and linking photographs. Suitable for KS2 and great for Black History Month or a general poetry topic.

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!