Author: Miss Wallace

What happens in Active Literacy Reading? Sharing Learning with Families

Sharon Wallace, Curriculum Support Officer, Services and School Improvement Team has developed a range of materials to share with parents and carers about what happens in their children’s classrooms.

Mums, grans, aunties, big sisters and little sisters from St. Patricks R.C.P.S. in Denny shared one of these experiences at their ‘Girls Night In’.

Sharon demonstrated how teachers use a range of texts (in this case, Michael Rosen’s ‘Chocolate Cake’ poem) to develop the six reading comprehension strategies.

Firstly, the ‘big’ girls had a competition to see how many types of chocolate bars and how many characters they could spot in the ‘Charlie and the Chocolate Factory’ film trailer. This was a close competition! Sharon then ascertained their prior knowledge and experience of ‘chocolate’ by asking some open questions and asking the girls to put the word ‘chocolate’ into a sentence.

A recital of Michael Rosen’s ‘Chocolate Cake’ poem was well received with lots of giggles and laughter. The girls then drew ‘visualisers’ demonstrating their knowledge of the main ideas in the poem. One girl was able to make excellent comparisons between Bruce Bogtrotter (Matilda) and the little boy in the poem – very impressive!

The girls then eloquently answered a range of questions relating to inference. When asked what the little boy should have for his play piece after sneaking up in the middle of the night and demolishing a whole chocolate cake, the girls replied “Nothing!” or “Well, maybe a piece of fruit!”

The session concluded with the girls all trying out a sample of chocolate cake, whilst at the same time offering some fantastic adjectives to describe the smell, taste and whole experience.

All of the girls left the workshop with big smiles on their faces (and maybe a few sticky, icky fingers!).

Feedback from this session  included:

I liked the poem about the little boy who liked the chocolate cake.

Direct quote: I like the poam wif a litel boy wot likt choclt caik.  (Primary 1)

It was very good – I loved the story of the cake – thank you (Sophie P3)

We enjoyed hearing the story of the chocolate cake – we had lots of laughs during the session.

Good idea to introduce Literacy activities this time!

Chocolate cake workshop was worthwhile – something a bit different!

We wish we had visited the chocolate cake workshop – heard lots of good things about it.

More sessions like this are coming soon to a school near you! For further information, please contact Sharon.wallace@falkirk.gov.uk

I Like Big Books!

Larbert High School has highlighted the value of reading in this parody you tube video entitled ‘I like big books’.

The video can be viewed by clicking on this link.

 It was produced as part of Literacy Week 2013.

Active Literacy is used in all Falkirk establishments and aims to develop six key reading comprehension skills which are:

  1. Prior knowledge and understanding
  2. Metalinguistics
  3. Visualisation
  4. Inference
  5. Main ideas
  6. Summarising and paraphrasing.

All six comprehension skills are explicitly modelled and taught and pupils then apply these skills across a wide range of texts across a variety of genres.

Talking and Listening – Spelling Strategies – Skills for Life.

Larbert High School has produced a new you tube video relating to Talking and Listening highlighting the importance of  literacy skills.

 The short you tube video is a parody of Ant and Dec’s ‘Let’s Get Ready to Rumble’ entitled ‘Let’s Get Ready to Mumble’.

The video can be viewed from this link.

The video was launched at Larbert High’s Literacy week 2014 where there were a variety of literacy activities on offer, including ‘Spelling Bee’ which incorporates Active Literacy spelling strategies introduced in Falkirk Council primary schools. More information about these exciting literacy activities can be found by reading the article in our local newspaper The Falkirk Herald.

The Active Literacy Spelling programme aims to provide children with a range of strategies they are able to apply to tricky words in all curricular areas.

Parent Zone – Education Scotland Website

Literacy is important in all areas of learning. Being able to read and write accurately, to listen carefully and to talk clearly about ideas will increase the opportunities for young people in all aspects of life and will allow them to participate fully in learning and later in a work environment.

Parents play a crucial role in helping children to develop literacy skills from an early age. They contribute to this by reading to their children every day, learning nursery rhymes together and using normal events in life to help children learn about the world around them, for example by pointing out signs. Parents can contribute further to their children’s learning by encouraging children to talk about their thoughts and ideas, and about how they are feeling. Parents can encourage children to explore literacy outside the classroom.

Young people will enjoy reading different types of texts and all reading helps them to develop their skills. So whether they are reading a book, a blog, a magazine or a sports report, it will help if parents are encouraging and supportive.

This website has lots of ideas and links through to other websites to help parents and carers support their children with literacy at home.

Fun with Writing

The 50 Word Writing Competition.

Each month, the Scottish Book Trust runs a fantastic writing competition. This competition is open to all young learners up to the age of 18.

Young writers are asked to write 50 words inspired by a photograph or a theme or a title.

Further information can be found at the Scottish Book Trust’s website:

http://www.scottishbooktrust.com/writing/love-to-write/the-50-word-fiction-competition

Parent/ Infant relationships – Suzanne Zeedyk

Suzanne Zeedyk is currently Senior Lecturer in Developmental Psychology at Dundee University. Suzanne’s work focuses on parent-infant relationships. She is frequently invited to speak to groups of parents and professionals on the importance of such relationships, and how babies’ early experiences influence the development of their brain, bodies and psyche.

For more information, please visit the following website: http://www.educationscotland.gov.uk/earlyyears/prebirthtothree/nationalguidance/conversations/suzannezeedyk.asp

Adult Family Learning

 

Throughout the course of 2013 Scotland’s Learning Partnership has been writing a series of papers designed to generate discussion and debate by and between those involved in the delivery of various aspects of lifelong learning in Scotland. In this Family Learning Document they highlight and discuss key issues around the meaning of family learning in Scotland and raise awareness of some of the main thinkers in the family learning field. 

More information can be found at: http://www.salp.org.uk/