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Read and write powerful poems about the sea and the Titanic, including Hardy’s Convergence of the Twain. Revise word classes, noun phrases and adverbials.
We recommend that you start with the core unit, the heart of this English block of study. This introduces key textual material and sets the tone for any further units you wish to teach. These can be selected on the basis of the needs of your class – look at the green icons to identify the unit’s particular focus: SPAG, Composition or Comprehension. Whichever units you choose, we suggest teaching them in order, as there is a built-in progression indicated by the numbering.
‘UNIT PLAN’ gives you a text version of all parts of the unit to use in your school planning documentation. ‘DOWNLOAD ALL FILES’ gives you that unit plan plus all of the associated documents.
Spoken Language
-- Listen and respond appropriately to adults and their peers.
-- Use relevant strategies to build their vocabulary.
-- Articulate and justify answers, arguments and opinions.
-- Maintain attention and participate actively in collaborative conversations.
-- Use spoken language to develop understanding through speculating, hypothesising, imagining and exploring ideas.
Word Reading
None for this unit
Comprehension
-- Read and discuss an increasingly wide range of poetry.
-- Identify and discuss themes and conventions.
-- Identify how language, structure and presentation contribute to meaning.
-- Discuss and evaluate how authors use language, including figurative language, considering the impact on the reader.
-- Summarise the main ideas drawn from more than one paragraph, identifying key details that support the main ideas.
Transcription
None for this unit
Composition
-- Use other similar writing as models for their own.
-- Note and develop initial ideas.
-- Select appropriate grammar and vocabulary, understanding how such choices can change and enhance meaning.
-- Describe settings, characters and atmosphere.
Grammar
None for this unit
Poems
(All provided in resources)
Sounds of the Sea by James Berry
Seashell by James Berry
Song of the Seashore by Daphne Lister
Little Fish by D.H. Lawrence
The Sea’s hands by George Szirtes
The Cave's Mouth by George Szirtes
Who Makes Her Own Bed? by Grace Nichols
The Sea by James Reeves
The Ocean’s Blanket by Carol Ann Duffy
Website
Sea sounds from www.YouTube.com
Day 1 Teaching
Play sea sounds as children listen with their eyes shut. What images appear in their minds? Discuss Poetry Terms and explain that children will be thinking how these techniques and other types of language can be used to build images in poetry.
Activity
Children read a range of sea poems and discuss them, guided by the Discussion Prompt. They use the poetry terms in their discussions and make notes, ready to feed back to the class.
Day 2 Teaching
Recap ‘metaphor’ from Day 1 and use Sounds of the Sea by James Berry, to introduce personification as a type of metaphor. Read and discuss the poem, considering the impact of personification on the image built.
Activity
Most: Children choose from two poems by George Szirtes, The Sea’s hands and The Cave's Mouth, identifying and discussing words and phrases which personify the sea.
Easier: In a group, discuss Who Makes Her Own Bed? by Grace Nicholls.
Day 3 Teaching
Share a poem from Day 2. Agree that any technique that helps to build an image through words can be called imagery. Display and read the first stanza of The Sea by James Reeves. Discuss the metaphor.
Activity
In pairs or individually, children read The Sea by James Reeves and answer questions, thinking about how the image is developed through different techniques.
Day 4 Teaching
Share The Ocean’s Blanket by Carol Ann Duffy, discussing the images and use of language. Discuss the pattern of the poem and explain that today children will write new lines in a similar style. Model how to do this.
Activity
Children use the modelled example to write lines in the style of The Ocean’s Blanket. They can use the same line opening or choose a new one each time, e.g. The ocean’s hair is…The Ocean’s eyes are… etc.
Spoken Language
-- Articulate and justify answers, arguments and opinions.
-- Use spoken language to develop understanding through speculating, hypothesising, imagining and exploring ideas.
Word Reading
None for this unit
Comprehension
None for this unit
Transcription
None for this unit
Composition
-- Select appropriate grammar and vocabulary, understanding how such choices can change and enhance meaning.
-- Describe settings, characters and atmosphere.
Grammar
-- Use and understand the grammatical terminology in English Appendix 2 accurately and appropriately in discussing their writing and reading [noun, adjective, verb, adverb, preposition, pronoun, conjunction, determiner].
Poems
Long, Lone by Russell Hoban (see resources)
Presentations
Grammar PowerPoint: Word Classes
Day 1 Teaching
Use the PowerPoint: Word Classes (slides 1-9) to revise each word class. Distribute Word Classes – A Spotters’ Guide and display the top of the resource, Selkies. Ask children to read this and find examples of each word class in the text.
Activity
Children read Sea Myths in pairs. They identify and record examples of each word class in the text (in the supplied table). Encourage children to reach a consensus before recording, explaining why they have classified the word in this way.
Day 2 Teaching
Review PowerPoint: Word Classes (slides 1-9) and then read Long, Lone by Russell Hoban. Discuss impressions of the poem, using discussion to revise word classes in a meaningful way. Introduce today’s activity: describing a new mythical sea creature.
Activity
Children develop sentences using the Description Builder, discussing and trying out different words to see which will fit in of the correct class. Once they have a bank of ideas, they write a paragraph about the creature, adding pronouns and conjunctions.
Day 3 Teaching
Reread Long, Lone, discussing the mood the children think the poet was trying to achieve. What if we wanted to change the mood? Could we make it exciting, or threatening? Explore changing words and assessing the impact.
Activity
Children choose a mood they want to create and go through the poem, replacing words for new ones of the same class. They read their new version, assessing the impact and making changes.
Word Classes PowerPoint
Revise the function of different word classes: noun, adjective, verb, adverb, preposition, pronoun, conjunction, determiner, in the context of myths about the sea and practise identifying them.
Spoken Language
None for this unit
Word Reading
None for this unit
Comprehension
None for this unit
Transcription
None for this unit
Composition
-- Describe settings, characters and atmosphere.
-- Identify the purpose of the writing.
-- Select appropriate grammar and vocabulary, understanding how such choices can change and enhance meaning.
Grammar
-- Use and understand the grammatical terminology in English Appendix 2 accurately and appropriately in discussing their writing and reading.
-- Use expanded noun phrases to convey complicated information concisely.
Poems
The Kraken by Alfred Lord Tennyson (see resources)
Presentations
Grammar PowerPoint: Noun Phrases
Day 1 Teaching
Use the PowerPoint: Noun Phrases (slides 1-8) to revise noun phrases. Discuss expanding nouns in a given sentence, encouraging partner discussion. Discuss the impact of the noun phrases and agree that noun phrases can create strong images.
Activity
Children read and discuss given sentences with a partner. They annotate and develop each noun into expanded noun phrases, reading aloud to check the impact, and then record the new impactful sentences in books.
Day 2 Teaching
Discuss The Kraken by Alfred Lord Tennyson. Review PowerPoint (1-8) to briefly revise noun phrases, before extending to using noun phrases to evoke emotion concisely (9-13). Display images of shipwrecks and introduce today’s activity.
Activity
Children work in groups to build a bank of rich vocabulary, including expanded noun phrases, about the shipwreck images.
Day 3 Teaching
Reread The Kraken. Review slides 9-13 of PowerPoint noting the use of personification to evoke emotion. Choose an image from Day 2 and model writing a description of it, using the descriptive language developed on Day 2.
Activity
Children write an evocative description of one of the shipwrecks (or a combination of them) using and building on the noun phrases they developed on Day 2. Encourage children to use other imagery techniques: personification, for example.
Noun Phrases PowerPoint
Revise how to construct, identify and use expanded noun phrases to convey detailed information concisely. Consider the impact on the images created.
Spoken Language
-- Participate in discussions, presentations, performances, role play.
-- Use relevant strategies to build their vocabulary.
Word Reading
-- Apply their growing knowledge of root words, prefixes and suffixes to read aloud and understand the meaning of new words that they meet.
Comprehension
-- Summarise the main ideas and identify key details that support the main ideas.
-- Ask questions to improve their understanding.
-- Retrieve, record and present information from non-fiction.
-- Explain and discuss their understanding of what they have read.
-- Continue to read and discuss an increasingly wide range of poetry.
-- Read for a range of purposes.
-- Identify key details that support the main ideas.
-- Learn a wider range of poetry by heart.
-- Prepare poems to read aloud and to perform, showing understanding through intonation, tone and volume so that the meaning is clear to an audience.
-- Identify how language, structure and presentation contribute to meaning.
Transcription
None for this unit
Composition
-- Use other similar writing as models for their own.
-- Note and develop initial ideas, drawing on reading.
-- Select appropriate grammar and vocabulary, understanding how such choices can change and enhance meaning.
-- Describe settings, characters and atmosphere.
Grammar
None for this unit
Poems
The Convergence of the Twain by Thomas Hardy (see resources)
Websites
Animated Tale presenting The Convergence of the Twain by Thomas Hardy from player.hamilton-trust.org.uk
Titanic facts and figures from www.bbc.com
Day 1 Teaching
To prepare for reading a famous poem about the sinking of Titanic, children will research the facts. Discuss and list research questions. Allocate questions to children working in small groups, explaining how they will record and present their findings.
Activity
Children research their allocated questions and record their findings in brief notes. They then prepare a short role-play/drama to present their findings to the class.
Day 2 Teaching
Introduce the poem, explaining that it is quite tricky. Today children will be exploring the mood of the poem, rather than worrying about the meaning of every word. Read The Convergence of the Twain using the Animated Tale (see websites).
Activity
Keep the class together. Read the poem again, this time talking about key elements of each stanza, while children respond through art. Use Notes on The Convergence of the Twain to support teaching.
Day 3 Teaching
Reread The Convergence of the Twain. Focus on the first stanza. Discuss the sound (rhythm, rhyme, alliteration). Pick out words and phrases that children think create a strong image. Explain that looking closely at a poem helps us appreciate it more.
Activity
Allocate individual stanzas to children working in small groups. They read, discuss and practise reciting their stanza, guided by a prompt.
Day 4 Teaching
Share The Convergence of the Twain. Discuss and model how to pick out a powerful phrase and reuse it in a new context, e.g. The space monster emerged out of the gloom of the crater in the desert. It loomed up before us, grotesque, slimed..., etc.
Activity
Provide copies of the poem. Children choose an evocative phrase. They underline it and talk to their partner about what new context they will use this phrase in. They then write individually, building a descriptive paragraph around that phrase.
Spoken Language
-- Articulate and justify answers, arguments and opinions.
-- Use spoken language to develop understanding through speculating, hypothesising, imagining and exploring ideas.
Word Reading
None for this unit
Comprehension
None for this unit
Transcription
None for this unit
Composition
-- Select appropriate grammar and vocabulary, understanding how such choices can change and enhance meaning.
-- Describe settings, characters and atmosphere.
-- Assess the effectiveness of their own and others’ writing.
Grammar
-- Use and understand the grammatical terminology in English Appendix 2 accurately and appropriately in discussing their writing and reading.
-- Link ideas across paragraphs using adverbials of time, place and number.
-- Use a wide range of devices to build cohesion within and across paragraphs.
Websites
Trailer for 1997 film Titanic (stop at 60 seconds) from www.YouTube.com
Titanic facts and figures from www.bbc.com
Presentations
Grammar PowerPoint: Adverbials to Link Paragraphs
Day 1 Teaching
Use the PowerPoint: Adverbials to Link Paragraphs (slides 1-10) to revise adverbials and explore how they can be used to link paragraphs and create cohesion. Introduce today’s activity: identifying, punctuating and inserting adverbials.
Activity
Children complete Adverbials: A & B identifying and punctuating adverbials which link paragraphs and then inserting adverbials into given paragraph starters.
Day 2 Teaching
Revise PowerPoint (slides 1-10) and then discuss slide 11, how the adverbials bring clarity to the organisation of writing. Remind children how the Titanic’s story has inspired poetry and films. Pick out contrasts explored in these.
Activity
In pairs, children use the Contrasting Images resource to develop ideas, for content, language and adverbials to link and describe contrasting images associated with the Titanic. Children collect and develop ideas to be used in Day 3.
Day 3 Teaching
Demonstrate how children can use their notes from Day 2 as prompts for a series of descriptive paragraphs, introduced by adverbials. Explain that today children will create a series of images, each paragraph containing a different focus.
Activity
Children follow the process modelled, writing a series of descriptive paragraphs which open with an adverbial which informs of time, place or number. As they write, remind children to employ other image techniques.
Adverbials to Link Paragraphs PowerPoint
Revise adverbials and discuss how they can be used to link paragraphs, giving information about time, place and number. Consider the impact, and role in cohesion and clarity.
Spoken Language
-- Participate in discussions, presentations, performances, role play.
-- Give well-structured descriptions, explanations and narratives for different purposes, including for expressing feelings.
-- Ask relevant questions to extend their understanding and knowledge.
-- Gain, maintain and monitor the interest of the listener(s).
Word Reading
None for this unt
Comprehension
None for this unit
Transcription
-- Use dictionaries to check the spelling of words.
-- Use the first three or four letters of a word to check spelling in a dictionary.
-- Use a thesaurus.
-- Write legibly, fluently and with increasing speed.
Composition
-- Use other similar writing as models for their own.
-- Note and develop initial ideas, drawing on reading.
-- Select appropriate grammar and vocabulary, understanding how such choices can change and enhance meaning.
-- Describe settings, characters and atmosphere.
-- Assess the effectiveness of their own and others’ writing.
-- Propose changes to vocabulary, grammar and punctuation to enhance effects and clarify meaning
-- Proof-read for spelling and punctuation errors.
-- Perform their own compositions, using appropriate intonation, volume, and movement so that meaning is clear.
Grammar
-- Use and understand the grammatical terminology in English Appendix 2 accurately and appropriately in discussing their writing and reading.
-- Use expanded noun phrases to convey complicated information concisely.
-- Use adverbials of time and place.
Poems
The Convergence of the Twain by Thomas Hardy (see resources)
Websites
Animated Tale presenting The Convergence of the Twain by Thomas Hardy from player.hamilton-trust.org.uk
Titanic facts and figures from www.bbc.com
Day 1 Teaching
Recap what children know about the Titanic. Read the survivor’s account. Explore how eye-witnesses might recount the event through hot-seating. Children will plan their own poem about the sinking of the Titanic from a different viewpoint.
Activity
Children use Planning my Poem resource to discuss and plan a poem about the sinking of the Titanic.
Day 2 Teaching
Discuss how Hardy plays with word order for impact in The Convergence of the Twain. Display Interesting line openers and compose some impactful lines together. Today children will write the first drafts of their planned poems.
Activity
Children use their planning sheets from Day 1 and the opening lines sheet to stimulate ideas to write their poem.
Day 3 Teaching
Share a confident child’s draft poem from yesterday. Use the Polishing your Poem sheet to model how children will revise and edit their poems today, including reading aloud to assess impact.
Activity
Children review and improve their poem, using the Polishing your Poem sheet. Remind children to read their writing aloud to listen for impact.
Day 4 Teaching
Today children will prepare their poems for sharing. They will produce a final version which can be read by others and then rehearse performing it. Agree on the publishing process and expectations.
Activity
Children produce neat copies of their poems, thinking carefully about presentation, layout and handwriting. Once finished, they rehearse performing their work, ready to share with an audience.
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