Today we’re talking about our plans for teaching literacy.
I bet you have pencils in your home and classroom, right? What if I told you that you shouldn’t be using pencils?
Top Tip #5: don’t use pencils to teach literacy
OK, so using pencils isn’t completely forbidden. That would be extreme. But if we think of ‘literacy’ as learning how to write neatly along a line on a page, spelling your words correctly, and putting in the correct punctuation, then we are missing out a huge amount of vital skills that our children need to be literate.
The National Literacy Trust defines literacy as: the ability to read, write, speak and listen in a way that lets us communicate effectively and make sense of the world.
Communicating effectively means we need to have self-confidence, and we need empathy for those we are talking with. We need to understand how the world works, and find our place within it.
Literacy includes:
:: connecting with others
:: recognising feelings – our own and those of others
:: being able to express ourselves – not just in writing
:: understanding the world around us
So how can we plan our literacy curriculum to help our children develop all these skills?
Help your child make their mark
When we move away from thinking about literacy solely as reading text, and being able to write neatly and with correct grammar, we make our teaching vibrant and effective.
This is when we really have an impact on our kids and give them the skills they really need in life.
My resource Make Your Mark will give you 30 projects that you can use at home or in class to really help your children develop their literacy. Things like:
:: finger gyms, easel activities, and mark making with sticks, play dough, and shaving foam to build fine motor skills and make the physical process of writing fun and approachable
:: storytelling activities that are play time, not ‘school work’. I’ll show you how to support your children’s development of language, vocabulary, and fluency through playful lessons using story mats, small worlds, role-play, and art
:: and because a vital part of literacy is understanding ourselves and others, I’ll show you how to work on this through interviews, self-portraits, and collaborative projects
How to download your resources
Click here to download your copy of Make Your Mark.
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