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DCSF Primary Literacy Framework
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Teaching Approaches in The Renewed Framework

There are a variety of teaching approaches used to develop reading in the units of work. They include:

Reading Aloud and Re-reading

Teachers reading texts aloud to children brings texts alive and lifts them off the page. The act of listening to the language and ‘voice’ of the author or poet and provides an important background for children’s own reading of the text and for their writing.

Visualisation and Responding to Illustration

Asking children to picture or visualise a character or a place from a story is a powerful way of encouraging them to imagine the fictional world. Children can be asked to picture the scene in their mind’s eye or walk round it in their imagination.
Introducing a new book with a key illustration is a way to intrigue and motivate the children to want to find out more. Using an illustration can be a valuable way of allowing children to predict what the text will be about, the genre, who the main character is, etc. Children can suggest what the illustration tells them about the setting, character, main theme of the text. Teachers should record points from the discussion for later reference.

Discussion

Open questions such as ‘What did you like or dislike about the opening?’, ‘Did anything puzzle you?’, to which all children can respond, are more likely to result in extended and fruitful discussions at the beginning. Later on, the teacher can focus in greater depth on particular aspects of the text.
Keeping questions open is the best way to promote discussion, for example:

• Why do you think that …
• What might be happening …
• How do you know that …
• I wonder if …

Reading Journals

Reading journals provide opportunities for children to reflect on their reading experiences and respond through writing or drawing activities. They can support children’s development as readers and also provide a record of their progress. They can take the form of a dialogue between child and teacher, a group or class activity where responses are recorded by the teacher or a child, or more structured activities or investigations such as making word collections or creating character sketches.

Keeping a class reading journal alongside the children’s own reading journals gives the opportunity to record collective responses, which can be referred back to as the class moves through the text. A class reading journal also provides a model for children who are less confident to make notes and write about their own observations.

Readers Theatre

Readers Theatre is an approach where a text is marked up into a script as a whole-class or group reading activity. Characters and narrators are allocated, parts underlined and groups of children can then work on preparing a performance of the text for the rest of the class. A short chapter of a novel, a short story or a picture book are ideal for this purpose. Sections of the text can be allocated to different groups in a class and joined together for a final performance.

Drawing and Diagrams

Children’s texts can include both drawing and diagrams – for example, a story map or character sketch. Drawing provides children with another way to imagine settings and characters.

Shared Reading and Writing

Shared reading is a key approach for helping children to focus on key parts of the text. Shared writing helps the teacher to support and structure a piece of writing: the class is encouraged to take part in deciding, for example, how the writing might begin, be structured, or draw on language that has been collected.

Text Marking and Annotating

Text marking and annotating can be carried out as a class, group, paired or individual activity. It is usually better for the teacher to demonstrate the purpose of the activity to the whole class first, before asking children to carry out the activity independently.

Drama and Role-play

Role-play and drama provide immediate routes into the fictional world of a story and allow children to explore texts actively. Children can put themselves into a particular character’s shoes and imagine how things would look from their point of view.

Writing in Role

Taking the role of a particular character enables young writers to see events from a different view point and involves them writing in a different voice.

Improving Reading - a teaching sequence example in Year 1

• Word 2003, 47kb/2 page, 02/07/2008, improving_reading_sequence_y1.pdf

Improving Reading - a teaching sequence example in Year 3

• Word 2003, 57kb/3 page, 02/07/2008, improving_reading_sequence_y3.pdf

Improving Reading - a teaching sequence example in Year 5

• Word 2003, 63kb/4 page, 02/07/2008, improving_reading_sequence_y5.pdf