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Foundation, Year 1 and 2 non-fiction - Mixed age planning - Information texts

Note: Children working significantly above or below age-related expectations will need differentiated support, which may include tracking forward or back in terms of learning objectives. English as an additional language learners should be expected to work within the overall expectations for their year group. For further advice see the progression strands and hyperlinks to useful sources of practical support.

Progression in using information texts

There is a generic progression in using research skills and creating information texts. This matrix shows progressively what children can do independently at the end of each year. It assumes that within the year there will be a progression in which the teacher demonstrates and models before children's independent attempts. In many instances, children will have had oral experience before being asked to write. Setting success criteria and evaluating own work is also inherent in this matrix.


Research skills (on page and on screen)

Creating information texts (on page and on screen)

FS

  • Track the words in text in the right order, page by page, left to right, top to bottom.
  • Learn order of alphabet through alphabet books, rhymes and songs.
  • Distinguish between writing and drawing and write labels for pictures and drawings.
  • Attempt writing for various purposes, using features of different forms, e.g. lists, stories and instructions.

Year 1

  • Pose questions before reading non-fiction to find answers. Secure alphabetic letter knowledge and order and use simplified dictionaries.
  • Initially with adult help and then independently, choose a suitable book to find the answers by orally predicting what a book might be about from a brief look at both front and back covers, including blurb, title and illustrations. Read and use captions, labels and lists. Begin to locate parts of text that give particular information, e.g. titles, contents page, index, pictures, labelled diagrams, charts, and locate information using page numbers and words by initial letter.
  • Record information gleaned from books, as lists, a completed chart, extended captions for display or a fact file with ICT.
  • Convey information and ideas in simple non-narrative forms such as labels for drawings and diagrams, extended captions and simple lists for planning or reminding. Independently choose what to write about, orally rehearse, plan and follow it through.

Year 2

  • Pose and orally rehearse questions ahead of writing and record these in writing, before reading. Recognise that non-fiction books on similar themes can give different information and present similar information in different ways.
  • Use contents pages and alphabetically ordered texts, e.g. dictionaries, encyclopaedias, indexes, directories, registers. Locate definitions/explanations in dictionaries and glossaries.
  • Scan texts to find specific sections (e.g. key words or phrases, subheadings) and skim-read title, contents page, illustration, chapter headings and subheadings to speculate what a book might be about and evaluate its usefulness for the research in hand. Scan a website to find specific sections, e.g. key words or phrases, and subheadings. Appraise icons, drop-down menus and other hyperlinks to speculate what it might lead to and evaluate its usefulness for the research in hand.
  • Close read text to gain information, finding the meaning of unknown words by deducing from text, asking someone, or referring to a dictionary or encyclopaedia.
  • Make simple notes from non-fiction texts, e.g. key words and phrases, page references, headings, to use in subsequent writing.
  • Write simple information texts incorporating labelled pictures and diagrams, charts, lists as appropriate.
  • Draw on knowledge and experience of texts in deciding and planning what and how to write.
  • Maintain consistency in non narrative, including purpose and tense.
  • Create an alphabetically ordered dictionary or glossary of special interest words.
  • Design and create a simple ICT text.

This unit uses the example of caterpillars and their life cycle, following the Foundation Stage overview of learning 14. It could, however, be linked to any aspect of the curriculum using alternative information texts as available or relevant to the children. By using alternative texts and contexts this unit could be repeated later in the year and/or used each year as part of a rolling programme. The example used here particularly lends itself to making links with science, for example, QCA 1B Growing plants, QCA 2B Plants and animals in the local environment, QCA 2C Variation.

The organisation of literacy in a Foundation Stage and Key Stage 1 classroom

Ensure children have appropriate specific phonic input during this teaching sequence as a discrete daily entitlement (see guidance in Letters and Sounds).

Guided reading sessions need to be planned to run in parallel to this teaching sequence according to the ability of children in the class. Certain reading objectives identified for this unit are suitable for a targeted guided reading session. Therefore a guided reading session has been identified within this teaching sequence.

The extent of inclusion of the Foundation Stage in this teaching sequence will depend on the age and maturity of the children and the time of year it is to be delivered. By the end of the summer term it would be expected that the majority of the Foundation Stage children would participate in the full teaching sequence. Earlier in the year, the Foundation Stage children will participate as appropriate and then be offered a range of opportunities to extend and develop these experiences.

Throughout the unit a range of activities will be available for the Foundation Stage pupils.

Opportunities for children to explore and apply further (Overview 14)

  • Look up the author on the Internet: for example www.eric-carle.com. Use the site to see if there are more books by Eric Carle that they would like to read or have read, and to see how he creates his pictures, then copy his technique to make their own caterpillar pictures using pictures found in non-fiction texts.
  • Extend stories inside and outside. Provide props in a number of areas, for example add a making basket of cloths, tape, string, clothes pegs, etc. to construction, and make a story trail of objects from a favourite book or fairy tale that can be found and used by the children.
  • Make sharing stories, songs, rhymes and poems part of everyday experience. Make collections of favourites for rereading and learning some off by heart. Make story/rhyme sacks, including props, make story/rhyme/song tapes and CD-ROMs readily available. Use talking books on the computer or make your own. Make props that can be used on story boards or with the interactive whiteboard. Encourage retelling by providing microphones, listening back to stories or scribing children's own stories.
  • Follow children's lines of enquiry and interests by showing them how to find further information and pictures from non-fiction texts and websites. For example, a child fascinated by car badges and who knew many by heart was helped to make a collection by finding them on the Internet, printing them out, putting them into a scrapbook and adding it as an information book for others to learn from.
  • Play games, sorting books into fiction and non-fiction and matching key words to books. Give children words from the index of a book and ask them if they can sort them into the right order, using the alphabet to help.
  • Carry out practical work relating to the curriculum area, for example, observations of caterpillars and butterflies outside or on film clips. Discuss activities with children, encouraging them to ask questions and make observations. Record activities using a digital camera.