Labels, lists and captions
(1 week)

This unit is the first of five non-fiction units in Year 1. It builds on work from the Reception Year (see Developing early writing, Ref: 0055/2001, Reception Year unit 1: The supermarket http://www.standards.dfes.gov.uk/primary/publications/literacy/63337/). The focus is on using the medium of labels, lists and captions to consolidate the fact that writing carries meaning and to support children in developing the concept of a sentence. Skills are developed in the context of building a classroom display. The unit can be purposefully linked to other areas of the curriculum. The unit has three phases, with oral or written outcomes and assessment opportunities at regular intervals.

Context: Sentence-level progression

• Children should be used to seeing and reading one-word labels in their Foundation Stage setting. In this unit the emphasis is on developing children's understanding of complete sentences.
• Children need to understand the following.
• A sentence is a complete thought, for example This is a toy, not A toy.
• A sentence is not the same as a line of writing, even though it might take up a complete line.
• A sentence needs a capital letter to start and a full stop to end. However, capitals and full stops only exist as signposts to show where a sentence starts and ends; putting capitals and full stops in a sequence of words doesn't make it a sentence.
• You can add extra information into a sentence, for example This is a toy can become This is my favourite toy.
• When captions are written as complete sentences, the present tense needs to be used.

Phase 1

The teacher uses the classroom environment to revise the purpose of labels and lists. The teacher and children begin to build a classroom display (which will probably be linked to another curriculum area) and discuss objects or pictures for the display.

Phase 2

The teacher and children read simple captions that are complete sentences and discuss their purpose. The teacher demonstrates how to think of and rehearse sentence captions and children practise the skill.

Phase 3

The teacher demonstrates how to write sentence captions and edits and scribes as children volunteer suggestions. Children write sentence instructions, first as supported writing and then independently.

Overview

• Use the classroom environment to revise the purpose of labels and lists. With the children, begin to build a classroom display (this will probably have cross-curricular links) and discuss objects/pictures for the display.
• Read simple captions which are complete sentences and discuss their purpose. Demonstrate how to think of and rehearse sentence captions. Encourage children to practise the skill.
• Demonstrate how to write sentence captions, edit and scribe as the children volunteer suggestions. Children write sentence captions, first as supported writing and then independently.

1998 Framework objectives covered:

Year 1, Term 1: T12, T14 and T15 read and use captions; write captions for their own work; make simple lists for planning, reminding, etc.