Page 15 - JPGS Newsletter, Issue no. 13, 2021-22

Talk for Writing

should you need any further ex Imitation their own writing, using the mod-
This is the biggest el text, the boxed up planning and
and most impor- the toolkit to guide them.
tant stage. At the
start of each unit, This is done step at a time, allow-
teachers introduce ing feedback to be given by peers
the learners to a and by the teacher throughout this
model text through process; children are then expect-
a text or story ed to edit and improve their writ-
map. Before they ing before moving onto the next
even see the text, section.
children are intro-
duced to it orally Independent Application
and learn this us- At the end of the innovation stage,
ing images and ac- children should be given ‘next
tions, embedding steps’ to help them as they move
the language and into the final stage where they are
sentence patterns expected to write a new story in-
needed to succeed. dependently.
Children deepen
their understand- This is an opportunity for them
ing through dis- to show what they have learned
cussion, drama, throughout the unit and apply
and games in order it without the support given in
to know the text re- the innovation stage. We call this
ally well. a ‘HOT WRITE’. The Hot write
gives us a chance to look at the
In the Prep School, teachers have Once the children progress made throughout the
been training for some time now, know their text, they see it and an- unit by comparing the cold with
to teach writing using the Talk for alyse it, looking for features, iden- the hot, giving clear comparable
Writing approach, a current, pop- tifying new and interesting vocab- evidence for assessment.
ular and successful approach to ulary and ‘boxing up’ the text to
the teaching of writing from the see how it is structured. The teach- The process is partnered with ex-
UK. The process uses lots of dis- er will also help build a toolkit for posing learners to a wide range of
cussion and looking at real texts to different types of writing, that quality children’s literature and
build understanding, improving children can refer back to later. helps them to build a bank of tools
skills in reading and writing along that they can refer back to year af-
with speaking and listening. Innovation ter year.
The innovation stage takes what
The Talk for Writing process be- the children have learned through As we continue throughout the
gins with a baseline assessment, imitation. Together as a class, they year, we do encourage you to pro-
a COLD WRITE, which helps work on a ‘shared write’ where vide your children with a wide
us see what each child can do at they use the boxed up planning selection of great literature to en-
the start of a unit. This helps the and the toolkit they made together able them to build the language
teachers identify areas of strength to write a class story or text. and ideas necessary to make them
and weakness in order to provide great writers.
the best support as they plan their The teacher uses this time as an
lessons. After this, the process is opportunity to teach specific skills Mr David Millar
divided into three stages: and address the targets they iden- Year 6 Teacher
tified in the cold write. As the class
• Imitation work on this, the children have a
• Innovation chance to take what they have
• Independent Application learned and put it into practice in

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