Hatfield Woodhouse Primary School

So what is Big Writing? Here is a short guide to Big Writing,we hope it helps.

Big Writing is a term used for an approach to writing that was pioneered by Ros Wilson of Andrell Education. A relatively ‘new’ way of teaching writing, it focuses on 4 main aspects of the writing process and gives the children the skills to improve their own writing through self assessment, sharing of work and fun, learning games throughout the weekly special writing session.

The Four Elements

The children are taught to think about their writing in four particular ways Vocabulary, Connectives, Openers and Punctuation. They then use these aspects to help them improve. It must be remembered however that this process is to do with one aspect of their writing. We are also committed to improving the quality of the content and how they use writing to express themselves. The elements below will vary according to the age group of the children.

Vocabulary: Classes have  ‘Vocabulary Wow Words’ where new and impressive words are introduced to the children and they are encouraged to use these words where appropriate in their writing.

Connectives: Using creative connectives (joining words) create more interesting sentences which then lead into the use of paragraphs in Key Stage 2.

Openers: With good openers (sentence starters) we teach ways of improving a basic sentence e.g. ‘The children climbed the hill slowly’ to a better sentence by changing the word order; ‘Slowly, the children climbed the hill.’ or ‘the door slammed shut’ to ‘Suddenly, the door slammed shut’.

Punctuation: Key Stage 2 classes have a clearly displayed ‘Punctuation Pyramid’ showing the levels of punctuation. Children are taught the names of the  punctuation from Year One onwards and learn to use them in their writing. These 3-d pyramids sit on the tables in the classrooms and serve as a visual reminder for children. They help them remember what they need to do and then what they need t do to improve.

Big Writing lessons are also characterised by a ‘special’ atmosphere with  quiet music playing while the children write to enhance the special experience. They have special paper, special books and special pens or pencils.

It really helps the children if they can share their ideas for the Big Write as we believe ‘If a child cannot say it, we cannot expect them to write it’. The children will be given a modal map to help with their ideas and questions are sent home to help aid the ’Big Talk’ and idea generation.

Children who actively complete their Big Talk work in preparation for the Big Write session produce better quality work than those who do not.

 ’Failing to plan is planning to fail’.

Year 4 have been learning to write using persuasive language in their Literacy lessons. The children first invented a product then after researching existing advertising techniques they wrote their own radio adverts.

Are you persuaded by any of these radio adverts?

Year 4 radio by woodhouseprimary