Daily 5- Focus lessons

Year 2 | English
Writing
Mini lessons should be no longer than 10 minutes
Students work on their writing for 20 minutes.

Lesson 1
Describing the setting of a text
Content descriptor: Achievement Standard:
Discuss the characters and settings of different They create texts that show how images support
texts and explore how language is used to the meaning of the text.
present these features in different ways
(ACELT1591)
Plan: Reflection:
Have all students sitting on the floor in front of IWB.
- Slide 1: What are the 5 senses? Initially, some students didn’t
- Discuss with students each one and what they understand what the five sense were.
mean However, after group discussion and
- Slide 2: work together on haunted house example identifying each of them, they all
- What can you see? understood.
- What can you hear?
- What can you smell? This image was based on a discussion
- What can you feel? with a student the day before where she
- What can you taste? was describing a haunted house. The
- Slide 3: Have students pick one of the images students were all engaged with this
(Safari/beach/theme park) and describe the setting example and were about to brainstorm
using the five senses. some creative ideas.
- Having pictures on the board will prompt their The student who I spoke with yesterday
ideas instead of them having to come up with it even shared her piece with the class to
themselves. demonstrate how she wrote her
Independent task- description of the haunted house.
- Work on writing (describe on of the settings to
describe) In this time I tried to check-in with most
- Word work (based on Adverbs from earlier in the students to see their progress. Most of
week). them were on task for the session and
Differentiation: were able to use this strategy in their
Extending: Get students to write descriptive sentences writing.
about the five senses
Enabling: Give template with visual prompts of the five
senses.
Resources:
- Writing books
- Setting/landscape images (to be displayed on IWB)
Lesson 2
Describing characters in a text
Content descriptor: Achievement Standard:
Discuss the characters and settings of different They create texts that show how images support
texts and explore how language is used to the meaning of the text.
present these features in different ways
(ACELT1591)
Plan: Reflection:
Have all students sitting on the floor in front of IWB.
- Revise last week (setting) Student were easily able to recall what an
- Ask students ‘what is an adjective?’ adjective was. Using illustrations as a
- Use picture of farmer and have students describe reference made the lesson more engaging
him. for the students rather than relying on
- Show own descriptions and discuss the their own memory. In getting them to give
different adjectives used. me a description of the farmer, I had to
- Explain task for ‘work on writing’ prompt the students to use more
- Draw your own monster and describe what it descriptive language than ‘a brown hat’.
looks like.
- Refer to list of considerations (size, shape, All students were excited about the
colour, etc.). monster task, it allowed them to be
- Encourage students to use as many creative while also engaging in the topic
adjectives as they can. of the focus lesson.
Independent task- This task ended up linking with other
- Work on writing subjects such as art where the students
Differentiation: got to make their monster out of a variety
Extending: Get students to write descriptive sentences of materials.
about the five senses. Following this, create a story
about their character.
Enabling: After students have drawn their monster,
have them describe their character using simple
adjectives.
Resources:
- Writing books
- Pencils/textas
Lesson 3
Revising synonyms

Plan: Reflection:
Revise previous lesson
- Adjectives Students were already familiar with
- Describing our monsters synonyms as they had learnt about this
Ask students about synonyms earlier in the year. Therefore, this was a
- What do they already know? revision lesson for them to help improve
- Can they give any examples? their writing.
Use example of the word big As I made connections with the writing
- Students come up with synonyms for big they had been doing for their monsters in
- *use example of their monster to describe it being previous lessons, the students were
big engaged and willing to expand their
- Scaffold/extend students to use a variety of words vocabulary with different synonyms. Using
Independent work- the monsters as an example helped
- Word work: using whiteboard, students come up scaffold some ideas as I was getting
with a range of synonyms similar responses such as
- Work on writing: students continue their writing, ‘giant/ginormous/gigantic’.
tyring to use synonyms.
Resources: For the students who chose ‘work on
- Writing books writing’, I tried to challenge them by using
- Whiteboards adjectives such as ‘small’ and verbs such
- Pencils/textas as ‘walk’.
Lesson 4
Quick write

Content descriptor: Achievement Standard:

Plan Reflection
*This lesson will also be with the other Year 2 class As this was an opportunity for students to
Introduce today’s task- a quick write use all their knowledge from previous
- In pairs, students will refer to image on IWB and lessons, they were thoroughly engaged.
describe what they see
- This will be an opportunity for them to use their Modelling the task as a class was key in
prior knowledge that we have learnt about in ensuring that they all understood what to
previous lessons about inferring, verbs, do. When asking them to describe using
- describing the setting (using the 5 senses), the 5 senses, I challenged them to use
synonyms, etc. synonyms also.
Model task on IWB
- Get students to pair up with someone from the Some students did find it quite
other class- one gets a whiteboard, another gets a overwhelming that there were so many
marker. things that they could write. I reassured
- Display picture of boy walking dog them that it was ok, I just wanted them to
- Think, pair, share- what do you see? write about the picture, so they chose one
- Ask students for answers- write on whiteboard concept to focus on and write about.
Independent task (in pairs)-
- Display picture of camping site It was interesting to hear some of their
- Student to describe the picture using knowledge response, particularly what they inferred
learnt in previous lessons was happening in the picture. In this time
Differentiation: if was important to remind them that
Extending: Prompt students to use each of the concepts there were no right or wrong answers as
that we have learnt about in our Daily 5 sessions. we are only making guesses.
Enabling: Students video themselves describing what
they think is happening in the picture.
Resources:
- Whiteboards
- Markers
- Images for IWB
Lesson 5
Proof reading/peer editing

Content descriptor: Achievement Standard:

Plan: Reflection:
Have all students sitting on the floor in front of IWB.
- Discuss what students have been working on in Unfortunately, there were very few
‘work on writing’ students who believed that their writing
Introduce today’s focus was at a point where they were ready to
- We all need to be checking our work and looking edit. However, I will ensure that these
for way to improve. Sometimes we even need templates are continually available to
other people to read our work to help us (give students if they feel that they are ready to
example of uni assignments). proofread their work. I also plan to talk
- Show students the task cards (punctuation about this task at least once per week to
checklist and 2 stars and a wish) remind the students of the importance of
- Using the punctuation checklist, see if there are editing their work.
any changes you make to improve your writing.
- If you are happy with your editing, give it to a peer I ended up working closely with 2 students
and get them to read it. Using the 2 stars and a who were working on the ‘two stars and a
wish template, give two positive comments about wish’ sheet while reading each other’s
the persons work and one piece of constructive work. As I was walking around the
feedback (*discuss constructive feedback) classroom I overheard these two students
Independent task talking and found that one was struggling
- Students continue their ‘work on writing’ and the give feedback that was constructive.
begin proof reading if they think they are ready. At this point, I joined the students and
Differentiation: discussed with them the importance of
Extending: conference with students to support them in giving feedback that would help the other
using correct punctuation. improve their writing, instead of giving
Enabling: ensure students are using full stops and personal opinions. I did not get to see the
capital letters in their writing. outcome of this conversation as the lesson
Resources: finished soon after so I need to follow up
• Punctuation template on this.
• 2 stars and a wish template
• Writing books
• Pencils