Literacy Medium Term Plan
Year Group / Set
2 / Mixed ability
Date
Title / Theme / Stimulus
Fire & Light / The Lighthouse Keeper Stories
Sept 2014
Duration
7 weeks
Genre(s)
Narrative, instructions, explanation
texts
End of Unit Outcomes:
Lower ability
I can use a storyboard and write a sentence for each
picture, with at least one CL and FS.
Middle ability
I can write a shared story with support. I can use CL
and FS (accurately, at least 50% of the time).
More able
I can write my own story.
I can use CL and FS accurately (at least 75% of the time).
I can write a short, shared explanation sentence with
CL and FS.
I can write two sentences to explain a process, using
CL and FS and think about the tense.
I can write a short explanation text with CL and FS, in the
correct tense, with a causal connective (so, because).
Start of Unit Launch
Picnic (on school field, weather permitting) with Lighthouse Keeper theme and clues
from a story bag to be discussed as a starting point for setting / characters.
End of Unit Celebration
Visit to Reception to share own stories and videos of drama activities.
Outline of teaching activities: The 2013 planning below will be extended by a week and adapted to ensure the children write extra one off creative stories. These may be
retells or completion of stories from given story starts.
Week 1 Exploring Settings
(Inset Monday, Holiday writing Tues)
Wednesday: Launch Picnic on school field (weather permitting). Story bag containing clues of setting (shells, light, sand, picnic basket, seagull, images of beach, red and
white striped items, picnic cloth, etc). Discuss the story bag contents and printed images.
Thursday: Setting description – Begin reading Lighthouse Keeper’s Lunch. Share ideas and create a shared piece of descriptive writing and then write own (link to Art
activity, creating a 3-dimensional model of the beach; Science link – creating a working lighthouse for the model).
Friday: Comparing familiar settings. Discuss other settings from familiar stories. Children create a picture in two halves to annotate – 1 side familiar setting, the other of the
lighthouse Keeper’s story setting. LA – caption the pictures, CL and FS. MA – write sentences to describe each including adjectives, CL, FS. HA – write comparative
sentences using CL, FS. and connectives.
Week 2 Instructions, Descriptions & Dialogue
Monday: Guided reading groups
Tuesday: Create shared instructions for a mustard sandwich then write own independently.
Wednesday: Create a disgusting sandwich to scare the seagulls away. Write own descriptions of the ingredients and annotate with labels and captions.
Thursday: Write own instructions for how to make the disgusting sandwich, extend HA to use time adverbs.
Friday: Ask children to imagine the seagulls ate the disgusting sandwich. What would their reactions be? What might they say to each other if they could speak? Write shared
dialogue in speech bubbles then children write their own mini conversations. HA – extend to use inverted commas.
Week 3 Characterisation
Monday: Guided reading groups
Tuesday: Drama – role play acting as characters from the Lighthouse Keeper stories. Work in small groups to explore characters and construct short conversations.
Complete speech bubbles using cut and stick characters (own choice).
Wednesday: Character clue cards. Play “Guess Who” Give children a selection of clues about a popular TV character / well known story character. Children write who they
think it is on WBs and reveal when asked. Create shared set of clue cards for a character from the story for TA to guess when they come back into the room. Children then
create their own clue cards with a sentence on each for a character in the story, for a partner to read and guess. Extend HA to use adjectives.
Thursday: Role on the wall – choose a character from the stories. Hot seating activity to gain deeper understanding of their feelings / behaviour / character. Complete shared
role on the wall chart and then children complete independently.
Friday: Create an emotions graph for the Lighthouse Keeper. How did he feel at the beginning of the story? Middle? End? What other words can we use to describe his
feelings beyond happy and sad? Children to create a word cloud of emotions for one of the characters using colour and encoding carefully using sound mats. Extend MA /
HA to chart this as the story happens – in chronological order with words for beginning, middle and end.
Week 4 Story Writing
Monday: Guided reading groups
Tuesday: Choose one of the Lighthouse Keeper Stories. Use actions to retell the story as a class. Sequence together on the IWB using images and adding a caption for the
first image. LA Children complete sequencing activity independently, adding two captions. MA add captions to images. HA retell the story.
Wednesday: Planning a new Lighthouse story. Begin with a shared story starter – write a shared starter for children to use, based on the beginning of the Lighthouse Keeper
stories. Discuss in mixed ability groups to generate ideas for a new story. Make brief notes for ideas.
Thursday: Small world play (10 mins) to act out own stories. Children all complete story plan with setting, characters, problem / resolution. LA / MA – shared.
Friday: Children write own stories. LA – storyboard format with sentences. MA – Write a story based on shared ideas from yesterday (can write own if wish). HA – Write own
stories.
Week 5 Exploring Creating Explanation Texts
Monday: Guided reading groups
Tuesday: Differentiated alphabetical ordering activities.
Wednesday: A-Z of the beach. Write trios of beach words on the IWB – a noun, an adjective, a verb. Explain meanings of each term. Begin a shared A-Z of beach words,
children can come up with nouns, adjectives or verbs, extend HA to tell you which each is. Children complete their own A-Z of beach words. Extend HA explore alliteration.
Thursday: Creating a shared dictionary of the beach for Reception children. Explore a large dictionary and look at definitions. Discuss sentence structure / tense. Write a
shared definition for two or three beach words. Allocate children a picture of a beach object, each writes their own definition to collate as a class beach dictionary.
Friday: Creating an explanation piece about the beach – imagine you are an alien landing from a new planet. What is a beach? What can you find / do there? Model writing
an explanation of what a beach is and encourage children to add to this by writing their own sentence on WBs. A beach is…. At the beach you can… Children write a short
independent explanation of a beach for a visitor from another planet.
Week 6 Exploring and Creating Explanation Texts
Monday: Guided reading groups
Tuesday: Exploring explanation texts – look at an index page on the IWB, discuss alphabetical order. Set children a quickfire test to locate page numbers for a given item and
show on number fans. LA to work with TA at own pace. Look at a page of explanation text and explore the features. Children to highlight (differentiated) explanation texts
with features they recognise and label / annotate.
Wednesday: Researching a topic – children use internet / books to research how a lighthouse works and make brief notes / use flow chart template.
Thursday: Writing an explanation text – LA – write a shared sentence to explain how a lighthouse works. MA – Write two sentences in the correct tense. HA – Write a
paragraph about how a lighthouse works, maintaining consistency in tense and using causal connectives.
Year Group / Set
2 / Mixed ability
Date
Autumn 2
Duration
4 Weeks
Traditional Tales
Non-chronological report about
wolves
Drama/ role play
Cross curricular links
Title / Theme / Stimulus
ICT- to research for report about
wolves
Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?
Peter and The Wolf
Little Red Riding Hood
Mr Wolf’s Pancakes
The Three Little Pigs
non-fiction texts about wolves
Mr Wolf’s pancakes
Instructions- pancakes
recipe(/Science link to materials)
Genre(s)
PSHE/P4K- who is the most
bad/good character?
Art- making finger puppets for the
main characters
Music critiques- Peter and The Wolf
score
End of Unit Outcomes:
Write an alternative version of a traditional tale
Lower ability
Middle ability



To use simple adjectives (colour, size) to
describe a character using labels and at least
one sentence using initial, medial and final
sounds, with at least one CL and FS.

To complete speech bubble dialogue between
two characters as a comic book story with
some simple narrative sentences.

To include
sentences to describe the main characters
including dialogue, using adjectives and
including capital letters and full stops (1adj
sentences).
To write an
alternative version of a traditional story
reversing the characteristics of the main
characters.
To write
some compound sentences using conjunctions
like because and but and with CL and FS at
least half of their sentences.
More able




To include
sentences to describe the main characters
including dialogue, using more adventurous
adjectives
To write an
alternative version of a traditional story
reversing the characteristics of the main
characters.
To write
mainly compound sentences using a wider
variety of conjunctions
To CL and FS in most sentences and !, ? where
appropriate (and may begin to include commas
in lists and inverted commas)