Literacy Bank 4

KS2 (Years 3 - 6)

English

The title was used in a mixed age class, to support the Year 4 children during the Literacy Hour. During the independent group work, I try to have one group using ICT to achieve the Literacy objectives. During the autumn term, the Year 4 children in the class and occasionally the Year 3 children, worked on the activities for two days each week.

As the class consists of four-year groups, Literacy Hour needs very careful planning. Years 5 and 6 work together, as do Years 3 and 4. During the first half hour, Years 3 and 4 have their 'teacher led' text word and sentence work. A teaching assistant then supervises them during independent group work. The TA supervises Years 5 and 6 during the first half hour, after which the teacher takes them for text, word and sentence work.

The Literacy Bank activities were easy to plan in to the appropriate word and sentence level work, as they were linked to the NLS and numbered appropriately. The children were very quickly able to find their way around the program and after a few weeks, I stopped selecting the activities for them and just told them which ones I wanted them to do each day. I was able to check progress by looking at the records and when some of the activities proved to be causing problems, we were able to revise the topics causing difficulties.

For the simpler activities, the Year 3 children were allowed to use the software. They were able to complete tasks with support. Ideally I should have Year 3 Literacy Bank for them to use. I plan to obtain it when funds become available.

The lessons this term have involved the study of various text types with word and sentence work linked to the texts used to explore them fully. The Literacy Bank activities have allowed the children to improve their knowledge and understanding of spelling patterns, homophones, regular and irregular past tenses of verbs, suffixes, alphabetical order, identifying verbs, finding adverbs and using commas.

The software was used by individual children as we had only one copy, but I would have liked to have the Year group all working together on the computers, as this would make it easier for the TA who is supervising two different activities, for Years 3 and 4. When using this software, she had three different activities to supervise. Fortunately, the software was so easy to use she did not need to give much support.

When I allowed Year 3 to work on some activities, they worked in pairs for support.

The software helped to reinforce the teaching in the early part of the lesson, by giving the children the opportunity to test their knowledge and understanding of the concepts taught. It was a useful way of achieving this with minimal adult intervention. The activities could just as easily have been pencil and paper activities, but the important feedback and support given by the program was the most useful aspect.

Before the program was first introduced, I used the teacher menu to enter the names of the group and to select the activities available for them to use. These were selected to link with the work planned. After two weeks the children were managing so well, I stopped selecting the activities and just told them which one I wanted them to use each day. Some of the activities proved quite difficult - this indicated where it was useful to go back and revise a topic.

The classroom contains five PCs arranged in one corner and in most sessions, a year group is working on activities using the computers.

The program was introduced to the Year 4 children in an introductory session. They were shown the various features of the software - how to start it, how to log on and how to select activities. After this they were directed to use an activity on two days each week. As I had only one copy of this software, children used it individually. The group completed another task and each child worked on an activity, then indicated to the next child when the computer was free. The TA was available to help with any problems, as I was teaching the Year 5 and 6 group during this time. Headphones were worn, as the commentary was distracting for other children attempting to work on different tasks.

All five children almost always completed the activities in Year 4 during the independent work session, which lasted around twenty minutes.

The Literacy objectives taught were spelling, vocabulary, grammar and punctuation. The software was not used to teach the objectives, but to provide practise in using the skills taught.

The benefit of using ICT for this was the feedback available. Children were encouraged to try again if they had incorrect answers and they were praised when correct answers were given.

Their reports also helped the teacher to track how they had performed and a certificate was available with details of activities worked on and scores achieved.

The children were very specifically directed to a certain task each day. There was no children's choice during this session.

The children needed no particular ICT skills in order to use the software. They were all familiar with PCs and the program loaded and ran without any problems. Navigating was simple and directions easy to follow. Results were saved automatically, as long as the activity was completed. A certificate could be printed if desired, by selecting certificate from the menu and pressing print.

All the children were able to use the software without needing to learn any new ICT skills; they were confident computer users, having used PCs regularly in Year 3 and Acorn machines at Key Stage 1.

Pupils' progress was monitored by checking the results in the 'reports' section. A list of all completed activities, with dates and scores is saved for each child. This can be printed or saved as a text file, as a record of work done. There is no analysis of how the child tackled the activity, or indication of the strategies used to complete the tasks. Observation of the child using the software is the only way this could be monitored.

I observed that it was possible for children to choose the correct answers, by using clues in the text. For example, the inserting commas activities 52, 53 and 54, had an extra space in the text where the comma belonged, so the children clicked in the obvious space, instead of reading the text and working out where to place the comma.

The title is not suitable for children with Special Educational Needs. All the activities involve reading text displayed in quite a small space on the screen. This cannot be altered and the activity texts are not spoken. Some activities are simple enough to be used by slow learners and the support in the program could help them complete activities.

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