A secondary colleague recently flagged up the I Can website – a charity which provides support for children with speech, language and communication difficulties.

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There are some useful documents on the website that can be used by ALL practitioners to support Listening and Talking within the classroom.

The ‘Resources for Professionals’ section has a number of documents which can be used by practitioners. Particular favourites of mine are the ‘Milestones for Talk’ documents which can be found by clicking the links below. They can be printed out on one sheet for easy reference.

Primary Talk Milestone – CLICK HERE!
Secondary Talk Milestone – CLICK HERE!

The Highland Literacy Group are running two CPD events during inset on October 21st. Both events will take place at Crown Primary School in Inverness.

The first CPD event is an introduction to the ‘6 Traits + 1’ writing resource. Referred to in earlier posts, ‘6 Traits + 1’ is a resource which can be used across the school to develop writing. This open to practitioners within the Primary sector. October 21st 2013 – 09:30 – 12:30 – Crown Primary School

Our second CPD event we’re hosting is an ‘Introduction to the Literacy Toolkit’. This is aimed at Leaders of Learning within Primary Schools. The 2 hour CPD will allow practitioners to familiarise themselves with the Literacy Toolkit, providing  guidance as how to facilitate this within schools. October 21st 2013 – 13:30 – 15:30 – Crown Primary School

Both events can be found in the CPD calendar – put ‘Introduction’ into the Keyword box within the Search Panel. Click the picture at the top to access the Highland CPD website.

Scottish Book Trust is running a book trailer competition as part of the Scottish Children’s Book Awards, with a fabulous prize of £250 in book tokens from Waterstones; why not get your pupils to produce a trailer for one of the shortlisted books? The competition is open to all ages, and pupils can produce a trailer for any of the age categories. Scottish Book Trust have got a whole host of resources to help you produce book trailers with your pupils. Have a look at their Booktrailer Masterclass videos to get a comprehensive book trailer walkthrough – and on the same page, you’ll find a whole unit of work to help you integrate trailers into your planning.

They also have two exciting Authors Live events coming up, one with Mairi Hedderwick – all the info is here:
CLICK HERE – Scottish Book Trust

Click the image at the top of this post for online CPD which is provided by Scottish Book Trust.

The message below is from the Literacy Development Team at Education Scotland. It includes information and links to classroom resources which can be used to teach Literacy and English through the stimulus of the Commonwealth Games.

Game On Scotland: Literacy and Languages

Join us every month for a series of 19 exciting Glow meets running throughout the academic year 2013/14. 

The themed sessions are being broadcast live for all Glow users and will provide a wide variety of stimulating opportunities to engage with the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games.
The sessions will allow practitioners and learners find out more and get directly involved in educational opportunities related to the Commonwealth Games. Glow access is required to join the sessions.

This is the second Glow Meet in a new series around the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games covering all of the 8 curriculum areas, highlighting opportunities for interdisciplinary.

The session will highlight the opportunities Glasgow 2014 can provide to develop rich learning experiences within literacy, English and Languages. It will highlight the latest developments in these areas and will make links between the Games, wider engagement opportunities and newly developed resources such as the SSLN (Scottish Survey for Literacy and Numeracy) Professional Learning resource. It will also include a presentation of Inspire>Aspire’s ‘Citizens in the Making’ project, a values based programme that aims to help Scottish schools find ways to use the inspiration from Glasgow 2014 to develop aspirations in their pupils. 

Also:  Brand new Game On Scotland learning journeys developed in collaboration with Scotland’s National Centre for Languages (SCILT) will be ‘unveiled’ and you find out about the latest engagement opportunities around the Game On.  

On the panel will be Lisa Russell (Literacy Development Officer, Education Scotland), Julie Thomson (Inspire>Aspire project) and a representative from SCILT.

To register go directly to:  Game On Scotland Glow meet

We have added two new PowerPoints to our Literacy Toolkit for use within schools, with an aim to having at least six available by October. The Literacy Toolkit will be further explained at the Head Teacher conference this Friday and next, and training will be offered during the October inset for leaders of learning to facilitate the delivery within schools.

The Literacy Toolkit takes the form of CPD PowerPoints (roughly 1 hour long) and aims to provide opportunities for teachers to address, discuss and agree improvement steps in Literacy. The PowerPoints will include notes which can be delivered by a facilitator in school development sessions, or be used by individuals for CPD.

Check out the ‘Literacy Toolkit’ menu for more information.

Following our earlier post on Mr Thorne Does Phonics, a new Phonics Resource has been created to support the use of media when teaching phonics.

The document, which can be downloaded by clicking the image above, includes the first 33 phonic sounds, actions, the timing on the Jolly Songs youtube clip, and the link to the Geraldine the Giraffe clips.

Enjoy using the resource! 

As you’re looking over your plans for next week, here’s an important date for your calendar . . .

Next Friday, 6th September, Education Scotland will be supporting International Literacy Day (ILD) through the use of Glow TV. Sign up and see what’s going on by clicking the link below:

GLOW TV – ILD – CLICK HERE!!

Why not celebrate International Literacy Day within your class or as a school, using some of the ideas below – it’s a great opportunity for an Interdisciplinary Topic, encompassing Literacy, RME, Social Studies and Expressive Arts experiences and outcomes, as well as links with Global Citizenship and ECO:

– Host a ‘book drive’ or a whole school ‘book swap’ in which children can choose a new book to read and enjoy

– Have a ‘book buddies’ morning – working with a different class in the school e.g. P1 and P4

– Use the UNESCO website to explore videos of how ILD plays an important part in other countries – a great stimulus for writing in the upper school

– Invite a member of the local community e.g. local councillor, road crossing patrol, postman to come and share a story with the class

– Celebrate cultures and diversity through each class hosting a different themed event from a country – CLICK HERE for an EXCELLENT link with stories linked to countries across the world

CLICK HERE for TES and TES iBoard resources for ILD.

Let us know of any plans you have, or great links by commenting on this post!

It was great to see the buzz at Milton of Leys last Friday afternoon – 111 new Probationers, ready to embark on the first year of their career. We hope you’ve had a great first week.

As mentioned at the introduction day, there are three Literacy and English CPD training programmes available for Probationers currently. These are to be applied for through the CPD calendar, following the link below:
http://highland.cpdservice.net/

Primary

A two day Literacy programme designed to combine the work of the Highland Literacy Project, alongside the recent developments of the Highland Literacy Group, giving you practical suggestions on how to embed Literacy within your classroom.

Group A – Day 1 – Monday 9th September 2013 & Day 2 – Tuesday 12th November 2013
Group B – Day 1 – Tuesday 10th September & Day 2 – Wednesday 13th November 2013

Secondary – Teachers Not of Languages

A one day CPD event which equips practitioners with the rationale behind, as well as resources to embed literacy across learning within their subject area.

Group A – Monday 11th November 2013 
Group B – Thursday 21st November 2013

Secondary – Teachers of Languages

The course aims to support practitioners in developing literacy across learning through exploring materials to support development and sharing emerging practice which staff across the Authority have been involved in. This will include examples of progression, interdisciplinary projects and active learning. Exploring the challenges of CfE.

Wednesday 27th November 2013 

In the meantime, subscribe to our blog to keep up to date with the latest Highland Literacy developments.

Reading a Guardian Education Article recently I came across the work of Mr Thorne – a Primary School Teacher from England who has designed and created videos and apps to enhance Literacy learning and teaching.

If you’re looking for inspiring and engaging phonics or spelling videos click on the images above which will take you to his Youtube page and website.

One of my personal favourites is Geraldine the Giraffe. The video below shows her exploring the letter ‘s’ – something I’ll be trying with my class at the beginning of the session.

Our ‘Spelling and Phonics‘ area of the blog provides the Highland Guidelines for teaching phonics based on the HLP principles.

As you are aware, we are currently refreshing the Highland Literacy Project materials and publishing them on the blog once they are completed.

In addition to the ‘Sharing Box‘ you can access the original HLP Booklets by clicking the image above. These will continue to be made available until the document refresh has been completed.