Writing Standards At The End Of Year 6

In order to attain the 'End of Year 6 expected standard', the children must use a variety of skills within their writing independently.  The following list shows all of the expectations which the children must achieve in order to attain this standard independently in their writing:

• write effectively for a range of purposes and audiences, selecting language that shows good awareness of the reader (e.g. the use of the first person in a diary; direct address in instructions and persuasive writing)

• in narratives, describe settings, characters and atmosphere • integrate dialogue in narratives to convey character and advance the action

• select vocabulary and grammatical structures that reflect what the writing requires, doing this mostly appropriately (e.g. using contracted forms in dialogues in narrative; using passive verbs to affect how information is presented; using modal verbs to suggest degrees of possibility)

• use a range of devices to build cohesion (e.g. conjunctions, adverbials of time and place, pronouns, synonyms) within and across paragraphs

• use verb tenses consistently and correctly throughout their writing

• use the range of punctuation taught at key stage 2 mostly correctly (e.g. inverted commas and other punctuation to indicate direct speech)

• spell correctly most words from the year 5 / year 6 spelling list, and use a dictionary to check the spelling of uncommon or more ambitious vocabulary

• maintain legibility in joined handwriting when writing at speed.

Reading in Year 6

Within Year 6, your child takes part in Whole Class Reading sessions at least 3 times each week.  These focus at reading a text and then discussing this based on the following themes:

Vocabulary; Inference; Prediction; Explain; Retrieval; Summarising

These six areas of comprehension are key for the children to understand their texts.  Please could parents and carers support their children at home by asking questions and discussing the children's books around these key six themes.

Children will be able to choose a book from the school library and the class reading area as their free choice book.  Each child has a reading journal for them to record their thoughts and comments about the book.  Please could parents or carers sign the journal each week to monitor your child's home reading.

Spellings in Year 6

Each week during the year, the children's weekly spellings can be found on Spelling Shed.  These are updated weekly and the children should use this website to learn their spellings.  Please can parents encourage their children to learn their spellings on Spelling Shed at least 4 times each week as part of their homework.  Within class, we will look at the spelling rules for these words, as well as the key year 5/6 spellings.  These key spellings must be used accurately within their own writing in order to attain 'Expected Year 6' writing.