Example of a Written Language Unit

Myths and Legends

Level:
Four (Year 7/8)

Achievement Objective:
Poetic Writing – Write on a variety of topics, shaping, editing, and reworking texts in a range of genres, and using vocabulary and conventions, such as spelling and sentence structure, appropriate to the genre.

Links to other curriculum areas
-Social studies
- Culture studies
-Maori

Teaching Approaches
-Scaffolding
-Teacher directed
-Modeling

Skills:
-Work collaboratively in pairs to construct a brainstorm of ideas
-Identify language features
-Identify different sorts of characters
-The children will use the writing process
-The children will assess another child’s work

Processes:
-Discuss features of a narrative (myth) on whiteboard
-Discuss criteria and expectations
-Brainstorm ideas for a myth in pairs
-The teacher will write children’s ideas on a poster that will be displayed
-The children will brainstorm their ideas for their own myth before writing
-The children will use the writing process
-The children will assess another child’s work according to a previously discussed criteria

Learning Activities:

Lesson One
Model/discuss with class the features of a narrative e.g. introduction, setting. Brainstorm this on the whiteboard. Explain purpose to write an individual myth is so that at the end the teacher can bind them to make a book of myths.
In pairs the children will brainstorm ideas for their own creation myth –focus on characters e.g. misleading character, trickster character, and misunderstood character.
In their pairs, the students will report ideas back to the class to create a display chart of the different sorts of ideas for ideas/features of a narrative (the children will always be able to view this poster throughout the week).

Lesson Two
Share criteria of the myth –e.g. “has my myth got characters that play a set part?”
Individually the students will brainstorm their ideas for their own myth to write about in their book. Explain purpose – a guide for writing. The teacher will sign this off before the children start writing
Review writing process – draft, rework, proofread, teacher conference, revise and publish

Lesson Three/Four
Students work at their own pace, using the writing process – draft, rework, proofread, teacher conference, revise (peer), publish

If no children are up to having a teacher conference, the teacher will continuously roam to give individual feedback on children’s work.

Repeat lesson four until the children have published their work. Children can finish publishing in their own time if needed. At the end of the lesson, the whole class will have a sharing time. The children will assess another child’s work according to the criteria.