Exercise books- key info & takeaway points for use

The aim of this blog is to clear the slate in regards to what is expected of exercise books in KS2 primary foreign Language learning. I have visited many primary schools and have been exposed to many different ideas, concepts, myths and fables about what is to be expected. Throughout the blog, there are excerpts from one of the PLN team, who is a course deliverer, languages teacher and a current Y6 Primary school teacher, explaining what she expects in her own exercise books. (This is the orange writing).

1. Use exercise books to celebrate writing

“Books should be there to ‘celebrate’ writing and other work done in lessons”

One quality writing piece with a learning objective above it

This is a fantastic way of putting it!

It’s a maximum of 2 quality pieces of writing with a learning objective every half term, however 1 piece is more than enough (yes, you did just read 1 piece per half term!). Any other pieces of work can be stuck in the books as well. One exercise book should last 4 years of learning, and will demonstrate the terrific progress journey from year 3-6, stage 1-4. Unfortunately there is no short way of doing this, however once you have established a couple of years of quality writing across the years, then you will start seeing the fruits of your labour! Have patience padiwan…

2. Write on other things instead….

“It may be that the writing outcome of a lesson is actually done on a whiteboard, in the air or on a partner’s back with their ‘magic pen’ ”

Generally children hate making mistakes, and especially crossing out mistakes, so use mini-whiteboards, finger/ air writing or scrap pieces of paper to practise writing. If you want to evidence this writing, then take a picture of it! A great game can be played between two students writing on each others back, and guessing what they have written. It is great for both the writer and the ‘writee’.

Keeping your MFL books tidy is crucial. Any opportunity to practise writing elsewhere must be taken advantage of. You want to create an environment that you are only writing in books, when the pieces of writing have been throroughly revised. It should be a special event. This whole process is extremely valuable for not only book tidiness, but also consolidating language learning after having your classes create several drafts prior to the final piece!

Top Tip- Keep a big scrap book of pieces of writing done outside of the special writing books

3. There is more to language learning than just writing and marking

“The PLN marking code allows a short foreign language comment without making unnecessary workload for teachers”

Writing is but one of four key skills to learning a language- Listening, speaking and reading are equally as important. You should be spending as much time on each of these skills as you are on writing.

A book with PLN marking code on the left

From what I have observed, the main reasons why writing in books is such a “focused upon” activity, is firstly because it is the easiest to use as evidence, as the writing itself is the evidence, and secondly because of a lack of understanding about what is actually expected in KS2 PFL, and therefore assumptions and comparisons can be made between literacy and PFL.

What you have to remember is the children are in their first years of learning a new language, and to expect the volume and quality of writing produced to be similar to English, is pretty absurd. As MFL coordinators and leads you have to be the beacon of knowledge, and squash pressure from SLT in regards to quantity and quality of writing from students. With a membership of PLN we support and train you through this to become the primary languages’ experts in school. It’s not about endless hours of marking, instead adopt a marking code akin to the one in the picture above, allowing for clear and concise sentences in the target language. Below is a quote which sums up half a years worth of work in books

“Looking back through my Year 5’s workbooks so far this year, there are about 10 written pieces but some of these are worksheet based, concept cards, Puzzle It Out assessment sheets or Assessment clouds”

Concluding thoughts….

Most cases of confusion I have experienced with schools is purely down to a lack of understanding about what is to be expected in exercise books. But equally, there isn’t an awful lot out there in terms of what to expect, so don’t be too hard on yourself. This blog report hopefully has cleared up some of those issues

If you have any questions don’t hesitate to get in touch at info@primarylanguages.network

We have plenty of training courses you can attend.If you are a member of the network, you are entitled to in-school upskilling both for yourself and your staff (upskilling, up-training, coordinator 1-1, action plan meeting)

Finally, If you want to read the full passage from one of our PLN team on writing then click here