“Do you have an overview of the language, phonics and grammar coverage? ”
This is obviously such an important question when schools are considering joining Primary Languages Network or when you are sharing the long term development of your pupils’ language learning with staff, the wider community, and secondary colleagues.
Yes, we do! Knowledge acquisition and the coverage of all the elements above are now shared with all network members in our “Knowledge Nets”.
“What are “Knowledge Nets”?”
Knowledge Nets display the progress over time children make in content, personal information questions and answers, transactional language, phonics and grammar and link learning to the primary school calendar. The Knowledge Nets indicate the types of activities and development of language learning skills across KS2.
They exist currently in French and Spanish and are language-specific. There is one document per stage (from stage 1 to stage 4) and are aligned with the PLN Knowledge Organisers and Click2Teach and Be Creative Schemes of Work.
“How could the Knowledge Nets be useful as a coordination tool in our school?”
Add them to your school coordination documents.
Use the nets as a “coverage and progress in learning” reference tool.
If you work with an external specialist teacher or you are a teacher member of PLN then the nets are an excellent dialogue tool about expectations and progress in learning between school and external providers.
The nets can be a springboard to help you to develop your own additional activities.
The nets can be used as shared reference records and dialogue tools in the transition of pupils from KS2 into KS3 language learning.
“Where do I find the Knowledge Nets on the PLN VLE? ”
Click on ‘planning tools’ from your dashboard (see image right)
Then click on ‘Knowledge acqusiiton’ (see image below)
“ What picture of a pupil’s language learning coverage and potential progress can we build using the Knowledge Nets?”
Over the four years of KS2, the children meet approximately 500 words, explore phrase and sentence structure, start to develop understanding of target language sound spelling and basic grammar and explore the skills of learning a foreign language.
The coverage of language is chunked into small thematic segments and is revisited across KS2 language learning.
The Knowledge Nets help teachers see the bigger picture as learning activities become more sophisticated. From Stage 1/ Year 3……. (below left)
….. to Stage 4 /Year 6 …….. (above right)
All four core skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing are developed over time.
Children are given the opportunity to develop recall and retrieval skills and therefore become more independent in their use of the language.
The Knowledge Nets allow the school to have a clear picture of language acquisition. From coverage of vocabulary, with content broken down into nouns, adjectives and verb acquisition (below)
to acquisition of personal information questions and answers and transactional language (below).
The Knowledge Nets highlight new and revisited key sound spellings (right).
and right from the beginning in Stage 1, primary progress in grammar awareness and exploration is plotted (left).
