If you follow my blog or Facebook page, you will know that in 2023 I moved away from grouping my children for reading and started using whole class texts.

The Rationale Behind Whole Class Texts

These whole class texts were born out of my learning around the role of repeated reading, the importance of fluency, and sentence-level comprehension.

Our Reading Routine

Over the last three years, these texts—while they have changed in content—have followed a set routine. Each day, we read, a new part is added, while the part we have already read is retained. Once there are three parts to the text, a new one is begun, keeping the last part read and making it the beginning.

I have written before about our reading routine with these texts, so I won't go into this again in great detail, only to say we use echo reading, choral reading, fill-the-gap reading, partner reading, and independent reading. We explore unknown vocabulary and decode new words together before reading.

The Characters and Setting

The little stories are very basic on the surface. This year, there are three main characters: Ned the cat, Bob the pig, and Cleo the kāhu, with a supporting role from Pearl the possum (our class puppet). These characters live on a big farm close to an old forest, which is also inhabited by a wise magic tree.

Bringing Stories to Life

However basic they may seem, the stories bring reading to life for the children. Through discussion, we build up the backstory—so much is known by the children that is not written on the page. Children also add their own ideas for the stories and see these come to life in what we read.

We can bring the adventures that these characters have to life. Right now, our friend Pearl has discovered part of a letter, with only the words "house", "road", "tree" left visible. She also spotted a man in a high-vis jacket looking through her forest and making notes. She is terrified that her tree and forest will be cut down to create a road and has sought the help of Ned, Bob, and Cleo to find out more.

The friends have gone investigating and have now discovered a copy of the letter in the farmer's study. At this point, we have left them preparing to visit the wise magic tree on the farm to read the letter and get some advice.

Building Comprehension and Engagement

Each read, we write a gist to go with the new information in the story.

Ultimately, as a class, we will leap in and help the friends to stop the road being built through the forest, discovering that many protected species of animals live there. Along the way, we will learn all about these animals.

The world within the story, will spill over into our world, we will become part of the story.

Classroom Tools and Puppets

In the world of Ned, Bob, and Cleo, Pearl lives in the big old tree. We have a wise tree puppet that will bring the story to life alongside Pearl, our possum puppet.

The Impact of Class Stories

These class stories have been a fantastic addition to our class. We can focus on the 'decoding' of the reading, build vocabulary, and develop comprehension, while also bringing the story to life in a way that delights and excites. Not only that, but it can also be easily linked to our knowledge-building and spills over into our writing, giving children something to write about.

While for some, many of the words are out of reach for decoding on their own, with the support of myself and the rest of the class, they can access what has been written and be reading exactly what the rest of the class is.

How cute is this picture. Each read, we write a gist to go with the new information in the story.

The world of Ned, Bob and Cleo. Pearl lives in the big old tree. We have a wise tree puppet that will bring the story to life with Pearl our possum puppet.

The next to instalments of our story...

The Power of Simple Organisers: Building Independence in Young Writers, Intentionally linking Reading and Writing

Why a Basic Organiser Struck a Chord

Recently, I shared a very basic organiser for reading comprehension on my Facebook page—something I have used frequently in my classroom. I was genuinely surprised by how popular the post became. It’s clear there’s a real hunger among teachers for practical ways to foster writing independence in young learners. With that in mind, I wanted to share the reasoning behind this organiser and how it fits into the wider journey of developing independent writers.

Laying the Foundations: Sentence-Level Understanding

My class of six- and seven-year-olds are building solid foundations as writers. We’ve invested a lot of time working at the sentence level, using Colourful Semantics to help children understand how sentences are constructed. From there, we began to add greater detail using planners inspired by Colourful Semantics, linking this with the very basics of the POW strategy:

P – Pick my idea
O – Organise my writing
W – Write

This simple routine helps students focus on their ideas and structure their writing in a manageable way.

Moving Towards POW and TIDE

This term, my goal was to introduce the children to both POW and TIDE (an organiser for structuring writing), but I quickly realised that before making this leap, my students needed a better grasp of how to write factual sentences that capture important information.

Last year, many children struggled to turn the key information we’d gathered into clear, factual sentences. To support them, I decided to keep using the organisers we frequently rely on to sort information together as a class.

Customising Organisers to Meet Student Needs

The labels and structure of these organisers often change depending on the context or prompt, which keeps them relevant and accessible for the learners. For example, the organiser I shared on facebook included capital letters, as my class is currently learning when to use them. I encourage teachers to adapt organisers based on the specific needs of their class. Some examples of these are below. Basically children draw an image and record key words that will enable them to write a sentence easily from the planner.

Applying Organisers in Our Learning Context

Our current knowledge-building topic is “Past and Present Sea Creatures,” and the shared organiser related to our work on dolphins. We do shared reading, engage with simple texts, listen to podcasts, and watch short videos. As we learn, we brainstorm and compile the information together.

From this collective list of ideas, we select the details we want to write about. At the moment, this is a collaborative process, but as students grow more confident and independent, they’ll be able to do this on their own.

Bridging to Independence: The Organiser in Action

This is where the organiser really comes into play. Instead of jumping directly to using TIDE, the organiser serves as a crucial stepping stone. It helps children practise writing important details. The format allows us to record a picture and a few key words, making it much easier for students to build sentences.

In fact, this approach has enabled some of my more confident writers to combine sentences or start with a basic sentence and add further detail. The planner gives them a structure to lean on, and the writing task becomes much more accessible.

Some children wrote a single sentence.
Others managed all four sentences.
A few even added extra detail to their initial sentence.

We’ll use this organiser a few more times before moving on to the TIDE planner, gradually learning about topic sentences and conclusions through the texts we read.

Organisers as a Bridge, Not a Forever Thing

Ultimately, my goal is for students to achieve independence—planning their writing fluently, without needing organisers. Already, I’ve noticed that the key words provided by the organiser have been a powerful bridge for all learners, building both success and confidence.

I am currently thinking of how I can use their understanding of the planner we have been using to bridge to TIDE, it might look something like this.

Flexibility and the SRSD Approach

If you’re interested in learning more about Releasing Writers SRSD (Self-Regulated Strategy Development.) I highly recommend exploring the relevant Facebook pages. What I love about this approach is the flexibility—it allows me to adapt to my students’ needs without losing sight of our end goals. I firmly believe in the mantra “go slow to go fast,” and any scaffolds we put in place should support this journey towards independence.

Final Thoughts

There’s no one-size-fits-all when it comes to supporting young writers. Simple organisers, thoughtfully adapted, can make a world of difference—especially as we guide our students towards independent, confident writing. If you’re considering giving something like this a go, I encourage you to make it your own and see how it can help your learners bridge the gap to independence.

Pages

Thursday, 28 May 2026

Bringing reading to life through class texts and dramatic inquiry