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Grammar Games Compendium

Activities and games to support the teaching of grammar, compiled by teachers.

Originally produced by Coventry Primary English 2012


Grammar Games Compendium

Activities and games to support the teaching of grammar, compiled by teachers.

The activities contained within this compendium were compiled by teachers in 2006 when

the renewed framework began. We have repurposed this document to contain just the

activities under broad objective led statements.

We hope that these in conjunction with the Grammar Glossary will support teachers with

the teaching of grammar more creatively.


Activities to support: Creating Simple Sentences

Teaching and Learning Ideas:

• Writing names using finger paints, crayons, chalks, felt tips, paint, foam, sand, with water bottles, in the air.

• Printing names – alphabet sticks, sponges – identifying capital letter at the beginning of a name, lower case letters to follow.

• Rainbow letters – using lots of different colours to form individual phonemes.

• Instructing a friend how to form letters in their name.

• Making/decorating name labels for use on displayed work.

• Teacher modelling a sentence for example about a favourite toy, news etc.

• Teacher models incomplete sentence about the toy, children suggest words to complete sentence.

• Yes, No game – is it a sentence? Children show cards to answer questions – is the full stop in the correct place, does the sentence make sense etc?

• When modelling writing ask children to focus on where full stops are, and suggest where to put them.

• Human sentences – have a spot to mark beginning and spot to mark end of line. Children have to stand up and physically put the words on the line in the

correct order/stand in the right place holding their word.

• When modelling writing on a whiteboard, ask where does writing go when we reach the end of line? Show this using human sentence.

• Create success criteria for writing a simple sentence with the children, and make the success criteria into a bookmark, poster, or physical actions so

children can independently check their own work against it.

• Talk partners – tell a friend one sentence about…

• Beginning to use phonic knowledge to spell simple words for use in labels and captions.

• Children select an object/picture. Attempt to spell word by stretching word down their arm and writing sounds in the order in which they hear them.

• White boards, children have a go at writing sentence after orally rehearsing sentence to a friend. Partner supports. Use of writing bookmarks.

• Teacher/TA modelling of planning a sentence - who, what, where and giving replies - and then writing it.

• Hot Seating – asking children questions in character – child responds by giving simple sentence replies.

• Write replies on post-its, add to display of character on classroom wall.


Activities to support: Compose and write simple sentences


I can communicate meaning by saying a simple sentence

• Teacher modelling a sentence for example about a favourite toy, news etc.

• Teacher models incomplete sentence about the toy, children suggest words to complete sentence.

• Yes, No game – is it a sentence? Children show cards to answer questions – is the full stop in the correct place, does the sentence make sense etc?

• When modelling writing ask children to focus on where full stops are, and suggest where to put them.

• Human sentences – have a spot to mark beginning and spot to mark end of line. Children have to stand up and physically put the words on the line in the

correct order/stand in the right place holding their word.

• When modelling writing on a whiteboard, ask where does writing go when we reach the end of line? Show this using human sentence.

• Create success criteria for writing a simple sentence with the children, and make the success criteria into a bookmark, poster, or physical actions so

children can independently check their own work against it.

Sentence has to make sense – Child reading sentences aloud

• Reading out sentences to a friend – friend gives a sticker/advice, following success criteria.

• Reading out sentences to the class – children give thumbs up/down sign.

• Cut out sentences/sentences on the computer – sort and make sense.

Listening Centre

• Listen to different sentences – do they make sense or not? Why?

• Bingo games – listen to sentences, read on a Bingo board, mark off if a sentence makes sense or not.

Writing sentences

• White boards, children have a go at writing sentence after orally rehearsing sentence to a friend. Partner supports. Use of writing bookmarks.

• Teacher/TA modelling of planning a sentence - who, what, where and giving replies - and then writing it.

Role Play

• Hot Seating – asking children questions in character – child responds by giving simple sentence replies.

• Write replies on post-its, add to display of character on classroom wall.


Activities to support: Use capital letters and full stops in simple sentences


• Human Sentence games – give the children words and letters, they have to create the sentence and change lower

case to capitals, add full stops as appropriate.

• Swap - changing lower case letter(s) for capitals.

• Use a small ball to demonstrate adding a full stop at the end of a human sentence.

• Game – highlighting where capitals/full stops go – on computer – if correct create a sound effect or ask the

children to create one.

• Take a Card Game – give pairs of children different questions – eg. How old are you? What games do you like

playing? Children have to start their answers with the personal pronoun 'I'. Children practice writing sentence.

Children can play this in pairs.

• Kinaesthetic and visual action – create actions for 'being' capital letters eg children standing tall and proud/stand

on a line/line on your head.

• Create a sound effect/action for full stops.

• Use of personal pronoun for 'labelling' pictures of themselves at the beginning of Yr1 – 'I am David.', 'I am a girl.'

etc.

• Create success criteria for punctuating simple sentences with the children, make visual, put into bookmarks,

encourage the children to use to self-assess when writing. Refer to in teaching and when with guided groups.


Activities to support: Simple and compound sentences and subordination in relation to time

and reason


• Teacher to use and emphasise time connectives when explaining activities.

• Time connectives used on class timetables and referred to throughout the day.

• Ask children to tell a story – give them a card with a time connective on – children take it in turns to tell a story, each starting their sentence with their

time connective.

• Play consequences – every time a child starts a new sentence they use a time connective.

• Human sentences – add in a time connective.

• Ask children to talk to a partner about their morning before school, using time connectives.

• Give children a series of pictures/photos to put in order and then tell a story to match them using time connectives.

• Give one child of a pair a picture; one child uses time connectives to explain to their partner how to draw it.

• Instructional writing – annotate to identify the time connectives.

• Introduce conjunctions as 'wow' words – children identify them in work when writing by putting them in capitals or writing with a coloured pencil eg.

'BUT'.

• Identify examples of simple and compound sentences and display them.

• Collect a variety of conjunctions and add them to a working wall, with examples of them in sentences. Classify conjunctions as to their use.

• Interactive displays – put up different sentences every day, a different group has to add in conjunctions, time connectives.

• Give children a text with a variety of conjunctions – set them a time limit and have a competition to see who can find the most conjunctions.

• Show two simple sentences and model how to use an appropriate conjunction to create a compound sentence.

• Children work in pairs to pick conjunctions to join two simple sentences together. Check that they make sense. Ask the children to explain why using

compound sentences can improve their writing.

• Pick a conjunction – give children a list of conjunctions and set them a challenge to write as many compound sentences as they can in a given time.

• Human sentences – add in conjunctions.

• Rewrite/annotate a text that has no conjunctions at all.

• Ask children to retell a known story without using 'and, then'.

• Connect game – sentences on cards, find a word to link, move around etc.

• Barrier games.

• Give each other instructions, using appropriate time connectives and conjunctions.

• Give children the start of sentence, they finish by adding a conjunction and more information, give points for use of humour.


Activities to support: Using tense consistently (present and past)


• Direct teaching of present and past – children to identify statements about themselves that relate to the present and past eg 'Today I am 6. Last year I

was 5.' Identify what changes about the verbs and endings when the tense changes.

• Present tense – ask children to act out a different action eg. running, skipping, then ask them to say what they are doing eg. I am running. I am skipping.

Ask children to refer to others in class. – He is jumping. They are hopping.

• Matching game/snap– match pronouns and present tense/past tense words using cards eg. you / are he / is you / were NOT he / are you

/ is (Useful AfL activity to observe).

• Specifically refer to past tense language during news time / share stories in past tense / make up an adventure about class puppet – always emphasising

when we use past tense and why

• When teaching history – refer to language of past tense used in non fiction sources

• Create a song or chant or actions for changing past tense – eg 'when something has happened you add ed.'

• Human sentences/whiteboard work – change past tense to present tense and vice versa.

• Class puppet says sentence with tense mistakes and children write/say correctly.

• Modelled writing – emphasise the thought-processes involved in planning and writing in the correct tense. Make mistakes for children to correct.

• Spot mistakes in sentences – children change the wrong tense word and annotate/correct on whiteboards.

• Collect/classify past/present tense words and display.

• Tense detectives – groups of children use a range of familiar texts to identify which tense is used in different text types. Present findings to class - has

every group found the same?

• Read sentences aloud, children hold up past/present cards, to identify which have been used.

• Use songs as examples of past/present tense language. Annotate lyrics.

• Spot Change – in pairs, one child says a sentence to the other, who then has to say it back in a different tense. Swap.

• Create an action or sound for both present tense and past tense and encourage the children to use them in lessons.

• Be a tense detective in written work in other subjects – ask the children to investigate geography, history exercise books and assess if tense is being used

appropriately.


Activities to support: Using Question marks


Question marks

• Model and then ask children to act out a conversation only using questions.

• Hide an object in the classroom and get the children to ask questions to find where it is.

• Play 'who am I?' game – put a label or sticker naming a person on a child's back/forehead. The child has to guess who they are by

asking questions.

• In guided reading – discuss/read questions using a special question voice.

• Show children a variety of sentences and play True or False – stand up when it is a question.

• Create a question display including question words – why, what, who, where, when, etc and refer to them throughout teaching.

• Give children a statement eg. 'The boy is playing football' and ask them to write the question that may have been asked – eg.'What

is the boy doing?'

• Show children a picture of something (eg. place or events) ask them to brainstorm questions of things they want to find out –

record answers on whiteboards.

• Have a bag with a mystery object – children ask questions to find out what it is – record on whiteboards.

• Human sentences – children re-order sentences to make them into questions (have a selection of question words and ? to add).

• Hot seat a character – in pairs brainstorm questions to ask the character on whiteboards before quizzing the character.

• Compose question poems.

• Children design own magical creature and think of questions to ask about each other's questions in pairs.


Activities to support: Using Commas


Commas

• Punctuation symbols and sound – children make up actions, use when reading and display in classroom – act out

when reading a text.

• Develop success criteria with the children for the use of commas. Display and refer to so children can easily self-

assess their writing.

• Introduce the idea that 'ands' are scared of commas so will never be seen in a sentence next to one. Make up a

story/chant to illustrate this.

• Play shopping game – children role play going shopping, then make a list of what was bought. Say out loud what

was bought, then transfer to writing. Spot the naughty 'ands' in the sentence and use commas instead.

• Make lists for equipment, objects in PE lessons, Science experiments.

• Write letters to Father Christmas in list form.

• Write list poems with commas.

• Investigate independent writing in other subjects for evidence of use of commas. Encourage children to use them

across a range of writing.

• 'Comma of the Week' – award a prize for the best use of a comma in independent writing.


Activities to support: Using subordination and connectives (time, reason, cause)


• Model annotating sentences to identify the 'extra' information added, which give detail about time, reason or cause.

• Model planning and writing sentences and adding detail of time, reason or cause. Model thought-processes.

• Investigate sentences with the children and identify what type of extra information has been added, and how. Annotate texts, and display.

• Create success criteria with the children for showing the relationships of time, reason and cause within sentences. Add to class working wall and refer to

throughout teaching.

• Agree on physical actions/signs to show recognition of detail of time, reason, cause in text.

• Say sentences aloud and show them on the whiteboard. Children use agreed actions to signify whether relationships of time, reason or cause have been

added to the sentence.

• "Sentence Enders" – give the children the start of a sentence and the choice of 3 cards (time, reason, cause). Children have to finish the sentence using

one of the cards and an appropriate ending.

eg. I had to go to the shops – to buy milk as my baby brother had drunk it all! (reason)

- because I'd run out of milk! (cause)

- before 9 o'clock (time)

• In shared writing model how to choose suitable subordinate clauses.

• Sorting game – children to sort a range of connectives/subordinate clauses under the title of 'time' 'reason' and 'cause'.

• Class display of range of connectives/subordinate clauses already sorted under the 3 categories. Connectives mixed up every morning – timed activity to

sort them correctly.

• Missing word – teacher reads out a sentence with the connective missing. Children write what they think it could be on their white boards. Partner talk to

discuss variety written.

• Mixed up sentences – children to sort broken-up sentences into the correct format, including a main clause and subordinate clauses which add detail

about reason and cause.

• Post Box – children to collect examples of connectives and subordinate clauses from their own reading and 'post' on display.

• Enlarge a page of a comic strip – children to describe the events as they occur in the pictures, using appropriate connectives and subordinate clauses to

drive the story along. Rest of class use agreed physical signs to show recognition of detail of time, reason, cause actions.


Activities to support: Compose selecting words for clarity, precision and impact


• Create physical actions/signs to show recognition of adjectives, verbs and nouns in text.

• Teacher modelling of writing a sentence, demonstrating the thought processes of how to improve the sentence by adding/improving the parts of speech.

• Annotate texts to identify the adjectives, verbs and nouns used. Discuss whether they have been used appropriately, what the effect on the reader is, can

it be improved by changing the parts of speech.

• Children use three different highlighters to identify the part s of speech in a text and annotate with improvements they suggest. Discuss suggestions, ask

children to justify their choices.

• Create success criteria with the children for a successful sentence, which makes information precise, clarifies information or has impact on the reader.

• Develop a display with examples of good practice in effective sentences, with annotations explaining why. Children could add their own examples or

examples from texts they read.

• Ask the children to bring examples of their own writing in other subjects – are they using adjectives, verbs and nouns appropriately? Refer to success

criteria.

• Encourage the children to self-assess their own writing based on success criteria. Peer assessment.

• Be Specific - precise noun game – give children a sentence eg. The man sat down. Can they use more precise nouns to make it more interesting eg. The

Prime Minister flopped down. The Vicar settled comfortably down. Compare suggestions and add to display.

• Give a child a character sticker eg. angry, sad, happy etc and ask them to carry out an action eg. sit down, walk, shut a door. Child has to mime the

action in character. The children watching can guess the emotion and suggest a sentence to describe eg. Sarah slammed the door. James slumped into

the car.

• Play Quick Mate – Grammar For Writing page 158-159 start with the sentence 'The man is hot.'

• Give us a clue – give pairs of children pictures of objects. Each pair takes it in turns to describe the object without naming it eg. yellow, fruit, curved

(banana).

• Give children a picture and encourage them to use their five senses to describe what it might be like to be in the picture (could use a story hand or

pictures from Writing Conference CD available from CLG)

• Use the poem Magic Box as a start to repeat writing interesting sentences eg. In my magic box there is ..., Could use a different start eg. In my head I

see… dancing dinosaurs. In my dream there are…

• Time test - give children a word – one minute to brainstorm a variety of interesting adjectives, verbs, nouns.

• Children read about Horrid Henry and explain why his name is appropriate. Children could choose their own 'Horrid Henry' names and justify them.

• Give children a boring sentence, which does not give them a good image in their minds – ask them to swap noun/verb/adjective – discuss effect – use

drama to exemplify the change in image now in their minds.


Activities to support: Using exclamation marks


• Teacher models the writing of a sentence, demonstrating the thought processes of how to improve the sentence

by using exclamation marks and fully explain the reasons for using them.

• Exclamation Detectives – ask children to hunt for exclamation marks in texts and explain why they have been used.

• Create a display, which includes the examples found by the children and annotations explaining why they have

been used. Add examples when the children have used them successfully in their independent writing.

• Create physical actions/signs to show recognition of exclamations when teacher or children are talking.

• Read a text aloud to the children and ask them to 'do' the action when they think it is appropriate.

• Human sentences – should an exclamation mark be added? Where?

• Create success criteria with the children for the correct use of exclamation marks.



Activities to support: Using speech marks


• Teacher models the writing of writing a sentence, demonstrating the thought processes of how to show when a

character is speaking aloud, by using speech marks.

• Investigate some texts in pairs to find out the 'rules' for using speech marks correctly. Can the children come up

with all the rules?

• Create success criteria with the children for the correct use of speech marks.


• Human sentences – where does the speech punctuation go?

• Create physical actions/signs for speech punctuation and encourage children to use them when writing.

• Give children text without speech marks – ask children to annotate text correctly.

• Give children a cartoon strip and ask them to create a short story from the pictures, using speech marks and

exclamation marks as appropriate.

• Give pairs of children a set amount of speech marks and exclamation marks, and challenge them to write a few

sentences using only the set amount given.


Activities to support: Using varied sentence structure (phrases, clauses and adverbials)


• Model writing a sentence and then adding phrases, clauses, or adverbials to clarify meaning.

• Model writing a sentence and then adding phrases, clauses, or adverbials to clarify point of view.

• Read a text with the class and annotate to identify and show the phrases, clauses, and adverbials. Discuss how these add to the meaning or point of view.

• Model taking a phrase, adverbial or clause out of a sentence. What is the effect? What is left?

• Ask children in pairs to read texts, identify phrases, clauses or adverbials and annotate accordingly. A pair to explain to others what effect the sentence

structure has on the reader.

• Create success criteria for good sentences, which give us information, clarify meaning or point of view.

• Develop a display with examples of good practice in effective sentences, with annotations explaining why. Children could add their own examples or


• Ask the children to bring examples of their own writing in other subjects – are they using varied sentence structure appropriately? Refer to success

criteria.


• Human sentences – children physically move phrases, clauses, and adverbials around to create different sentences. Discuss the changes to meaning and

point of view.

• Encourage children to manipulate sentences to make them longer, shorter, more interesting by adding/changing adjectives, nouns, and adverbs, change

the clause etc.

• Drop in clauses – give the children an unfinished sentence eg 'Tim …… went home.' Can they drop a clause in the gap? Prompts to develop further

information about Tim could include: Who was he? What had he been doing? Where had he been?

• Three part sentence - encourage children to use the three-part sentence eg Tim ran down the road, jumped over the hedge and fell flat on his face.


Activities to support: Using commas to mark clauses


• Investigate the use of commas in texts – annotate and give reasons for the use of commas.

• Model writing sentences that use commas to mark clauses.

• Happy Families – show children how to pay the game. Read a card eg 'Mr Bun the baker'. Alter it to 'Mr Bun, the baker, made us some excellent cakes.'

Where each comma occurs, raise a curled finger. Ask groups of children to continue the game, adding the extra information and using the physical action

to indicate commas.

• Show and read to the children a sentence with no punctuation. Ask the children to indicate what the punctuation should be by using punctuation fans,

show on whiteboards etc.

• In a shared text, put commas in the wrong places. Read the text aloud, pausing at the commas so the text is meaningless. Encourage children to tell you

where you went wrong.

• Give children a simple sentence, to which they need to add a clause. Ask children to use a coloured pencil to highlight the use of commas.

• Create success criteria with the children for a successful use of commas to mark clauses.

• Develop a display with examples of good practice in effective use of commas, with annotations explaining why. Children could add their own examples or


• Ask the children to bring examples of their own writing in other subjects – are they using commas to mark clauses appropriately? Refer to success

criteria.


• Create physical actions/signs to show recognition of commas used to mark clauses in text.

• Share some examples of sentences where the positioning of the commas changes meanings. Challenge the children to invent their own sentences that

have completely different meanings depending on the positioning of the commas. From 'Eats shoots and leaves'.


Activities to support: Using the apostrophe for possession


• Read a text with apostrophes for both omission and possession. With the children, pick out the words containing

apostrophes and classify each one accordingly.

• Create a sign for Possession and one for Omission (eg raise a finger for P and make a circle with thumb and

forefinger for O). Read texts together and ask the children to make the 'sign' for the use of apostrophe. Insist

children explain the reason for their choice.

• Collect and classify examples, add them to a working wall.

• Give the children text with missing apostrophes for them to annotate, and aks them to explain their choices.

• Create success criteria with the children for the correct use of apostrophes for possession.


• Ask the children to bring examples of their own writing in other subjects – are they using apostrophes for

possession appropriately? Refer to success criteria.


Activities to support: Adapt sentence construction


• Show the children a piece of non-fiction text, such as a recount, a non-chronological report, instructions etc. Annotate it, marking out, in a different colour, all

the features and language of that particular type of text.

• Create success criteria for writing a similar piece of text. Display alongside good examples of annotated text and scaffolds and templates to support

independent writing.

• Provide individual copies of success criteria for children to refer to when writing. Encourage the children to self-assess their own writing based on success

criteria. Peer assessment.

• Give the children a similar piece of text for them to annotate, emphasising features and language. Ask them to explain their annotations.

• Distribute extracts from a selection of text types. Ask which text type each is, how they know, what are the key features of each.

• Matching Pairs Game/Sorting Game – Provide groups with different extracts from different text types and the names of all the text types on cards – play

pairs/matching game.

• Text type detectives – children investigate and then present examples of instructions, reports, explanation etc. Sort range of extracts under text type headings.

• Range of text extracts – distribute to different groups – read and decide the audience. Present argument/case with evidence to rest of class – who written for

and why?

• Do detailed analysis of an extract of the chosen type – pick out appropriate language features and examples of them, pairs/groups/in-class?

• Give children a real reason for writing, for example: school newsletter, parents letter; Non-chronological reports – write a report for the class on a new game,

toy or fashion accessory; Instructions – how to play a particular board game (even make their own!). How to make a pop-up card or a money container (link

with design technology); Explanation – explain how an aeroplane flies or a boat floats, after research; Discussion – is it right to kill animals for their fur? Is it O.K.

to kill animals for meat? Is there a difference, why? Do the children wear leather shoes? Bags? What are drums made of?; Persuasion - write a letter to the

Head teacher persuading them to: change the uniform, take the class on a trip somewhere special, buy new books for the Library (or a particular recently

published book).

• Who's it written for? Ask the children to identify the audience for every text they share. How has the intended audience shaped the text? What is specific to

that audience?

• Human sentences – words/phrases on cards are physically manipulated to construct a variety of sentences – check for sense, adapt for different audiences and

purposes. How can you change this sentence to be persuasive? Can you change this sentence into a recount? What would we need to adapt/change?

• Give the children a short piece of text and together identify the intended audience eg parents. Ask the children to work in pairs to adapt the text for a different

audience eg teachers. Share results and ask pairs to explain and justify their work.

• Clause sandwiches – the main clause, around another clause in a sentence. eg. Mr Janitor, who is our caretaker, is mopping the floor. Give the children sheets

with sandwich templates on to write their sentences with embedded clauses in. Write the commas in colour.


Activities to support: Punctuate sentences accurately


• Create success criteria with the children for the correct use of punctuation.

• Sound punctuation – share passage with punctuation highlighted – children make different sounds/actions at each punctuation point. Read passage with

punctuation missing – children make sounds to demonstrate punctuation.

• Create a sign for Possession and one for Omission (eg raise a finger for P and make a circle with thumb and forefinger for O). Read texts together and ask

the children to make the 'sign' for the use of apostrophe. Insist children explain the reason for their choice.

• Read a text with apostrophes for both omission and possession. With the children, pick out the words containing apostrophes and classify each one

accordingly.

• Collect and classify examples, add them to a working wall.

• P and O cards – Give the children P and O cards – say part of a sentence containing a word with an apostrophe of omission ort possession or a word

ending in ss' – s' which should not contain an apostrophe. The children hold up the appropriate card or not then explain their decision (Partner Talk).

• Pairs Game – Cards with whole words (do not) and with omission (don't). Play pelmanism. See Y2/3 book p.65

• Investigate some texts in pairs to find out the 'rules' for using speech marks correctly. Can the children come up with all the rules?

• Exclamation Detectives – ask children to hunt for exclamation marks, or other types of punctuation, in texts and explain why they have been used.

• Create a display, which includes the examples found by the children and annotations explaining why they have been used. Add examples when the

children have used them successfully in their independent writing.

• Give the children text with missing punctuation and ask them to annotate, and ask them to explain their choices.


• Ask the children to bring examples of their own writing in other subjects – are they using punctuation appropriately? Refer to success criteria.

• Profile a text in which some of the punctuation is missing or in the wrong place. Pairs/groups improve text – set a challenge of certain number

missing/incorrect.

• Hangman – with words with apostrophes in (omission)

• Ask the children to collect photos of apostrophes used in public places that have errors. Create a Hall of Shame.

• Human sentences.

• Ask the children to draw cartoons using speech bubbles to show the conversation of characters, and then write the conversation between characters

using appropriate punctuation.

• Carry out the above game with signs and sound effects then children write the conversation with correct punctuation in colour.


Activities to support: Use a variety of sentence constructions


• Use IWB or prepare sentence strips. Add/remove/change subordinate clause, discussing emphasis and effect.

• Human sentences.

• Play the 'If' and 'Or' games – model 'If I do this, I will (may, might, can) (be able to) do this. Unless I do this, I will not (may not, might not, cannot) (be able

to) do this. Ask the children to follow the pattern of the model to create sentences explaining eg what they will do if they win the Lottery. Who can create

the silliest/funniest/most tear-jerking sentence?

• Role-play – choose current (and appropriate) issues from news and model how to interview (display prompts and sentence starters) eg. 'If you were

David Beckham what would you have done?' 'If I were David Beckham .................I would have…' etc.

• Write sentences to practise hypothesis, speculation and supposition in a problem page-style (If I were him, I think I would...). Link to PSHE/SEAL work.

• Give children real writing opportunities or questions where they can speculate/suppose/hypothesis eg what will schools be like in 50 years? What would

you do if you were manager of Coventry City? How will the team perform this year?

• Investigate newspaper/magazine/comic articles and identify author's point of view and opinion. Discuss and annotate the way the sentences have been

constructed, and collect examples of phrases used.

• Develop a working wall display of phrases and words used and annotate them.

• Circle time game – complete the sentence 'If I were Prime Minister I would…', I'm going on holiday this year, as long as…', 'Provided our class are good

today…'.

• Compile a list of conditional sentences

• Ask the children to bring examples of their own writing in other subjects – are they constructing sentences and using vocabulary that supports

hypothesis, speculation and supposition?

• Award a 'sentence of the week' prize to the best use of hypothesis, speculation and supposition within sentences.


Activities to support: Using punctuation effectively


• Grammar for Writing Complex sentence game. This activity gives children oral practice in constructing subordinate clauses. Give children a starter

sentence eg. As I leaned against the railing, it collapsed. Put children into groups of 4-6. Using game cards (G4W p160) children in turn take a card,

change the sentence accordingly and repeat. You could introduce an egg timer to encourage quicker thinking.

• Start with a sentence eg. The man got into the car. In groups children write the sentence at the top of the paper. Each child changes it eg. swap words,

add clauses etc. and passes it on, folding up the paper so each child can only see the last sentence. Read aloud at the end.

• Even in Y6 children like to play 'Human Sentences' to demonstrate how clauses/phrases can move around and where punctuation occurs. Put parts of

sentence/words and punctuation on separate cards. Children to stand at front holding sentence in correct order then manipulate the sentence. Always

encourage children to explain their choices.

• Use "odd" times eg. when lining up for assembly/playtime to play Chinese whispers. Compare the final version with the original.

• Start with a simple sentence eg. The cat ran away. Give each group a job to change part of the sentence eg. detail about cat, where did cat run to. Come

together and share new sentences – can you join together to make one class super sentence?

• Use highlighters with a groupto highlight different word types/parts of a sentence and explain what they are ane what they do.

• Prepare sentence strips and have children physically make sentence – add/remove/change subordinate clause. T/F Yes/No games.

• Teach children actions for each type of punctuation – do as a warm-up or brainbreak.

• Each week choose a 'golden sentence' – Display on board/display and reward child. Ask the children to identify what is good about it. Explain why it was

chosen in relation to lesson objectives.

• Prepare texts (either linked to whole class or something that will motivate children) with something missing or used incorrectly, ask children to modify.

• Remember to refer to these objectives in all reading/writing activities. You expect children to be using complex sentences in all writing (where

applicable).

• Create success criteria for good sentences

• Ask the children to bring examples of their own writing in other subjects – are they using punctuation and varied sentence structure appropriately? Refer

to success criteria

• Punctuation snap – match picture of punctuation and its use. Could be done as a loop game.

• Give children timed challenges with a partner using their white boards eg. display an adverbial phrase and give children a set amount of time (to music?)

to come up with as many sentences as possible.

• Display a range of ways to open a sentence (simile, ing word, one word for emphasis). Put examples on a washing line and refer to it across all subjects.

• Say a sentence and ask children to repeat it (slowly, quickly, loudly, quietly). Include simple, compound and complex sentences (auditory learners).

Documents

Grammar Games Compendium Activity - Primary Englishprimaryenglished.co.uk/.../2014/08/Grammar-Games-Compendium-A… · Grammar Games Compendium Activities and games to support the