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Presenting a theme Setting up the environment of the classroom Organise the classroom to set up a central display, perhaps a model or a large wall display, so there is space around your theme area for the children to sit close to it during talking and listening time. It is easier for them to imagine the events going on if they can see the setting. Then the fun starts! Setting up the model This could be "Bottle Village", or a space station, a shop, an underwater scene, a restaurant, a home corner. Cover the wall or display area with anything you have available that can be used as a back ground. Be imaginative and creative about how you build up the display using boxes, coloured paper, fabric. Think 3 dimensionally. Displays are more exciting if they are not placed flat and squarely onto a wall. Clearly, and in appropriate lettering, label the main things on the display. Later, a child can collect up the labels and put them back in the correct place. With good quality labelling, the children can refer to the labels or go and collect and return them when they are writing and want to be sure of a spelling. (Or provide each child with a thumb indexed word book, an exercise book in which they collect the words they want to use.This way they feel grown up, independent and need only ask once for each word.) Once the display is ready Invite the children to sit around the display and discuss it. Give ample time thinking and talking; both are important facets to the start of writing. Talk about what they see in the display, what it is about, how it makes the children feel, what they might add to it. If it is a place, talk about the sounds, the smells, the way being there would make you feel. Encourage adjectives and adverbs from younger children, similes and metaphors from older ones. The children should feel familiar with the display and should not feel it’s a “Don’t touch” place. Explaining the theme The setting Have the children around you and near to the model, as you do this. Get them to practice carefully moving from their seats to the theme area, so that a calm atmosphere is created and maintained. Once there, they need to be in the best possible position that will encourage them to give you their full attention and not be distracted. An important point for creating this is that there needs to be lots of two way eye contact. If they can see you looking at them and giving them your attention, they are more inclined to look at you and give you theirs. (Also they need to have opportunities during their school day, to be in different parts of the classroom and moving to the display area is one opportunity to put this into practice. They need to see the room from different aspects. Well, would you want to sit in the same place all day and everyday?) Introduction to the theme: tips If the theme is story book based: remember that when you read to them, you are also being a role model for when they read. be brave and use different voices for the different characters who might speak. When you are not reading the book, leave it in a place where the children can readily pick it up to read themselves. (They must promise not to tell the ending to others if they get that far in the story) Never hide a book you are reading away in a drawer for another time. By doing that you are missing out on an ideal opportunity to encourage someone to read, and we never want to do that! The best thing is to prop the book on a stand, (maybe made from an old wire coat hanger), and keep this on the actual display to temp anyone to have a read. If the theme is not a story, try to put a story into it in the way in which you present it. Put lots of expression in your voice and try to make sure the children are visualising as you go. Point as you go, to the various things on the display. Children like to look as well as to listen and the two activities aid the memory and concentration process. Make the whole thing fun.
Thinking about Writing Visual memory promotes independent writing and good quality displays promote visual memory. Once writing has started, allow children to leave their seats to go to the display for words. They can copy the word they need, but they should, when ready, be encouraged to go and look, “write the word in their brain” and return to their work, remembering the word shape. They can always go back again and check. This is important. It encourages visual memory and improved spelling. The children need vocabulary word lists (a word wall) to refer to when they are writing. A line of children queueing up at the teacher's desk for words is time wasting for both you and them and it is distracting for the others who are trying to work. A word wall will make the children more independent, less frustrated and more constant in the focus on the theme of their writing. Leave some wall or shelf space nearby for labelled additional displays that enhance the theme and that give somewhere for the children's work to be displayed and celebrated.
Putting pencil to paper......  Remember, always pre-empt this with lots of looking, thinking, talking and discussing. As E.M. Forster said, "How do I know what I think until I see what I say?" 1. For younger ones Get them to draw a picture and write a sentence about it. The youngest ones will need you to write the words so that they can copy your writing. Offer a variety of ideas for the drawing, but do not impose your own. After all, how do you know what they are thinking of drawing? Do not be the teacher who asked a child what she was drawing and the child said "God" The teacher inappropriately said, "But no one knows what God looks like!" The child answered ,"They will in a minute!" Cloze cards This is usually a card with a picture on it related to a few sentences, each sentence having a word missing. (Making these is where your Picture Library comes in handy!) 
At the bottom of the card, maybe in different colours, is a jumbled list of the missing words. First stage cloze procedure cards, usually have the missing word at the end of each sentence, progressing to the words being in the middle of each sentence and finally being with the missing word at the beginning of the sentence. Cloze work encourages children to take contextual clues, an essential reading skill for all readers. Cloze also allows the children to work independently. Make a sequence of cards getting the children to work through this sequence, so ending up with a complete story. This could be a shortened version of the theme story, or it could be the Christmas story , in which case the teacher can illustrate this set of work cards by using a sequence of Nativity pictures from old Christmas cards.etc. The cards will last for years if each one is protected in a see-through plastic bag whilst the children are working from them. If the children work on a sheet of exercise paper to do their writing and illustrating , a sheet for each work card, then, the completed pages can be stuck on a long sheet of paper that has been zig zag folded and the final result would be a Christmas Story zig-zag book that will stand up as a display. Children like to take this home for Christmas and the fact that they know this will be special and looked at by visitors, encourages them to make a particularly good job of their work. For the next stage, progress to question cards, insisting that the answers are given as a complete sentence. Remind the children of the three main characteristics of a sentence:
A sentence always starts with a capital letter.
A sentence always ends with a full stop, (or question mark, or exclamation mark).
A sentence always makes sense.
(And teachers should make sure that all the sentences they write follow this rule.)
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