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- Present students with a range of information texts that have been read throughout the unit. State the purpose of each one, and generalise the purpose of information texts. Look for other commonalities between the texts.
- Brainstorm another aspect that could be included in the goat information report, for example, the shelter that goats need or how their hair can be used. Use the sentence structure from one of the paragraphs as a model for writing. Complete a whole class or small group shared writing session to add a paragraph to the existing report.
- Students work with a partner and are given a sentence beginning and a sentence ending about the farm. For example:
- Baby cows ___________ calves.
- Bees _____________ honey.
- Billy goats _________ male goats.
- Five little ducklings _______________ on the pond.
- Students think of an appropriate verb group that fits the sentence and share it with the class.
- Select a farm animal. Students view a short clip about the animal and then in small groups list the important information viewed (teacher or students might act as scribe). Students (or teacher) scribe their collective thinking onto a large sheet of paper or whiteboard. Each student chooses one aspect from the list and tells the group about it. This helps the students to rehearse their ideas orally before writing. Students record their thinking.
- Students work with a partner to find examples of diagrams in the non-fiction books about farms available in the classroom. Discuss with students why labelled diagrams are useful in information texts. Students add a labelled diagram to a class display.
- Students record words to describe farm animals and list these on cards. For example, black, feathery, two-legged etc. Place these cards into the middle of the room. Students then create sentences which include noun groups for a farm animal using some of these words. For example, Chicks have soft, fluffy feathers.
- Provide examples of prepositional phrases of time and place highlighted in the texts students have read, for example, on a farm, in a barn, in spring time. Ask students to write (or provide orally) their own sentences about farm animals which include prepositional phrases. Discuss the kind of detail each provides.
- Students are given a short information text, which has been cut up into sentences. Students sequence the sentences. The teacher makes explicit some of the language features during the re-assembly of the paragraph. For example, the information report started with a simple noun group rather than a pronoun to orientate the reader to know which animal the information report is about etc.
- Provide small groups of students with sentence strips which provide information about goats as well as another set of cards which might form subheadings of an information report, e.g. Appearance/ What do goats look like? Food/ What do goats eat? Students read the sentences and sort them under the headings they best belong.