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Year 2 (KS1)

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Science

Geography

PSHE and Citizenship

Using the UN Sustainable Development Goals Teacher's Guide

English

The Station Cat – UKS2 Lesson Plan 1

History

Can You Crack the Code? Activity Sheets

Favourite Resources

Top Tips to Becoming a Greener Primary School

How Can the History Research Review Inform History Teaching in Your School?

Literacy

How to Implement the New Reading Framework with DK Learning

Inspiring Articles

Kelsey Benham

\n\nI taught my Year 1 class about the human body right at the start of the school year. When I came across the \nDKfindout! Human Body\n book and accompanying \nBrilliant Bodies\n lesson pack, I decided to use them as a means of revisiting the learning. I was able to recap and assess the children’s knowledge and understanding months after initially covering the topic in science.\nHigh-Quality Non-fiction\nMy colleagues and I thought the book was amazing. DK books are clearly high-quality texts, covering lots of content. They’re really visual for the children, with simply-written key information in text boxes and lots of great illustrations and photos.\nFor this age group, there’s not a huge amount of non-fiction texts out there, so it’s lovely to have a resource like this in the classroom that they engage so well with.\nWe gave each group a book, which they absolutely loved! Weeks later, the children are still choosing to look at the books in our reading corner, meaning they’re fuelling their curiosity, embedding their learning about the human body and developing their reading skills. They really enjoy the quizzes and games in the book, which make it more interactive and ideal for looking at with a friend.\nEngaging, Adaptable and Accessible Lessons\nIt was really clear in the lesson plan what the learning objectives were. We particularly focused on the five senses, as this is a Year 1 science objective. Through the activities, I felt all the children were able to meet the learning objectives.\nBy the end of the lesson, I felt that all children had a really good understanding of the parts of the body we focused on and the important roles that each of those body parts have.\nThe lesson lasted just under an hour and it was perfectly pitched for my learners. There were different activities within the lesson, which meant they could get up and move around between tasks. This kept the children really engaged throughout.\nI loved the fact that there was the opportunity to present their work in different ways. Not all children needed to write everything down; for those children who find writing more difficult, there was the option to show their learning in a different way.\nThe children worked in mixed-ability groups throughout the lesson. This supported them with the reading and worked really well for the bingo activity, where they played in mixed-ability pairs.\nThe class loved the bingo game, which we played again at the end of the day. That was a great way to really consolidate the learning in a fun way.\nGoing Beyond Assessing Pupils’ Science Knowledge\nThere was lots of opportunity for discussion at the beginning of the lesson and then again at the end. This supports speaking and listening skills and builds children’s confidence in taking part in discussions. They also developed their questioning skills, as they wanted to know more about the parts of the body that we hadn’t had time to cover in the lesson.\nThe fact that they loved the book so much also meant that they were keen to read (or attempt to read) sections, growing their independence with reading and their understanding that non-fiction books are a reliable source of knowledge.\nWe’ll use the books in guided reading sessions and be able to talk about the layout and organisation of information. Using the contents page during the lesson was also great for showing children how to locate specific information in non-fiction books.\nFree Resources to Save Teachers Time\nI think it’s brilliant that these teaching resources are free. As teachers, we spend so much time planning and searching for different things, so having a resource that’s ‘ready to go’ was amazing!

Year 1 (KS1)

Engaging Children in Non-fiction Books with the Brilliant Bodies Lesson Pack

Julia Foy

\n\nLike many Year 2 teachers up and down the country, I’ve recently been teaching my class about life cycles, as part of our Science topic, Animals Including Humans.\nWe’d previously learnt about the life cycle of a human and a duck. Then I came across DK’s \nAmazing Animals\n lesson pack to use with the brilliant DK title, \nThe Egg Book\n.\nMy class were fascinated to learn more about animals that hatched from eggs and they really enjoyed the whole lesson.

Getting My Year 2’s Egg-cited with the Amazing Animals Lesson Pack

Compelling Case Studies

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