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Oral language#

Ideas to support oral language at home

With your child, you could:

  • retell favourite stories or scenes from a movie using interesting words and changing the pace and tone of your speech to create suspense, joy, sadness, or excitement
  • talk about the lyrics of songs or the words of poems your child is learning, and see if there are any connections to who they are and where they come from
  • talk about a recent family event, holiday or activity
  • watch videos, read books and listen to audiobooks about interesting topics and discuss the meaning of new words
  • talk about their learning and progress. 

The teacher will focus on expanding your child’s oral language skills. For example, by the end of the year your child will be able to:

  • give detailed and well-structured descriptions, explanations and arguments, and tell stories for a range of purposes, including expressing their feelings
  • plan and present a detailed argument or story, backing up their viewpoint with quotes and facts, as well as assessing and addressing opposing opinions
  • participate in discussions by asking questions to check understanding, challenging others' ideas with sensitivity, identifying areas where everyone can agree and supporting everyone to take part  
  • recognise how their ideas and viewpoints can develop and change following a discussion  
  • use discussion and self-reflection to monitor their progress, adapt their learning goals and find solutions for challenges.

Reading#

Ideas to support reading at home

With your child, you could:

  • have discussions about books they are reading
  • encourage research about topics of interest
  • have plenty of books and magazines that everyone can read at home
  • share your thoughts and feelings about what you are reading so they see you as a reader
  • help them to read and understand difficult words – look for smaller words or word parts in longer words, and look up meanings in a dictionary if you need to
  • help your child to identify an author, character, or series of books they like and find more titles in the series or by the author
  • find books that have been made into movies or TV programmes – this can help them to discover different ways to tell the same story if they read the stories they have watched
  • read to them no matter how old they are – they can understand more challenging information than they can read.

The teacher will focus on expanding your child’s reading skills. For example, by the end of the year your child will be able to:

  • use their knowledge of letters, sounds, and word parts to read words with 2 or more syllables  
  • read longer texts independently, as well as those that are related to their interests
  • use information in the text, knowledge of word parts that have a meaning, and knowledge from other subjects and topics to work out the meaning of new words and phrases in Year 6 texts
  • compare and contrast different types of texts – for example, stories, articles, poems and plays – and discuss how they are written for different audiences
  • identify the main message or idea in a text, and summarise how it is developed through key details
  • use the evidence that is explicitly stated and the evidence that is hinted at to justify their ideas about the text and compare them with what others think
  • make connections between what they are reading and their own knowledge, experiences, cultural understandings, values, and practices, comparing their thoughts about the text with others' ideas  
  • share opinions about how topics and ideas are communicated in texts, listen to and build on others' responses, and notice differences between ideas and areas where everyone can agree. 

Texts for Year 6#

The books used during Year 6 will be a mixture of print and electronic oral, written, and visual fiction and non-fiction texts of different lengths. They will include poems, stories, plays, comics, articles and instructions. These texts could include Level 3 School Journals.

There are example books on the page below.

Reading books at home in Year 6

Your child may bring books like these home. Often they will be books they have chosen from the school library. 

Writing#

Ideas to support writing at home

With your child, you could:

  • ask them to write about their heroes, pets, sports events, ancestors, hobbies and interests
  • encourage them to share their work with family members
  • play word games and do puzzles to help them learn more about words and spelling
  • support them to write the weekly shopping list, a packing list for day trips or holidays and events on the calendar  
  • write and send messages, invitations, thank you letters, poems or postcards to friends and families, as well as writing stories and poems for them
  • write contracts for agreed jobs – for example, "every day I will … make my bed, do 1 lot of dishes, feed the dog".

If your child misses sounds in words or words in sentences, praise them for trying and encourage them to have another look at their writing.  

The teacher will focus on expanding your child's writing skills. For example, by the end of the year your child will be able to:

  • handwrite easily and automatically and use efficient keyboarding to develop speed and accuracy
  • use apostrophes to show possession – for example, Tama's cat
  • plan and write for a specific audience and purpose, making careful choices about the right content and style to make the meaning clear, and taking into consideration how readers might react  
  • write effective sentences by reordering ideas and sentence parts to create the most impact
  • write a range of texts including:
    • stories with a setting or settings, shifts in time, well-developed characters with feelings and a satisfying conclusion  
    • information reports with a clear introduction, ideas grouped in paragraphs, words and phrases that explain or compare ideas (such as 'especially', 'for example' or 'in contrast')  
    • persuasive texts that order ideas with supporting facts and reasons from the strongest to weakest, and that include language that persuades the reader to agree with their viewpoint
  • use a range of computer programmes to create and edit texts that include a mix of words, images and sounds
  • make notes, grouping key information from printed and online resources, to plan their writing  
  • reread as they write, improving their choice of words and sentence and text structure, and fixing any mistakes in grammar or meaning to make their writing clearer
  • make choices about which audience and classmate feedback to use and explain their decisions.  

Resource#

pdf thumbnailReading and writing at home - Year 6 NZ Curriculum
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