A 3-week, fully resourced primary literacy unit based on The Whales’ Song by Dyan Sheldon. KS1 Fiction. National-Curriculum-aligned grammar, WT/ARE/GD differentiation, and ready to teach.

What’s inside

This complete English unit gives you everything for three weeks of high-quality teaching, designed to match the standard of leading primary schemes (Literacy Tree, Write Stuff, Power of Reading).

• 15 lesson PowerPoints — illustrated cover slides, success criteria, vocabulary previews, modelled writing, “big questions” (Bloom’s-laddered), differentiation tiers, plenary, and reflection.
• 15 differentiated resource sheets — Working Towards, Age-Related Expectations, and Greater Depth, with sentence frames, word banks, and writing frames.
• Complete teacher unit plan — unit overview, key themes, model texts, full session-by-session plans, key questions, assessment focus, and vocabulary focus.
• Child-friendly mark scheme — “I can…” success criteria for the final writing piece, ready for self- and peer-assessment.
• 3 weekly exit tickets — 5 multiple-choice questions per week, with teacher answer keys.

Final writing outcome

A narrative passed between a grandparent and child about the magic of nature — pupils write Lilly’s story of the night she waited by the sea and heard the whales’ song, using capital letters, full stops, the joining word ‘and’, adjective noun phrases for the whales and the sea, and exclamation marks for moments of wonder.

Grammar features (Year 1 NC-aligned)

• Capital letters, full stops and the joining word ‘and’.
• Adjective noun phrases and exclamation marks.

Themes explored

The magic of the natural world, Intergenerational stories and family wisdom, Listening to the elders who came before us.

Key vocabulary

Whales, ocean, magical, grandmother, wonder, silvery, listened, gift.

Format & compatibility

• Editable PowerPoint (.pptx) and Word (.docx) files.
• UK English spelling.
• One printer-friendly A4 page per resource sheet.
• Compatible with Literacy Tree, Write Stuff, and Power of Reading planning approaches.

Year groups & key stage

• Year 1 (KS1).
• 15 sessions over 3 weeks (≈45–60 minutes per lesson).

Tags

KS1, Year 1, English, fiction, Dyan Sheldon, reading and writing, complete unit, differentiated, NC-aligned, lesson plans, resources, the whales’ song