ONE STEP AT A TIME in OUTLINE

One Step a Time is a structured programme for the systematic teaching of spoken language skills in the Foundation Stage and Key Stage 1, i.e. for children aged from 3 to 7. It aims to make spoken language teaching manageable in the mainstream classroom by:

• concentrating on the spoken language skills that are most critical for educational progress
• identifying different types of skill that can be taught one type at a time, one year at a time
• breaking these types down into sub-skills that can be taught one skill at a time, one term at a time
• ensuring that all skills are taught to all children in a class or group, skill by skill, child by child

Hence One Step a Time - for both teachers and children.

One Step a Time identifies four types of spoken language skill that are crucial for progress in school:

• Conversation is the most important way in which we develop children’s spoken language, and provide them with a model of how language works. It also underpins most other learning and personal and social development, and is the basis of most classroom teaching, especially but not only in the early years.
• Listening is essential for learning: for understanding and retaining information, following directions and instructions, and for discriminating sounds in words in preparation for reading, writing and spelling. However, much of the listening expected of children in schools is very different from listening at home or in conversation, requiring attention over an extended period without immediately replying or responding.
• Narrative involves connected or extended talk, as in describing a picture, recalling a recent event, telling or re-telling a story, or predicting an outcome. It requires children to connect sentences and thoughts in a systematic and structured way. Extended talk develops children’s thinking skills and prepares them for writing.
• Discussion involves connected or extended conversation, where children talk in groups about finding something out, planning an activity, solving a problem, explaining or justifying, or negotiating or resolving individual differences. Discussion helps develop children’s thinking skills, social skills and emotional literacy, and is also a valuable teaching tool, allowing children to learn actively, thinking things out for themselves.

Each of these skills is developed over the course of a school year:

• Conversation Skills in the nursery year (children aged 3 to 4)
• Listening Skills in Reception (children aged 4 to 5)
• Narrative Skills in Year 1 (children aged 5 to 6)
• Discussion Skills in Year 2 (children aged 6 to 7)

There is also a preliminary step to the programme, Getting Started, for children who lack the most basic skills and are not ready for systematic work on conversation.

At each step of the programme there is

• an initial screen for identifying children as Good, Average or Delayed in the relevant skills
• three skills checklists for guiding intervention and reviewing progress (each checklist provides a syllabus for roughly one term’s teaching, though children may vary in their rate of progress)
• a 100-word vocabulary of key terms from the vocabulary for maths and science and the vocabulary of feeling and emotion, including adjectives, prepositions and adverbs as well as essential nouns, to broaden the range of words that children are using and help develop their sentence structure
• information on classroom procedure, advice on teaching methods, and detailed notes on each checklist

The content and procedure for Getting Started is different from the other steps.

The detailed content is as follows:

Getting Started: Learning through Looking and Listening: confidence; looking; listening; communication

Learning through Play: solo play; taking turns; playing with others; imaginative play a Starter Vocabulary of 100 first words

Conversation Skills (nursery year)
Early Conversation Skills: social contact; listening and responding; taking turns
Basic Conversation Skills: expressing needs and wants; initiating conversation; maintaining conversation; conversation in everyday routines
Further Conversation Skills: describing feelings, needs and wants; terminating conversation; seeking clarification; attempting repair; understanding reasons
a Vocabulary List of 100 words needed for the maths and science curriculum, and for talking about feelings and emotions

Listening Skills (Reception)
Understanding Questions and Instructions: early question forms; following instructions; later question forms
Hearing Sound and Word Patterns: hearing rhythms and rhymes; identifying sounds; discriminating sounds in words; using word memory
Understanding Meaning: understanding pictures; understanding stories; understanding time; understanding implicit meaning
a Vocabulary List of 100 words needed for the maths and science curriculum, and for talking about feelings and emotions

Narrative Skills (Year 1)
Talking about the Present: describing the present; using question forms; sequencing
Talking about the Past: describing the past; using question forms; sequencing
Talking about the Future: describing the future; using question forms; sequencing
notes on the transition from narrative skills to writing
a Vocabulary List of 100 words needed for the maths and science curriculum, and for talking about feelings and emotions

Discussion Skills (Year 2):
Learning through Discussion : basic discussion skills; extending knowledge
Planning and Problem Solving: planning; problem solving; explaining
Negotiation and Emotional Literacy: negotiation; understanding emotions
a Vocabulary List of 100 words needed for discussion, and for talking about feelings and emotions

 

© Ann Locke 2005