VCOP and BIG WRITING

Writing is a whole school focus at Wattle Grove Primary. You may have heard your child come home and talk about VCOP and Big Writing. Essentially, the two combined form a very powerful writing program. The gains that a child can make in writing when using the VCOP method can be rather outstanding. It would be wonderful for this program to also be encouraged at home. Finding opportunities to discuss VCOP will have a great impact on the writing skills of your child.  Here is a quick rundown of VCOP and a few ideas to do at home:

V-Vocabulary (Wow words!): • Talk about and write down interesting (WOW) words in the stories you are reading at home. • Try using the words you have found in a sentence. • Have a mini-quiz: ‘How many words can you think of instead of ‘said’, ‘went’, ‘nice’ or ‘good’. Put each one in a sentence. • Give your child a Wow word to put into a sentence. How many different sentences can they make?

For example, alternatives to went could be: shuffled, toddled, crept, meandered, plodded, trudged, wandered, moving unsteadily, lumbered, doddered, waddled, limped, wobbled, lurched, quickly stomped, marched, strolled, traipsed, strutted, hiked, roamed, paced, stepped, pounded, prowled sneaked, tiptoed, crept or pattered. Imagine how these words could enrich a piece of writing and promote creativity.

C – Connectives are used to join sentences together. The simplest connective to use is ‘and’. E.g. ‘Bill went to the shops and bought an ice-cream.’ Other more complex connectives include – Then, after, so, while, because, although. • Try to search for connectives in the stories you read at home. Use them in a different sentence. • Try rearranging sentences with the connectives at the start. • Give your child a connective and ask them to use it in a sentence.

O- An opener is the first word used in a sentence. When children start on their writing journey most sentences initially begin with ‘I’. To develop this try: • Searching for openers in the stories you read at home and use them to start your own sentences. • Give your child an opener and ask them to complete the sentence. Some good openers are:  Next, Although, I discovered, Eventually, Finally.    • Search for powerful openers. These end in ‘ly’ and ‘ing’ e.g. Surprisingly, Steadily, Glancing.

P – Punctuation • Look at different types of punctuation in your reading at home. • Ask your child to give examples of when they would use a question mark or exclamation mark. • Punctuation Kung-Fu (make the shapes of each punctuation sign in the air.) • Use different types of punctuation in different sentences.

Big Writing is the time of the week where students are able to showcase their VCOP and writing skills.