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This intriguing poetry-writing theme, and the accessible, attractive worksheets, will motivate writers of all ability to think up imaginative description and similes. The Ideas Sheet, titled ‘City Lights’, is fun to use, with a spider diagram and scattered lines for adjectives and images. The poem frame, titled ‘Night Lights’, has plentiful space for writing, with clear, supporting structure, though able writers may prefer to use it as a launch pad for an individual approach. Both sheets are excitingly illustrated, with details to spark ideas. The Guide provides prompt suggestions for each and development ideas for the poem. The resource is home-produced and has been successfully used with Yr 3-6 classes. Black and white, PDF.

Young children will enjoy colouring in this rabbit picture, including the grass, sun, bird and flowers in the scene. The activity promotes fine motor skills, colour differentiation, design skills, creativity, and an understanding of the natural world. The picture also offers a focus for discussion.

This large and varied list of rhyming words will provide the backing you need for class dragon poems. See video for extra ideas + song! Select your favourite words, or those best suited to your group, and read out some of the example verses on the next page, to build your class poem, or help children concoct their own, in pairs or individually. These words and examples offer funny, exciting, mysterious and crazy possibilities, opening up the potential for inspired creativity. Your pupils will love this activity. Watch your reluctant writers and hesitant speakers come alive as the activity takes off! With young children, make up your own, leaving a word gap for contributions, or concoct a simple couplet together. Clap the beat to ensure a punchy rhythm. Now, how about some illustrations?

A woodland poem example, featuring description, presented over a colourful autumn wood photo. Writing frame also included. Repetition of the opening line also features in this simple format. **Offers a framework and idea spurs **for KS2 writers, and for KS1 verbal contributions. Warm-up: go outside to experience trees (and woods?) with all the senses. Then discuss - what did the children notice? What creatures might live there, and what are they like? How would the trees be in different seasons? What might they be like on Halloween night? Enact trees together, then pretend you’re walking through a wood, finding “treasures”. You’ll find more poem guides and poetry themes here at my TES shop.

A beautiful, calming snow scene to write on, following the snow’s gentle curves. The starter phrases invite describing words and similes.

A fresh, beautiful spring picture display comprising 7 pictures, showing spring flowers, blossom, robin, nest eggs, butterfly, and a home-produced scene of toy spring animals. Purpose: to inspire seasonal teaching and learning. Use as spurs for creative writing, artwork, nature study, colours teaching and discussion. They also offer cheer, comfort and hope.

The climate change crisis, global warming, the greenhouse effect - these are key phrases in today’s heated global debate about the future of our planet. This word bank supports climate emergency discussion in the classroom with words for all aspects: causes - fossil fuels, carbon emissions, deforestation… , cattle-breeding, to effects - melting ice, rising sea levels, extreme weather, damaged ecosystem, broken food chain…, and goals - cleaner air, renewable energy sources, alternative lifestyles. The double column of words will help teachers and students alike, in group chats, debates, writing tasks and research projects. Rather than offer a vast maze of terms, it offers a broad selection, each potentially spurring further concepts and word choices.

Pirate treasure from the sea bed could be beautiful, mouldy or smashed to bits. It could be flamboyant or faded, delicate or dangerous, and you might find it floating and drifting or submerged and water-logged. It’ll probably be secret, too - stolen, smuggled and concealed. All these words and many more are listed in this mind-stretching word bank. Either read out from it yourself or copy and distribute it around your class, for selecting and trying out, or to trigger other ideas. Encourage some of these words in conversation too. VIDEO SUPPORT: me reading my published poem, ‘Treasure Chest Mystery’ - details on my website, poemsforfun.wordpress.com : https://photos.google.com/share/AF1QipMarEm9uVBDEGPTykSlkAfT6jdVArKlPen6X5lk1le7dqUc89gEztNjSO7V6qsxUQ?key=X0hIWmdaV1M0Q2lHYURKbDdIVFFPMTVBTWRUdkhn SEE ALSO: **Under the Sea **poem frame: /teaching-resource/under-the-sea-poem-frame-example-y2-4-11922054 , Seabed Rhymes Y2-4: /teaching-resource/-seabed-rhymes-fun-rhyming-couplet-frames-ks2-11892578 . Seabed Mystery Poem Frame KS2: /teaching-resource/seabed-mystery-poem-frame-ks2-guide-11892739 and Treasure Map alliteration game: /teaching-resource/treasure-map-alliteration-game-yr1-6-guide-for-use-11887395

Your emergent writers will love choosing an item or more from this lively picture and writing the word in the space provided to complete the phrase - I can see… More words can be added, on the line or below. Where prompts are needed, point to familiar items in the picture, e.g. dog, boy, bus or bird, and help to sound out the word. Colouring in the picture can be a reward for the writing effort. This resource promotes literacy (vocabulary, phonics, independent expression and handwriting), fine motor skills, colour awareness, shading control, and awareness of the world outside. The picture also provides a focus for discussion.

This simple illustrated poetry frame celebrates the beauty of birds in flight and the wonders of bird migration. The theme will inspire your children’s imagination and ignite their poetic powers, spurred on by the sketches and line-starters. They’ll love thinking up similes to describe how the birds look and other aspects of them, and also thinking up their own developments and rounding-off line. The accompanying Guide Sheet offers suggestions for each line, in case handy for reading out as examples or prompting for, while encouraging independent thinking and word choices. Recommended for KS2.

Children love this activity. Dragons can be sizzling-hot, ice-cold, fierce, friendly, clumsy, graceful - whatever the individual child wants them to be, and their exciting features, shown in the illustration, are sure to trigger a colourful array of possibilities, as your class dash down their descriptive word ideas on the lines. They’ll need to turn the sheet round as they go to follow the line angles - adding to the fun! Encourage able writers to add in similes under the lines, as demonstrated in the accompanying guide. Suggestions are provided there for warm-up and follow-on activities, as well as for words. See my other resources for more dragon-focused activities and supporting posters.

Fascinating creative opportunity for older/more able writers, depicting the sea as different entities or things. Format and starter lines for a sequence of verses are provided, with quality sample poem, written by myself (published poet) for the purpose. Tip: build up to metaphors by (1) discussing sea in different weathers, climates, times and seasons, enacting and sounding out; (2) elicit words and similes for the variations; (3) invite pupils to try taking out the ‘as… as’ or ‘like’ from their similes to form metaphors (e.g. ‘the sea IS a mirror’; (4) read the sample poem; (5) give out the frames and scrap paper for independent writers and let them write their own, personal versions. See also my many other sea poetry frames in my catalogue, with sub-topics such as sea monsters, seabed mysteries, summer’s day sea, stormy sea and a pirate’s treasure map.

**What jungle creature am I? ** this poem asks, with prompts for all sorts of clues and poetic techniques. Children forget they’re writing poems when there’s an exciting, exotic riddle to present and a whole class of others to guess. Jungle offers a wealth of possibilities, not just for creatures, but for creativity too. There’s also an anagram riddle suggestion below, to write on the sheet. Best for Yrs 3-6.

This is a simple, illustrated frame for poetry-writing (or general descriptive writing), for beginner-writers, with jungle animals as the theme. There are three short sentences, referring to different jungle animals (tiger, money and snake), each with a gap for a one-word description. Below is a simile to finish: 'The jungle is as green as _ '. The activity calls for some preparation, such as learning about jungles and their inhabitants and sharing associated ideas and descriptive language. It supports literacy development, especially in creative writing, also providing a window on the wider world and natural environments - appropriate to the EYFS curricular learning area of Understanding the World. The opportunities for colouring support Expressive Arts & Design, and children will also develop other skills, such as pencil control and handwriting.

**Dragon writing! ** This illustrated writing frame invites similes, description, and action words for dragons - plus suggestions for their favourite food. Not Teachers on Toast, surely?!? The Guide sheet provides teacher support for firing enthusiasm, ideas and language, and presenting the sheet. Supports literacy, poetry, vocabulary-building, speaking and listening skills, expressive movement (in the recommended warm-up enactments), and study of mythical beasts. Best for lower juniors (7-9 year-olds).

**Snappy dragon rhymes - with key colours. ** Great for all ages, especially early years, developing rhythm, rhyme, language, creativity and expressive confidence. Scope for drama, music and art developments. Once there was a dragon dressed in red. He liked to stay all day in… You can guess the last word, as can the children, though some may prefer to offer alternative rhymes. Red is just one example of the numerous colours featuring in these crazy dragon verses, which lend themselves to being enacted, and even sung to a made-up tune, as well as chanted and clapped. Follow on with dragon sketches or try my dragon’s menu for easy, crazy writing fun.

Halloween fun! A sheet of magic spell rhyming couplets to complete - all guided towards happy, innocent wishes. Four couplet frames + two blank lines for an independent one. Example: Wind, rain, snow and sun - Let today be __ and fun! I have a debut book of poems: ‘SQUEAK! SQUAWK! ROAR! Amazing Animal Poems’, published by Otter-Barry Books. ‘A brilliant resource for schools’ - School Reading List.

1 pig, 2 pigs, 3 pigs - this illustrated reading + writing sheet teaches the letter and sound ‘i’ with fun and meaning. Also teaches numbers and counting. The words are presented in three soft colours, for children to write over. See also my phonic sheets for o and a : /teaching-resource/phonic-a-in-cat-12249906 (free) /teaching-resource/phonic-a-cat-in-a-hat-12251051 /teaching-resource/phonic-o-on-off-12248311 and more. (Click preference “newest”). BOOK NEWS - I have a new book of poems for children: ‘SQUEAK! SQUAWK! ROAR! Amazing Animal Poems’, published by Otter-Barry Books. ‘A brilliant resource for schools’ - School Reading List.

Fun in the Snow - this is a simple, 40-word story, lightly illustrated, about a boy enjoying the snow and making a snowman. There is an extra page highlighting a few words from the text - in different colours for extra fun. Engages young children, encouraging sounding-out and ‘have-a-go’ reading. See my other stories and also Phonics sheets, for more simple, fun reading.