Rationale behind mental literacy using keyboard crazy

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Rationale behind mental literacy using keyboard
crazy
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What is mental literacy?

• Mental literacy is a 10-12 minutes activity using
  a keyboard recognition skills game (keyboard
  crazy). It is done to cover any aspect of
  grammar from plurals to connectives through to
  capital letters and verbs. It is very fast paced
  and is done as a collaborative exercise. (Groups
  of 2,3 or 4). It works on four major areas.

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• Speaking
• Listening
• Cementing grammatical knowledge
• Improving keyboard recognition skills for ICT and
  across the wider curriculum.
• (The added bonuses are extra motivation from the
  children and pacier lessons from the teacher.)

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Where does it fit in?

• It fits into the word work part of the literacy
  hour. The first few minutes can be a quick
  demonstration of the taught concept and then it
  is on to your mental literacy games. As it is
  fast and full of pace there is no chance of being
  bogged down and losing other elements of your
  hour.

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Who Benefits?

• Because of the nature of the game the benefits
  are in place for the three learning styles.
• Audio Learners They benefit from the
  discussions that take place, listening to
  instructions and talking through the choices.

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• Kinaesthetic Learners The game offers a
  hands-on experience by placing keys into a
  plastic overlay board. These children love the
  doing side of this activity.
• Visual Learners The game and the keys are
  brightly coloured and interesting to look at, so
  there is plenty for the visual learner.

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Do I have to come up with my own lesson ideas to
play this game?

• The simple answer is no.
• There are game ideas that cover key stage 1 and
  2, with most areas of grammar catered for.
  However, after a couple of plays it is a proven
  fact that teachers then come up with their own
  ideas. Indeed some of the best ideas on the
  keyboard crazy website (www.keyboardcrazy.co.uk)
  have come from teachers after having the game
  only a week.

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How do you play the game?

• Obviously it is not possible to go through each
  game but the basic mechanics of mental literacy
  are the same. Let us take the use of adjectives
  for example.
• Round 1 is recognition of the adjective. Teacher
  reads out a sentence The bouncy ball was thrown
  over the wall. Children key into their boards
  the adjective in the sentence. This is not
  first-to-finish, each team is given time to key
  in their word. There are two questions in round
  one.

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• Round 2 is the speaking and listening round.
• A child is asked to come to the front. The
  teacher presents the child with an adjective.
  The child then talks about the adjective for 20
  seconds without actually saying the adjective.
  After the 20 seconds is up the teacher says go
  and it is the first team to key in their word
  first. When they have done this they put their
  hands up and the teacher shouts freeze to all
  the other teams. (There are two questions in
  this round).

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• Round 3 is all about improving the adjective.
• As in round 1 the teacher reads out a sentence
  with an adjective. Teams have to improve the
  adjective without altering the sense of the
  sentence.
• The final round is all about vocabulary
  extension. Teams are asked to come up with the
  biggest adjective they can think of. The
  adjective must be spelt correctly so the bigger
  the word the more risk that is involved. Teams
  get one point for each letter in their adjective.

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What are the assessments for learning?

• Teachers can find out amazing things by simply
  tuning into discussion. If a common error is
  creeping in during the session that teacher can
  take note of this and work on this at a later
  time. Through discussion children are
  continually assessing what they know, and what
  they need to know.

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What is the hoped for impact?

• That childrens writing will improve by a third
  of a level by the end of the trial. (This cant
  be done in isolation but as a partner of the
  other strategies to improve writing skills) The
  major impact is on childrens motivation in the
  classroom so that we can produce eager and well
  motivated learners.

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Results so far

• When this was introduced into Admirals in year 6
  results of SATS went from 51L4 to 76L4, this
  result was slightly improved the following year
  with a larger cohort.

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• In my present school during an Ofsted inspection
  the standards in literacy were said to be above
  average in years 3 and 4 where the idea of mental
  literacy is used. The previous inspection stated
  that these standards were below average only 18
  months ago. Using mental literacy as part of my
  literacy lesson Ofsted deemed it good enough to
  be graded as a 1.

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• Any questions you can email me at
  johnbelljr66_at_hotmail.com
• Or
• Telephone
• Norwich Road School
• On 01842 753279

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