How do I help DS understand how to form sentences?

[Yorkieaddict]

DS is in Y1. He seems to be doing fine with reading and writing as far as I can tell, but he doesn't seem to understand the concept of sentences. He has been writing stories at school, and seems to quite enjoy it, but he says he doesn't put in any full stops or capitals because he doesnt know where they go.

I have tried to explain it to him, but I am not sure how to explain it so he will understand it. I think at the moment I am just confusing him further. Any suggestions on how to explain it to him properly would be gratefully received, thanks!

I wouldn't worry too much about it if he's only just gone into Y1. Sentence writing is something teachers demonstrate/teach lots and lots in Y1. For 5 year old children it must be very confusing to work out what an individual sentence is when spoken language seems to blend into one long sentence! (I.e. we don't necessarily pause whenever we've finished speaking a sentence aloud). It comes with maturity/practise. Here are a couple of games you could use to help enforce the concept of a sentence -

• Give him a sentence with a word missing at the end and ask him if it makes sense; talk about why/why not.
• Show him two sentences with no full stops and ask him to put the full stops in.
• Cut out some cards with words and ask him to help you put them in the right order.
• When reading to him, ask him to count how many sentences there are on the page.

Thanks for that. It's good to know they will be doing a lot of this in Y1. I'll give those games a go.

Hi -

Yes, agree with ABofD - it is a big 'ask' at this age, and they will be covering it, not only in Yr1, but throughout all the primary years, with (hopefully) increasing degrees of sophistication. For instance, full stops and Capital letters; then comma; question mark, and exclamation marks; speech marks (often taught first by 'speech bubbles', which children often do understand from comics).

Write and cut out largish word cards to make a simple sentence (perhaps from a book he is already reading) including a large 'full stop'. In fact, some VERY early reading books don't even have any punctuation, so the child concentrates solely on the words. Then jumble up the cards (include one or two 'extra' unnecessary ones if you like, to make it a bit more difficult). See if he can lay the cards out to make the sentence.

When he is reading, encourage him to observe any punctuation, and see if he can tell you what effect it has on the sentence, and what difference it might make if it wasn't there.

(If you yourself should happen to be a 'fan' of grammar and punctuation, there is a brilliant book by Lynne Truss, Eats, Shoots and Leaves.)

And if DS enjoys words and generally likes learning, the Oxford Phonics Spelling Dictionary is a book that will serve him throughout primary school.

Eats, Shoots and Leaves.

[Naughty 'Bold' not working, but I can see why, because it wanted a 'space' between * ) ]

Not ideal, but as a start, get him to read his writing to you. When he needs to take a breath he needs a full stop (maybe a comma - told you it is not ideal)

Every time he uses a full stop the next letter is a capital.

Also use capitals when anything has a propper name, so a man or woman does not have a capital. But if that man is Uncle Dave, it does and if the woman is Mummy it also has a capital.

This can be a game played at anytime, go round a room with him pointing out things that have names. Or you can do it out on a walk, going to the shops etc so if you meet someone walking a dog, dog is without a capital, when you ask the dog's owner the dog's name it does have a capital.

Depending on what is in your cupboards or where you shop you can even pick out names in foreign languages (stick to European ones with a roman alphabet, it doesn't work with Japanese) and look at the full stops and capital letters.

Thanks for all these, will give them a go.