NAPLAN planning activity – Fast Ideas
3 min
Classroom Activities
Abi Bennett
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With the NAPLAN test coming up, how do we prepare students for test conditions?
The pressure of planning, writing and editing a whole text within 40 minutes is hard and students only get 5 minutes of this time to plan! Therefore, it’s important to practise writing using time restraints so they can feel more confident at test time.
On test day, students are given a writing prompt and asked to write a response for either narrative or persuasive writing. With 5 minutes of planning time, they need to think of ideas quickly!
Action Activity – Fast Ideas!
Try this NAPLAN planning activity to challenge students to generate as many ideas as they can within a short time frame. The more they practice, the easier it gets and the more creative their ideas will be!
Download and print these free one-word writing prompts.
In the classroom
- Divide students into small groups and give each group a writing prompt, face-down so they can’t see it.
- Set a timer for 5 minutes. Reduce this down to 1–2 minutes for an extra challenge.
- Ask students to brainstorm and write down as many ideas as possible in the time provided. Make sure they don’t turn over the writing prompt until you’ve started the timer and said ‘Go!’
- When the timer stops, ask students to pick their top three ideas and share as a class.
- As a class, vote for the top idea from each group.
- Have students individually write a Sizzling Start in 5 minutes, using the chosen idea.
Not sure what a Sizzling Start is? Learn Step 2: Sizzling Starts for free. - Students can then share their Sizzling Starts within their groups for their peers to give feedback.
For a persuasive writing brainstorm activity, teach students to brainstorm arguments for both sides, but only in a mad minute! Then, they can select the side they’d like to write about. Get them used to doing this in a short amount of time, to fit the NAPLAN 5-minute planning time.
Simple guide to NAPLAN writing
We’ve put together a comprehensive guide to NAPLAN writing on the blog to help you focus on the skills that get results.
Jen’s NAPLAN Super Summary
Help your students plan, write and edit a response under test conditions with this collection of insights and samples from Seven Steps founder Jen McVeity.
Want more free writing prompts?
You can find them here:
There are even more writing prompts on Teacher Hub that include thinking questions and activities to use in the classroom. Members can find them in the Resource Library by selecting ‘Writing Prompts’ under the ‘Resource Type’ dropdown.
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More member resources:
Step 2: Sizzling Starts
Give NAPLAN markers what they want
Meet 5 of the criteria NAPLAN markers are looking for with just one simple Step!
