Using the exemplars/tauaromahi to promote learning

What is an exemplar/tauaromahi?

The exemplars are authentic examples of student work. They illustrate learning, achievement, and quality in relation to the levels described in the national curriculum statements. The annotations surrounding the student work samples draw attention to important features of the work. The indicators of quality and achievement that form the basis of the annotations are also set out in matrices (grids) that show progressions from level 1 to level 5.

See the English exemplars online.

See this exemplar online.

What is the intended learning outcome?

The teacher wanted her students to be able to understand that a simple idea can be conveyed visually (Concept). She also wanted the students to be able to use visual and verbal features to convey a simple idea (Impact).

The class explored picture books, focusing on how the illustrators communicated the characters' emotions and learning that colours can represent different emotions or states.

See curriculum links online

The teaching process

The teacher gathered several picture books for shared reading with the common theme of emotions and feelings. To stimulate discussion about how the illustrators conveyed the emotions of the characters in these stories, she asked focus questions, such as:

• What colours has the illustrator used? Why?
• How are the characters moving? How do you know?

She continued using questions to prompt the class as they discussed the picture books, paying specific attention to the visual and verbal features of the books' covers.

The class then practised drawing pictures of the main character from one of the books that they had discussed. The teacher observed that they needed more guidance about size and the dominant image. Before the class repeated the exercise of drawing a character from another book, the teacher helped them to develop a set of criteria to guide their work.

Contexts for further learning

In the context of shared and guided reading, the teacher can encourage the students to think about the visual and verbal features of the books they are reading by asking focus questions and by modelling the use of terminology appropriate to Visual Language in class discussions.

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