What it is. Words are separated by a space wide enough to see.
Why our test works. A space is invisible — there is nothing on the page to check. Putting a finger in makes the space into an object with a size, which a six-year-old can judge and an adult can see from across the room.
Leans on. Lesson 6 — they can now write a whole word.
Watch for. Children remove the finger and the spaces vanish. Have them write one phrase with the finger and one without, then compare.
Write two words with a clear space between them. The worked example is the one you build on the board: Teacher writes two words with no gap and asks the class to read it, then rewrites with a f The class reads the teaching page printed at the top of the sheet — our own writing, so a child who was absent can still get the lesson.
You open by saying where this sits — what it follows and what it is part of — in one sentence, and then you give them the reason it matters, in your own words, for about ten seconds.
Then you do one yourself, building it on the board and leaving it up: Teacher writes two words with no gap and asks the class to read it, then rewrites with a finger space and asks again. The board copy is what they look back at when they stall, so it stays there for the whole lesson.
The We-do is the main whiteboard moment of the lesson — short answers, boards up on your signal, every child visible at once. Class writes a two-word phrase using a finger as the spacer, then reads it back to a partner. If the answer is a whole sentence rather than a word, take it on the printed sheet instead, because a sentence written on a whiteboard is written once and destroyed.
They read the teaching page — printed at the top of today's sheet — with you, either read-aloud or FASE, never round robin. Stop at the worked example and let them look at it.
Exit directions in full, standing still, before anyone moves. Then they work alone: Write three two-word phrases with finger spaces: red hat, big dog, my cup.
You close on the exit direction — Point to the space in your first phrase. — taken from every child before anyone stands, and then the line you want them to still have tomorrow: One finger of space.
Children remove the finger and the spaces vanish. Have them write one phrase with the finger and one without, then compare.