What it is. A sentence you write yourself is planned in your head before the pencil moves.
Why our test works. A six-year-old who begins writing before deciding what to say runs out of sentence halfway. Counting the words on fingers first fixes the whole sentence in memory, so the hand is only executing a plan rather than composing and writing at once.
Leans on. Lessons 8 and 9 — the shape of a sentence and the care to write one.
Watch for. Three words is the target, not a limit. A child who says a longer sentence should write it; a child who says two should be asked one question to get a third.
Write your own three-word sentence about a picture. The worked example is the one you build on the board: Teacher looks at a picture, says a three-word sentence aloud, counts the words on fingers, 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 looks at a picture, says a three-word sentence aloud, counts the words on fingers, then writes it. 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 says a three-word sentence about a second picture, counts the words on fingers, then writes it together. 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 two three-word sentences of your own about the picture. Say each one before you write it.
You close on the exit direction — Say your sentence out loud, then count the words. — taken from every child before anyone stands, and then the line you want them to still have tomorrow: Say it, count it, write it.
Three words is the target, not a limit. A child who says a longer sentence should write it; a child who says two should be asked one question to get a third.