What it is. The anthology is read for volume and pleasure, not for analysis.
Why our test works. MCT includes an anthology deliberately, and the temptation is to teach it — which converts the one part of the course meant to build appetite into more work. The test is unusual because it is honestly about enjoyment: a child who answers no should change what they are reading, not push through it. Wide reading is the largest single input to writing quality and it cannot be assigned into existence.
Leans on. Every reading lesson since Grade 1.
Watch for. Do not comprehension-question this. A log of what was read is enough, and even that should be light.
Read and use Read Your Head Off — the anthology from The Writing of Literature, pp.122–129. The worked example is the one you build on the board: Teacher reads the key passage of Read Your Head Off — the anthology aloud with the book op The class reads Writing Book 7, p.61 — our own page, 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. Before anything new, sixty seconds of retrieval on U27 set 1: ask, take the answers from boards rather than hands so you see all thirty, and do not re-teach — note who has lost it and carry on.
Then you do one yourself, building it on the board and leaving it up: Teacher reads the key passage of Read Your Head Off — the anthology aloud with the book open and models the move it teaches on one sentence. 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 applies the move from Read Your Head Off — the anthology to two sentences together, checking against the book's own example. If the answer is a whole sentence rather than a word, take it on their notebooks instead, because a sentence written on a whiteboard is written once and destroyed.
They open Writing Book 7 to page 61 and read it with you. Stop at the worked example and let them look at it.
Exit directions in full, standing still, before anyone moves. Then they work alone: In your notebook: apply Read Your Head Off — the anthology to three sentences of your own, double-spaced.
You close on the exit direction — Read out one sentence that uses Read Your Head Off — the anthology. — taken from every child before anyone stands, and then the line you want them to still have tomorrow: Read more than you are taught. That is the whole instruction.
Do not comprehension-question this. A log of what was read is enough, and even that should be light.