Challenge Week: Shorthand
February 13, 2015
During Challenge Week, all pupils were introduced to Pitman Shorthand – a skill which allows people to take notes quickly and efficiently. At first sight, the children merely saw a mass of squiggles, dots and strokes. However, by playing games such as ‘Simon Says’, children were allowed to see the correlation between shorthand (which is based on sounds) and their own knowledge of phonics. Pupils were then asked to draw the symbol that matched the sound. By the end of the lesson they were able to recognise and draw some strokes which represented sounds such as ‘p’, ‘b’,‘t’, ‘d’ , ‘ch’ and ‘j’ and even copy words to match the picture of animals. Year 5 and 6 pupils were asked to decipher a message written in shorthand. Well done to all pupils: a great start was made learning a difficult skill.
