5 Star Skills Posters

5 Star Skills Posters

34 pages, designed by Clever Classroom.

This file can also be found on our first ever super mega pack - Classroom Organization Super Mega Pack 1150+ pages

The ‘5 Star Rated’ system is a tried and tested approach that helps students developed a pragmatic structure to developing skills.

I have provided more than 30 blank stars proformas (with heading e.g. A five star independent worker...) for you to use with your whole class. You will brainstorm with the whole class or even a few targeted students on what a 5 star ______ looks like, does, is.

Print and laminate all of your posters and keep them organized and ready to go in a folder or container near your whole group area.

When teaching such skills as story writing, listening, expressive reading, being a team member use these cards to outline what a 5 star person or piece of work looks like.

Complete the posters with the children by collaborating on the desired points. Use a dry eraser (whiteboard marker) to write your points. This way, you can clean off and re-use the posters each year. Some teachers may like to write the points and then laminate the poster.


My grade one students found the matrix quite easy to use. My struggling students especially liked using a star stamp on their work. As children finished their work, they would come and sit with me and we would revise their genre writing based on the 5 star poster. If they could show that they had covered this, they gave themselves a star stamp for each point. This was particularly successful for exposition writing, year after year. I would also display the work sample, with the 5 stamps for children to read. Revising a 5 star piece of work on an overhead projector was also a great evaluation tool.

Tip: For younger students you may have to add some very basic skills and then revisit the poster in the year to add more difficult points. For recount writing with Kindy, I would always add a point about neatness and basic punctuation.

Here is an example for an explanation that you could use for grades two and up:

5 star explanations have the following:
A statement outlining what will be explained
Present tense
Nouns and action verbs
Conjunctions of time
Technical language
Here is an example for an explanation that you could use for

Kindergarten and grade one:

5 star explanations have the following:
Name what you are explaining
Present tense
Nouns and action verbs (you may start with just nouns)
Capitals and the beginning of the sentence and periods and
the end.
Neat handwriting.

Use these posters for all kinds of skills that you want your students to remember and assimilate. I have left one blank page so that you can write your own skill, if you choose. Please leave feedback, if you would like to help other teachers learn of a new way to use the posters.

This file also includes a guide page as well as 34 posters (one blank for you to handwrite your focus after laminating (wipe off and re-use) and a cover page.


Cloud image not included in download.

Clip art by Scrappin Doodles.

Designed by Clever Classroom, 2012.


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