This Year 6 reading comprehension unit centres on Many Roads, an original poem by children’s author Sue Hardy-Dawson.
Written in homage to Robert Frost’s The Road Not Taken, the poem explores themes of choice, change and the future. This makes it especially resonant for pupils at the end of Key Stage 2, as they prepare to transition to secondary school.
Challenging yet accessible
The unit offers a carefully structured teaching sequence designed to support deep reading, discussion and creative response. Many Roads is challenging and layered, yet accessible, making it an ideal model text (WAGOLL) for developing upper KS2 reading and writing skills.
The pack encourages pupils to engage with the text through multiple types of reading, including model, choral, echo and paired reads.
Key questions prompt critical thinking. Meanwhile activities such as drama, visualisation and role writing help pupils explore the poem’s message more personally.
Teachers are supported with detailed annotations and flexible lesson plans. This will help you guide pupils through initial exploration, vocabulary focus, close reading and text comparison.
You'll revisit the poem throughout the unit to build understanding, introducing Frost’s original poem at the final stage for thoughtful comparison.
This resource forms part of the Real Comprehension whole-school programme, which offers thematic fiction, non-fiction and poetry units to develop reading comprehension and deeper understanding from Year 1 to Year 6.
This pack includes:
- Many Roads poem in plain, illustrated and PowerPoint formats (with/without highlights)
- Annotated teacher version with guidance for close reading and discussion
- Vocabulary PowerPoints focusing on countless and the suffix -less
- Two fully resourced teaching sequences with comprehension, discussion and reading strategies
- Big Questions PowerPoints and worksheets
- Activities for drawing the poem, rewriting lines, writing in role, and personal response
- Robert Frost’s The Road Not Taken for comparison
- Full teaching notes with suggestions for drama, visualisation and flexible teaching pathways
This unit not only builds comprehension skills such as retrieval, inference and sequencing, but also invites pupils to reflect on their own experiences, opinions and aspirations. This makes it a meaningful and memorable end-of-year reading experience.