Before asking, sketch a simple favourite-pets bar chart on the board with one bar clearly tallest. Take three hands-up answers, not open call-outs. Give five seconds of quiet think-time before any hands go up.

Trace each bar's top across to the scale and read the number aloud: apple stops on five, banana on eight. Point to the empty pear bar and ask what a bar that reaches zero tells us. Hold out for pupils reading the top against the scale, not guessing by which bar looks biggest.

Talk this one through together — pupils take turns at the board and the class agrees or corrects out loud.

This step is the doing to the watching we just did: the same fruit data, but pupils place the bars themselves. Call a pupil up for each bar; the class predicts the height first, then the pupil drags the bar top to that line. Reconcile any disagreement by tracing the top back to the count from the picture we read. Keep the zero bar for last so the class sees a real bar can be empty.

This is the practice round — pupils take turns at the board, check each answer, and the class confirms before moving on. Keep the board work brisk rather than over-explaining.

The counts climb so the top has to travel further each time; the last bar reaches ten, so watch pupils keep counting single squares all the way up. Use the Check button and let the class confirm the ✓ before the next bar.