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| Just some of my new friends. |
Not often I say this but, in one respect, I'm glad half-term is over. You see, I developed a habit of going into every charity shop I could find in search of soft toys to use in my language lessons. So 4 trips later, in village, city and even far-away Welsh shops I've got a fine collection. Now, how to use them.
Literacy Week
It is Literacy Week in one of my schools and so I decided to incorporate some of my new acquisitions into this by working with Dear Zoo across the whole school. Time will be short, so I won't be attempting to do all of these activities but I'm recording them for the future.
Dear Zoo in KS1
In KS1, we'll talk about what we know about the story in English and which animals we would choose to ask for if we were writing a letter. We'll need to give our reasons too. Then we will do actions for each of the animals from the story and play games to help us remember the animal nouns in French. We'll start with Corners so the children get lots of opportunities to hear the pronunciation before they say the words themselves. Other games could include:
Doucement - like hot/cold with one child hiding a small toy with the class chanting the animal word in voices which get louder as the 'seeker' moves nearer to the hidden toy.
Levez-vous - each child has a small cut-out/picture of an animal. When they hear their word they stand, wave their picture and do animal action.
Statues - walk around to music. When music stops teacher calls out animal and children have to get into pose appropriate for that animal.
Marchez comme ... - walk around in the style of the chosen animal and change walk as new one is called out.
Pass-the-animal - pass an animal around the circle, with each child saying the animal word quietly (or mouthing it), before passing it on to the next child. Additional animals will get added to the circle so that more children are actively involved.
Repeat/Silent - show an animal and say a word. The children only repeat (and do action) if word matches animal.
Heads Down - by this time individual children should be able to say the words with confidence and this is a game they always ask to play.
Feely-bag/box - 2 versions of this game. In version 1, a secret object is placed inside a bag with a closeable top (such as a PE bag.) The bag is passed around the circle to music and when the music stops, the person with the bag puts one hand in, feels the shape of the animal and has a guess. If they get in wrong, the bag passes around twice more before the animal is revealed.
In version 2, a feely-box with a selection of animals inside is placed in the centre of the circle. A beanbag is passed around the circle to music. When the music stops, the child holding the beanbag puts their hand into the box, feels an animal and guesses out loud. They then pull out the animal and can keep it until the end of the game if they guessed correctly. If they get in wrong, it goes back in the box and the game continues. (I haven't made one of these boxes yet - that's a project for the next holiday - but there are lots of instructions on the internet such as this one.) Reading the story
I will then read the story, and the children can predict which animals they think will be under the flaps by doing the action to match their guess. The final stage in KS1 will be reading the story one more time, leaving 'gaps' for the children to fill in the words.