Topic “Activities”  

- 2 different soft toys

- 2 plates

- 2 boxes or baskets

- big/little food pictures - click here to print

2. Put the 2 soft toys in front of your child, and put a plate and box/basket in front of each one.

2. Select four or five pairs of pictures (i.e., big and small apple, big and small burger etc.) and spread them out - putting the big and small pictures next to each other. Say the name of each picture as you put them out.

3. Ask your child to put an item of food on the doll's or teddy's plate or basket (e.g. "put the big banana on teddy's plate").

- boy/girl figures - click here to print

- big/little everyday items - click here to print

PE equipment

Give sequences of one then two instructions, for example: 'Run to the post then turn around', 'Jump then run to the window', 'Throw the yellow ball', 'Jump three times then turn around'

Variations:

Have a fixed set of instructions, for example turn around, throw the ball, run to the post, jump in the hoop. Let the children take it in turns to be the teacher, giving the other children the instructions. It may be useful to have picture prompts for the instructions which the children can use.

No specific equipment

Paper, coloured pens, a barrier so that children can't see what each other is doing

Black sheet press have a range of ready made sheets for doing these activities.

Two soft toys

cups and plastic food

Laminated symbols for who and what

Use symbols you already have, or get them using the Commtap Symboliser.

1. Set up a tea party together and talk about it using 2/3 word phrases e.g. "teddy's got the cup" and "dragon's got the banana";

2. Play at drinking and eating etc.;

3. Show the symbol for "who" and ask "Who has the banana?" To start with give the model answer "Look.........teddy's got the banana";

4. As the child gets used to this type of response give fewer clues e.g. "Look, ... t....." etc.

Small figures

Small furniture

Small animals

1. Use these to play games so that the boy sleeps on the bed or the camel jumps on the chair etc. Ask "who" questions as above using the "who" symbol;

2. Model the correct answer if needed.

Favourite book

See above activities for resources, plus laminated "what" symbol

Any of the above equipment

Home made dice:

(Stick "who" and "what" symbols onto sides of a square box to make a dice)

Use symbols you already have, or get them using the Commtap Symboliser.

Any of the above equipment

Several "Who?" and "What?" symbols

Bag

For the symbols, use symbols you already have, or get them using the Commtap Symboliser.

e.g. a pop-up or a picture book

When the child is familiar with a book and the possible answers to likely questions point to pictures and ask questions using a short phrase e.g. 'Where's Spot?', 'Who's that?', What's that?'. You want a two word answer e.g. 'under bed' etc.

Digital camera

Book of photos taken at school

If a digital camera is not available use ordinary cameras and photos.

Dressing up cloths

Cooking toys

Dolls

Tea set

Simple outline drawings, e.g. pictures of food, everyday objects, or pictures related to the current class topic

Coloured crayons or pens

Safety scissors

1. Put three or four pictures in front of the child;

2. Make sure the child understands the names of the items in the pictures (e.g. ask them to "find the apple");

3. Ask the child to colour or cut out one of the items (for example "cut out the fish", "colour the house");

4. Guide or prompt the child if they are having difficulties working out what to do;

5. After a few goes, you can give the child a go at telling you what to do.

Various PE activities, for example

ball and beanbag

or

Crawl tunnel or bench or mats etc.

A teddy or soft toy

1. Tell teddy to do something, e.g. "jump" and then make him do it;

2. Do this three or four times with different actions, e.g. "run", "sleep", "sit", "lie down";

3. Give the child the teddy and tell them to do one or two actions;

4. Take the teddy back and tell him to do an action again, e.g. "run";

5. Tell teddy "don't run" (make sure he stays still!);

6. Tell teddy to run, then tell him "don't run" (repeat);

7. Give the teddy to the child, and then give commands using just run (or another action you chose in "4"). Change between saying e.g. "run" and "don't run". Help the child to keep the teddy still when you say "don't run".

8. Repeat with different actions.

No materials required

- printable shopping game pictures - click here

- You could substitute the printed pictures for real objects.

1. Print and cut out the pictures.

2. Put the bag and the trolley in front of the child.

3. Lay the shopping items out on the table.

4. Explain to your child you would like them to do some shopping and put the item in either the bag or the trolley.

5. Some examle instructions you could use:

- put the carrot in the bag

- put the pizza in the trolley

6. After a few turns, ask you child to give you an instruction.

- Animal post boxes and food pictures - click here to print

- Toys - tea set, 2 different soft toys and play food.

- 2 hand puppets

- Play food

e.g. a pop-up or a picture book

1. When the child is familiar with a book point to pictures and ask questions using short phrases beginning with "Where?" e.g. 'Where's Spot?'

2. The child should either point to the appropriate place, or say the name of the place where the object is on the picture (e.g. "basket", "car").

Puppet or teddy or doll.

Items to hide and somewhere to hide them.

- A hand puppet

- Selection of play food

1. Place the puppet on your hand and lay a few items of play food in front of you.

2. Explain that the puppet is hungry.

3. Give your child instructions, e.g. '(puppet) wants the bread', '(puppet) wants the banana'.

4. Encourage your child to give the puppet the piece of food you asked for.

5. After a few turns, swap roles and see if your child is able to tell you which food to give to the puppet.

- A selection of every day items

- A box

- Optional soft toy

- Optional action cards - click here to print

- Optional action dice - click here to print

- Post box - you can make your own with a cardboard box

Optional printable post box template here

- Picture cards to post - cick here for first words picture cards.

Laminated song symbols on a velcro strip

1. Sit opposite the child at the same height and make sure you have their attention

2. Start off offering the child a choice of two song symbols. Help the child choose a song if needed and then sing the song with lots of oomph!

3. Offer the child a choice of the song symbols again and repeat the process.

4. Repeat until you have an idea of the songs the child specially likes.

5. When you sing one of these songs stop before a main word e.g. sing 'Twinkle twinkle little .............' And wait. Will the child put in the word star? If they do, smile and continue.

6. Allow more and more gaps in the songs for the child to sing the words

Copies of idioms pictures, for example from Black Sheep press "Speech Bubbles" pack

School exercise book

Pen/pencil, scissors, glue

The following books may also be useful:

"Red Herrings and White Elephants: The Origins of the Phrases we use Every Day" by Albert Jack (Metro Publishing, 2004)

"Idioms at work" by Vera McLay (Language Teaching Publications, 1987)

Explain that you are going to do some work on idioms. Explain that idioms are phrases that mean something different to what the words mean individually. Give a few examples that you think the student might already know (e.g. "pain in the neck", "get lost")

Using the exercise book, let the student make a title page for their book, saying "Idioms Dictionary" and giving a definition of an idiom - you can help the student compose their own definition

Let the student choose one idioms picture, cut it out and stick it in the book.

Discuss with the student the literal meaning of the idiom, as well as what it actually means.

Have the student write a definition of the idiom in the book, next to the picture. Also have them write a sentence using the idiom in context.

Continue to build up the collection of idioms over time.

This activity requires the purchasing of a particular commercial product. Please help to further develop this sheet by providing an example or description of alternative resources to use in this activity.

Flash cards made from the idioms pictures from Black Sheep press "Speech Bubbles" pack

This activity requires the purchasing of a particular commercial product. Please help to further develop this sheet by providing an example or description of alternative resources to use in this activity.

Idioms pictures from Black Sheep press "Speech Bubbles" pack of cards showing the meaning of the idioms.

Simple paper folding activity, e.g. paper plane, hat, box

Talk through the activity with the children, and how to fold the paper.

Demonstrate for them.

Support them to record the steps they need to take to do the activity themselves.

Let them fold their own models.

Review the steps they needed to do, and look at their finished models.

For example: To listen to an explanation in class, e.g. of a science investigation, and to plan the steps they need to take to complete it.

None

1. Have the children sit in a circle;

2. Introduce the game by giving a demonstration of how to play;

3. Go around the circle - each child says 'I went to market and bought...' each child has to recall the items the children before them have said and then add another item;

4. Talk about trying to help memory by repeating the information in their heads as they are waiting for their turn to recall the list.

None

A range of interesting items or topic vocabulary items

OR

Pictures of topic items or items interesting to the children

Puppet

Instructions the puppet can do, written out on cards

OR

Whiteboard and pen

Judge's card with 'great' on one side and 'almost' on the other.

None

Stories could be taken from reading books, or from picture sequence cards. (For example 'And then' published by Schubi).

Read chunks of the story to the child, or tell the story from the sequence cards. The chunks should be 100 to 200 words long (2 -4 paragraphs) and/or contain between four and six things that happen. (Use shorter chunks if this is too long for the child).

Ask the child to retell the chunk you have read.

The child could also be asked to reconstruct the story using drawing, using miniatures (e.g. playmobil), selecting and ordering cards from a set of picture sequence cards.

For the child to gain more information from stories and explanations at other times he/she will be assisted by the use of visuals to support , and also by being asked a question before hearing the story or explanation so that he/she has something to focus his/her listening on.

Short stories on tape or CD

Clips of a favourite TV or computer programme

Pictures of facial expressions showing the feelings:

• Happy
• Sad
• Excited
• Angry

(If you don't have these resources use pictures from magazines or books).

1. Show the children the pictures of the facial expressions

2. Talk about what the 'feeling' is that corresponds to the picture

3. Talk about other words that mean the same as the feeling words (e.g. happy/ glad, angry/ mad)

4. See if the children can think of any other feeling words

5. Describe a situation and get the children to identify the appropriate feeling

6. E.g. 'you saw a spider in the bath', 'David Beckham was coming to your school', 'you found 10', 'you failed a test' 'you saw a fight in the playground', 'your homework was easy'

Pictures of facial expressions showing the feelings:

• Happy
• Sad
• Excited
• Angry

(If you don't have these resources use pictures from magazines or books).