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Topic “Primary (5-11yrs)”
Primary school age (5-11 years)
Communication activities for classes
various contributors
Created 12 September 2012; updated 11 May 2023.
Understand and use ordinals (1st, 2nd, 3rd etc)
| Activity/strategy name and materials required | How to do the activity | Key principles for doing the activity and comments |
|---|---|---|
| Write it Writing materials |
| This works best 1:1. Use this activity only with a child who can read and write. With children with less good literacy skills, you will need to talk about what you are going to focus on, but miss out the written support. With children who can cope with larger numbers, you might want to go beyond 10, be careful to explain how numbers such as 21st, 22nd and 23rd are formed. |
| Line up None | This works best with a class or group. You may want to focus more on the front of the line. | |
| PE Equipment as required by the PE activity | This works best with a class. | |
| Small World Small world equipment, including several ‘people’. | This works best 1:1. This activity is more suited to younger children. | |
| Actions Equipment as required by the actions. Visual prompt cards if required. | This works best 1:1 or with a small group. Make sure you stress words such as “first”, “second” etc. Bear in mind the child’s auditory memory – the more instructions you give, the harder it will be to remember them. |
Learn new words
| Activity/strategy name and materials required | How to do the activity | Key principles for doing the activity and comments |
|---|---|---|
| Exploring words Written word with a picture Written sounds for beginning/ end of each word Visuals for the story Dictionary (maybe)
| Ideas you can use to help word learning - you do not need to use all of them, and some will work better than others for different children. 1. Introduce the written form of the word; 2. Say the word to the child and ask for repetition; 3. Ask the child to clap syllables on your or their hands, use prompting if necessary. Or alternatively they could tap the syllables out on pictures of drums (say four arranged in a row); 4. Ask if any other words rhyme with this new word (think of examples yourself) - you could take this in turns in a group; 5. Ask for beginning and ending sounds; 6. Tell the child a short story or anecdote, including the word as the main feature if possible - or work with the child to work a story out; 7. Give an explicit definition (school dictionary maybe - some dictionaries are more helpful than others for this!) and give context(s) preferably first one being the one used in the story as it’s familiar but make sure to offer other contexts; 8. Ask the child if they can put the word in a sentence/ tell a short story including the word; 9. If ability allows, ask the child if they know of any word which means a similar thing. | These activities help to build a child’s vocabulary with solid representations of words. It gives a child strategies to use when learning and remembering new words. It builds the child’s confidence on a topic, especially if taught before the relevant lesson. |
Number action rhymes
Below are some action number rhymes which you can use to develop children’s understanding of numbers and also encourage them to initiate and continue the song/interaction with you.
Remember to sing these songs a few times with your child and show them how to move their hands/body by modelling it yourself.
Communicating Phonics - Quick Reference
Background
The Communication Trust's publication "Communicating Phonics" was published to help teachers who are administering the Year 1 phonics screening check to children with speech language and communication needs (children with SLCN). Although this guidance was written with this check in mind, it also provides much useful information for developing literacy skills with this group of children.
The table below is reproduced from the reference table which comes from pages 12 - 16 of this guidance.
Communicating Phonics - Quick Reference
various contributors
Created 13 June 2012; updated 6 December 2024.
Initiate a request for items to do a task
| Activity/strategy name and materials required | How to do the activity | Key principles for doing the activity and comments |
|---|---|---|
| Impossible task! Materials as needed, for example:
| Ask the child to carry out tasks without giving them the equipment they need. For example:
| If a child does not request anything, you can try to motivate the child to correct you or "help you", for example:
See also suggestions here: make a choice at snack time |
Text mangle tool
See the "comments" link associated with this page for more information about this tool.
What this tool is for
The purpose of this tool is to be able to get a flavour of:
- What an early reader might get from text;
- What can be gained from text where only a selected number of high frequency words are used;
- How a strategy of signing could assist comprehension;
- Or...to create your own Jaberwocky poem!
See the comments page for more information on this tool.
use switches to turn something on or off
| Activity/strategy name and materials required | How to do the activity | Key principles for doing the activity and comments |
|---|---|---|
| Keeping cool: learning to sustain an action Fan, (with optional ribbons attached) Mains switch control box | Configure the controller so that the fan is on as long as the switch is held down. Hold down the switch and let the child/adult feel the breeze. Let them do the same. | The child/adult should experience holding down the switch and feeling the breeze. On release the breeze stops. State, "On" and "Off" as you and the child/adult press and release the switch. |
| Learning to use a switch to turn a device on Fan (as above) | As either of you press the switch say, "on." When it stops say "off." Show them the effect of the breeze, blowing your hair or rubbing your arms because it is cold. | |
| Switching a device on and off (Do this in a subsequent session after the child/adult has understood the process in the above activity). A device to control, for example: fan toy computer monitor bubble machine | Let the child/adult turn the fan on and off modelling the vocabulary as you go. Reinforce this learning with different devices at different times and places. |
Make a choice using two switches
| Activity/strategy name and materials required | How to do the activity | Key principles for doing the activity and comments |
|---|---|---|
| Establishing motivators Items/activities the student may be interested in. Items/short activities the student is not interested in. |
| Don't use two things which are motivating for the student as you won't be able to tell whether they've succeeded in expressing a choice or not. |
| Establishing the switches to use Appropriate switches to use Typically you might start off with a couple of large recordable buttons (for example "Big Macs". You may have already established this with single switch work and established that they can make something happen with a single switch). | You may need to work with an occupational therapist to establish what type of switch a student can use - particularly if they have complex physical difficulties. | |
| Making choices Pair of switches Motivating and un-motivating items/activities (see the activity "establishing motivators" above) | If they don't press a switch you may need to:
Consistency of pressing Do they appear to be pressing one switch more than another, or do they appear to be choosing the switch randomly? Swapping the switches around from time to time will help you to know this. If they aren't consistent, you could try making the switches more different, for example:
You could also try:
|
Developing attention and listening skills through motivating activities
| Activity/strategy name and materials required | How to do the activity | Key principles for doing the activity and comments |
|---|---|---|
| Sensory Play - Sensory toys and materials for messy play (e.g. trays with sand/ cornflour and water/jelly). - The best toys are those that the child can manipulate easily to produce a result. | 1. Guide your child's hands and visual attention to toys/trays of material(s) that they can touch and look at. 2. Let your child explore the toys/materials in the tray and encourage them to investigate all their properties, stimulating all of the child's senses as far as possible (colour, smell, texture). 3. You may need to draw the child's attention back to the activity if the child becomes distracted. Use your voice to regain their attention (e.g. a drawn out "ohhhh!", or an intake of breath). | Do not continue with something the child has lost interest in, but wait a while before introducing another object. |
| Turn taking games - Ball / dark cloth - Your voice - to sing simple nursery rhymes that have an element of anticipation built in such as "Round and round the haystack, like a little mouse, one step, two step and into his little house". | This is a fun activity for you and the child to enjoy together. Use plenty of facial expression and your voice to gain and keep the child's attention. |
Today arrow
Picture:
Picture description:
Arrow to indicate today on a timetable.
Common irregular past tense verbs
These can be used with activities sheets from www.commtap.org including:
- make phrases in past tense using irregular verbs 1
- make phrases in past tense using irregular verbs 2
Some common irregular past tense verbs for use in the above activities
See below if you are not sure what an irregular past tense verb is.
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