Topic “key skill”  

Laminated 'I need you to help me' card

Use the card during classroom tasks. Introduce it as something that reminds us to ask for help when we need it.

Make it a 'reward' to have the card for an activity. Tell the child who has the card for that activity, that they can ask anyone for help by showing them the card. Give them a target to use it at least once.

Praise the child for using the card.

• Pictures of dishes - e.g. baked potato with beans and salad;
• Pictures of the ingredients to make each dish.

"On my way home from school" resource: activity available to download free from www.speechteach.co.uk

(see: www.speechteach.co.uk
/p_resource/speech/
on_my_way_home.htm)

Download selected pictures and assemble the board in your chosen way. A start square and a finish square are recommended - try not to make the game board bigger than an A3 size sheet. Laminate for future use.

1. Players each have a token and roll dice or use a spinner to move places on the board;

2. When a player lands on a picture of an animal they must say the starter phrase "On the way to school I saw..." and then add the name of that animal;

3. The activity can be extended by asking players to add to their story. Additional information could include adjectives (describing words - e.g. "big"), conjunctions (joining words - e.g. "and", "because") and verbs (action words, e.g. "run", "drop"). For example, "On my way to school today I saw a tiny mouse."

Sets of sequencing pictures;

Question mark card (optional).

1. Put the pictures in order so that you can easily show them to the child one at a time;

2. Show the child the first picture in the sequence;

3. Ask them to tell you what's happening in the picture;

4. Then ask them to imagine what might happen next. To show this visually, put a card with a large question mark on it to the right of the picture;

5. When the child has suggested a sensible thing that might happen next, show them the next card in the sequence;

6. If there are differences between what the card shows and the child's suggestion, discuss why this might be;

7. Repeat for all the cards in the sequence.

Story books

A picture to colour - enough copies for everyone doing the activity, and for the adult too.

Colouring pens / pencils

A big book or folder to make a barrier

Explain that this activity is to practise listening, so the child must listen carefully. You will only say the instruction once.

Give the child / children a sheet (one for everyone) and take one yourself.

Put the barrier up, so that the child cannot see your picture.

Give an instruction telling them to colour part of the picture, and colour it yourself. Make sure the instruction has at least 4 key words, and involves doing one thing before something else. E.g. if you have a picture of a robot you could say: 'Colour the robot's head blue and then colour two shoes red.' The words underlined are the key words, and there are 2 steps to the instruction.

When you have all finished that instruction, hold up your picture, so the children can check if they got it right.

2D shapes in several different colours

Something to use as a barrier

Imagination!

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 around 100 words long (a couple of paragraphs) and/or contain between two and four 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 this, 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.

Two toys, one to be Sammy and the other to be Marvin

Picnic 'blanket' (optional)

Toy food

Pictures of the toy food, and pictures of Sammy and Marvin (can be very rough!)

1. Explain that Sammy and Marvin are going to have a picnic.

2. Have the child give them the food following your instructions.

3. Give instructions using 'before' and 'after' e.g. 'give Sammy an apple before you give one to Marvin'.

4. Select the pictures of the food you mentioned, and put them with the pictures of Sammy and Marvin in the right order (for who should have got the food first and who should have got the food second). Do not let the child see.

5. When the child has given the toys the food, have them check your pictures to see if they got it right.

Several different animals or toy people

One or two exciting vehicles, e.g. fire engine and police car

Laminated cue sheet with a picture of a person and then pictures of several actions e.g. jump, sit down, turn around, clap your hands. For example:

Dry wipe marker

Familiar picture story books - the story should involve at least two people/animals etc.

1. Read the book to the child - make sure they can see the pictures - (note this is NOT a reading activity - the child does not need to read the book);

2. As you go through the book, say what each person is doing and what they are going to do on the next page, for example "Daisy is wearing a hat", "Sam is going to put a hat on";

3. Next time round, ask questions like "who is wearing a hat?", "who is going to put a hat on": accept the child's answer, however if it is incorrect, you can say "I think Sam's going to wear the hat", then turn the page, and say something like "oh, yes, he put the hat on". If the child got it right, then you can say something like "Yes! Sam put the hat on!".

You can use purpose designed pictures, or you can make your own:

Make a set of pictures using a digital camera with at least two children you are working with. You could also use two soft toys such as a teddy and a doll.

Make a sequence of pictures showing the children doing various actions, such as putting on a hat, kicking a ball, drinking something, eating a cake.

First picture: show the two children;

Second picture: one child doing the action e.g. putting a hat on - and the other child waiting to do the action;

Third picture: the other child doing the action (the first child should also be in the picture having done the action - e.g. if they have just put a hat on, this picture should have them with the hat on).

Put the three pictures in this order in a book.

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

You could also use stories from "Language for Thinking" (Stephen Parsons and Anna Branagan). Initially don't show the pictures but instead read the stories from p136 to the children, before asking the suggested questions on them.

You could also find short animated stories on YouTube for example, so that you can show the child the story after you have narrated it and asked the child questions on it.

Read chunks of the story to the child, or tell the story from the sequence cards. The chunks should be around 50 words long (a paragraph) and/or contain between two and three things that happen. (Use shorter chunks if this is too long for the child).

Ask a question relevant to the key information in the story. For example, suppose this was part of the story: "Lucy rode her red bicycle down the hill. At the bottom she couldn't stop and fell straight into the fish pond..." Relevant questions would be 'What did Lucy do', 'What happened to Lucy at the bottom of the hill': avoid asking questions about details which aren't particularly relevant to the story such as 'What colour was Lucy's bike?';

Ask the child the question then re-read the part of the story which contains the answer to the question;

Show him/her part of the story using pictures.

Try to guide the child to recall the information with the minimum amount of prompts necessary. Try to avoid the situation where you need to say what the answer is. If you keep needing to do this then the story is probably too hard.

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.

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.

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.

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