Teach Primary Issue 19.5

70 | www.teachwire.net • Kim’s game . A classic game for helping children build their memory. There are two ways I like to play this game. In both instances, you need to place some interesting objects on a tray. These could link to What if, Pig? if you like (e.g. a small mouse toy, a party hat, party bag toys, a balloon, or a woodland leaf). Give the group a certain amount of time to look at the tray of objects, then cover it up. The children need to write down as many of the items as they can remember or tick the correct items off a list. Alternatively, pupils can play in pairs. After looking at the tray, one partner hides one of the objects and the other child has to guess what it was. • Shopping list game . Another good game for building a child’s memory is the shopping list game. This could simply be of items on Pig’s party shopping list (hats, cake, balloons) or an alphabetical list where each child adds something new on after recalling all the previous items. You can scaffold the game with visuals for children who initially find recalling the items difficult. • ‘What if?’ question circle . This game is useful for developing questioning and critical thinking skills. Sit the group in a circle and go round asking silly or serious ‘What if?’ questions. For example, “What if the moon was made of cheese?” or “What if Pig got lost in the woods?” Encourage children to answer in full sentences. Another variation on this is to play ‘Would you rather?’: “Would you rather be Pig or Mouse?”; “Would you Take it further Use the following activities to enhance the teaching in What if, Pig? and help develop the speech, language and communication (SLC) skills of the children you work with. Activities Discussion (spoken language) Stories are wonderful vehicles for starting conversations with children about difficult topics and developing the skills they need to express their thoughts and feelings clearly. The inability to do this can often cause a child to become distressed, and display behaviours that you would not usually see from them. • Objective: Develop spoken language skills by discussing feelings and emotions. • Activity: Read the story aloud and pause at key moments. Ask children: • How do you think Pig is feeling? • Have you ever had a ‘What if’ worry? • What could Pig do to feel better? • What could you do if you had a worry? • Why do you think Pig’s friends threw a surprise party for him? Book topic • Extension: Create an emotion word bank with words like worried , excited , nervous , and brave to describe the story characters’ different emotions. Challenge children to add other emotion words which were not included in the story. Use these regularly with the children and share examples of when you have felt like that, and what was happening in your body at the time. Role-play (speaking & listening) Role-play is an incredibly powerful tool for helping pupils to really explore a text, and to develop their communication and language skills. It can either be adult-led, with clear direction, or be left to happen organically with the help of a few well-chosen objects as prompts. • Objective: Encourage expressive language and social communication. • Activity: • Child-led: Set up a role-play corner where children can act out scenes from the book. Include a few useful props such as blank party invites, party hats, a pig or mouse mask. The inclusion of puppets may encourage less confident children to join in as the role of a party guest rather than a main character. • Adult-led: Warm up with a game of ‘emotions charades’. Pick an emotions card/ emotions stone for the whole group to enact. Alternatively, you could play traditional charades, with one child picking a card to enact to the group. Think carefully about body language and facial expression (younger children may benefit from exploring facial expressions in a mirror before taking on the full game). Ask children to create freeze frames of key moments in the text, such as when Pig starts to worry that nobody will come to his party, or at the end when Pig is surprised by his friends. ‘What if’ scenarios (communication) I have often found that using scenario cards linked to a story (but which also link to real-life issues the children might face) are a brilliant way of encouraging pupils to problem-solve. Doing these in pairs or small groups, then feeding back at the end also means that children need to develop the skill of listening to others’ ideas. • Objective: Develop reasoning and problem-solving skills. • Activity: Give children different ‘What if’ scenarios to discuss. You may want to stick these in the centre of a large piece of paper so Illustrations (c) Linzie Hunter