Animals ,actions and verb paradigms

I wanted to think of a way today to explore with some teachers how we can explore verbs in the present tense with UKS2 language learners ,who are "advanced" UKS2 primary language learners.
I wanted to explore discussion,team work and creating a paradigm of a verb as well as understanding the mechanics and meta- language of verb conjugation..... 
This is what I created.

My ideas are based around this small book in French , which I have used so many times with children to explore actions , animals and infinitives of verbs associated with each animal.(With younger children we have explored nouns,as names of types of animals that may do the action e.g . "la grenouille" and "sauter" .This can lead to great lift the flap books or pelmanism cards games made by the children).

Firstly I decided which verbs I was going to focus upon.With a group of 20 teachers I needed two "er" verbs,so I selected voler and nager

Then I thought of two types of animals that I could link with the key actions in the verbs

(I was training 20 teachers - so I needed two verbs and 10 picture cards per verb.For the activity there are two teams of teachers).

I sourced animal pictures of birds and fish

I needed 10 bird pictures and 10 fish pictures?

Why?Well all will be revealed.....

Step One 

• Print out on card the bird pictures and the fish pictures

• Write one part of the paradigm in the present tense of the verb "voler" on the reverse of each bird picture 
• Write  one part of the paradigm in the present tense of the verb "nager" on the reverse of each fish picture

• You could decide on an another action and another animal so that you have 30 cards (make sure you have enough -one for every child in a class of 30 etc)
• For each verb card set of ten cards you will have enough cards for each of the first,second,third person singular/plural in French.You will have enough cards left over to write the infinitive on one card and the plural command form on another card.(The number of verb cards in a set may vary depending on the language)

Step Two

• Keep the plural command cards to one side.
• Ask two children (one per verb so if you have three verbs,you will ask three children) to observe with you and to not join in the first part of the activity.
• Muddle up the rest of the bird and fish cards and hand out randomly -one to each child
• Ask the children to find their animal families by walking around and saying the noun of their animal card e.g "l'oiseau" or "le poisson"
• Can the children gather together with their animal family in one area of the classroom
• Now ask the children to turn over the picture cards and show all the other members of their animal family, the phrase that is written on the back of each card.
• Can the children recognise what type or phrases are written on the back of the cards?
• Do they realise that they all have parts of the same verb paradigm?
• Designate an "observer" to each team- can they help to organise the group in to a paradigm of the verb - infinitive, first,second, third person singular and first,second ,third person plural ?

Step Three

• Can they form the paradigm of the verb in to the shape of the animal or the action?
• Ask the group to discuss what magic word they require to make the static shape verb paradigm come to life.Wait and listen , take feedback.Which children realise that we need a command and it must be a plural command to make every part of the verb move?
• Ask the group to decide what the plural command would be for their verb.
• Ask the group to send the "observer" to the teacher to say the target language word for the plural command
• Give the "observer" the correct plural word command form card!

• Now can the team think about how the verb paradigm could "come to life" and add an action for each part of the verb that explains the action of the verb?

Step Four 

• Ask the observer to lay the paradigm of the verb out on a table or display area so that other groups can see and read their verb paradigm. 

Add a twist- come back and revisit it again!

• Create enough sets of verb cards for the children in your class but this time you must  omit one or two parts of each of the verbs  e.g.

• As the children create their paradigms of the verbs can they spot the missing parts? 
• Ask the teams to write the missing parts down (as they think they should be written) and send the observer to request the missing parts.
• Ask them to check the correct version against their own written version(s)
• Can they now complete their paradigm with the new cards? 

Six Characters in Search of an Author

At University I was a member of Theatre Group and one of my most memorable productions was Six Characters in Search of an author by Pirandello.
(Six characters arrive at a theatre - each in turn melodramatic but with a story to tell , which in turn is part of a whole story......It is theatre within theatre. They are looking for a producer to tell their story.)

In its simplest from this can allow us to explore all 4 skills of language learning, to encourage accurate use of grammar and punctuation and to develop pronunciation, intonation and emotion in spoken language.

The activities below can be used with UKS2,KS3, KS4 and KS5 language learners.the task set by the teacher can challenge the language learners at the level they can operate in the target language.

(You will need an equal number of groups - so that one group can swap work with a second group and then the two groups can come back together and share their work with each other)

1. Share the idea of mystery characters with the class. Explain how these mystery characters want to tell their story and need a producer to help them put together their story.Can the class help you to write and perform the introductory utterances for the characters? 
2. Share with the class a picture stimulus. This could be with a mystery picture as above or allow the class to think of characters for themselves.With younger learners maybe we could look at characters we have been  exploring in story ,history etc (pirates.Romans, Kings and Queens, a family from a different time period etc).with older learners maybe we want to link the characters to our investigations of characters we meet in target language poetry and literature. 
3. Working in groups of six , ask each member of the group to focus on one particular character and to imagine how they might think, look and act (brave, bold, timid, angry, happy, young , old, role in the group).
4. Depending on the language level and skills of your pupils decide what types of sentences you want the pupils to create as utterances spoken by the characters - so for example with UKS2 and Y7 learners we would want them to write spoken utterances based on : name, age,preferences and personality.With more advanced learners you may want opinions and  personal past history or future hopes.
5. The pupils must write out their spoken utterances on a strip of paper or card. Each card from the group is gathered together and passed over to a second group.These two groups are now partner groups for the rest of the activities.
6. The second group of six children must now read the utterances as a team and decide which character might say the utterances. 
7. Now this second team must create a spoken dramatic performance as an introduction to the characters as if they were on set and speaking with the producer.They have to bring the utterances they have read to life.
8. The second group should then act out their introduction performances and vice versa. What do the original authors of the characters' utterances think about the characters as they have been brought to life by the second group? 
9. Finally can the original group that wrote the utterances , take back the characters and create a story board about each of the characters reflecting how the personality was brought to life by the second group? 

Circus ! An independent project for early target language learners

Summer time and all across Europe you will find  the circus is coming to town!
Last year I sat down with a local teacher to plan and consider how we could link the target language  learning of her Year 5 and 6 to the language and context of the circus and the culture of circuses at the seaside in France and Spain.Circus was the focus of the UKS2 children and the school was trying to encourage independent learning at the end of the school year, looking back at what they had learned throughout the year

We set out to be the facilitators of the Summer focus and give the children the time to explore the language skills and knowledge of the language they had acquired during the year.

The children were at the stage in language learning where they could understand ,say,read and write simple spoken and written sentences using nouns, verbs and adjectives in the present tense.

The important points were that we wanted to 

1. to allow the children the opportunity to explore the language of the circus by independent access to text be it written or spoken
2. to allow the children to create their own final product - an advertisement for a Summer circus in the target language in either spoken or written form.

• The task

The children were asked to work in groups of four - differentiated ability- and to include in their project:

1. A poster (dates, times, venue,cost,participants). 
2. A simple description of the circus  ( simple present tense description of a circus using there is/are and third person singular of the verb (to be and to have). 
3. A rhyme, song or poem about the circus ( simple "advertisement jingle" style poem/ song/rhyme describing the circus and giving simple opinions e.g it's good/fantastic/ fun etc).

The expectation was that the children would use their prior knowledge of language and the skills required to access key language to generate the three components mentioned above.

• Core language gathering 

We let the children explore the language of the circus through simple authentic text.In groups we asked the children to explore an authentic text (here a French book or a Spanish video) and to find the key words for acrobat, trapeze artists, magician , the circus clowns etc, giving them access to bi-lingual dictionaries to check the language.

We found a brilliant book about in French about the circus









And this great simple video clip in Spanish introducing the key nouns associated with the circus. We gave the children the hyper-link for the clip on their chrome books

• Let the children explore how to create their own circus posters 

Using posters of the circus coming to town we decided to ask the children to use these as information banks they could  access to find and see how to use  target language in their own posters. The important thing was that the children should access the posters to find out for themselves for example how to describe the action , how to write the date and times etc.

Care was taken to select posters that had sufficient examples of key information so that the children had a text from which they could find examples for their own posters.

• Generating your own advertisement jingle 

We understood that these would need to be simple as the children had limited language but we wanted also to consider how added a flavour of the circus to their advertisements 

We watched with them video clips  and asked them to discuss how they could make sure their jingles had a circus flavour. We added the hyper- links to their chrome books so they could watch again for inspiration!

Here is a Spanish example 

Here is a French example 

• Over to the groups 

Then it was over to the groups to create a package that sold their circus to the class!

We found that the children really enjoyed the feeling of independence when using the target language and having to think of ways of accessing and checking language.The children valued the material that each group.

The  project worked because the challenges were not beyond the limits of the language but the project allowed the Year 5 and 6 children to feel the responsibility we often bestow upon them in other subject areas to organise, access and generate their own materials and outcomes! 

A great end of year project !

Advanced Adjective Fisherman's Trawl

Working with teachers actually, thinking ahead and planning with them ,is definitely one of the best ways of  generating a new and useful approach or tweaking to practising the target language.It's a way of meeting both the teacher and learners’ needs and next steps. Today at staff CPD was a perfect example!

I was sharing with the teachers a very simple game with adjectives and mimes called Fisherman’s trawl (which I recently added to the blog).You can read the original idea in this blog on nouns, verbs and adjectives.

We were discussing the potential of the original game with Year 4 to practise and internalise adjectives when we realised that this game could be made more advanced and become more of a challenge for UKS2 learners. 

The original game is about working in pairs and is a miming and guessing game.

The advanced game involves the children working in teams,using adjectives for extended feelings e.g. “ tired “ would be a good example . 

We ask the children to extend the feelings they give with a reasons…..”I am not okay because  am tired “

It’s a simple extension of the original game and it gets the children to think in Year 5 and 6 whether they should say in French and Spanish the following verbs before the adjective either :

“ je suis/estoy “or “j’ai/ tengo”.

How to play Advanced Adjective Fisherman’s Trawl.

• Put the selected adjectives below on to cards and stick the cards to the whiteboard.

calor/chaud

sed/soif

frío/froid

triste/triste

hambre/faim

feliz/heureux.

• Divide you class in to teams – boys/girls for example.
• Invite a child to select without sharing an adjective from the whiteboard. They must mime the adjective. 
• Can the team guess the adjective? As this is advanced fisherman’s trawl firstly the team only has two guesses (unlike the original game where there were four guesses) and the team wins two points for a first correct guess and one point for a second correct guess. If they can’t guess correctly, it gets passed over to the other team.
• The team that’s guessed the adjective correctly can now get the "fish in the net" and gain two bonus points by deciding if the adjective goes with :

estoy/ je suis   or tengo/j’ai

Simple but effective, building on a previous game and developing a learning tool which can be used at different levels with different stages of language learners!

Preposition Picnic

Preposition Picnic

This is an activity that we have used with” House and Home” language learning  and also when we practise setting the table with cutlery and crockery and pretend to be” à table” in a French Christmas sketch with Year 6.

This year I think it sits really well with UKS2 a  celebration of your French/ Spanish/ German picnics or café culture focus during Summer term.

In KS2,the new DfE POS expects young learners to..... 

 "understand basic grammar appropriate to the language being studied, including(where relevant): feminine, masculine and neuter forms and the conjugation of high-frequency verbs; key features and patterns of the language; how to apply these, for instance, to build sentences; and how these differ from or are similar to English."

It’s a series of simple activities that would work well in KS3 too when children are practising prepositions and especially in German where there is quite a lot to take in and understand.(See my comments below in italics)

You can develop some Art and DT work from this language activity too.

German :This will work in all three languages as described, however if you are working with German you may need to use the command  “Put” with key accusative prepositions first introducing the concept using feminine and neuter nouns. I would then introduce and share how the sound and spelling of the masculine definite article (der) has been altered when using these prepositions. Let your children be the language detectives and solve the sound and spelling riddle here. You can then continue with prepositions that are either accusative/dative or purely dative as and when you feel the children are ready to strengthen their language detective skills.

Equipment

Here are my picnic items. They are nearly all red in colour- but you could have different colours so that the children had to add a colour to the noun too to increase the challenge.

When we worked on this in class all the children had access to a plastic spoon, fork, knife, plate, cup and beaker. There was one between two of everything and I just bought cheap packs from a local supermarket.

Revisit and recap

• Revisit and recap the items of crockery and cutlery for your picnic and reinforce the correct definite article with each noun etc). Do the children know that it’s “la tasse” for example.
• Using physical actions with the children create preposition warm up. The children need to move their hands and arms to represent the position of prepositions e.g.

Next to – one arm out to the front bring the other arm and hand out and clap together

In front- hands in front

Under – touch the floor

Above – reach the sky

(and don’t forget “on the right”- arms to the right and “on the left” – arms to the left)

Altogether now

• Bring the class to the front or to an area where you can lay out your picnic mat. 
• Demonstrate setting the picnic mat for the class with your items.
• Demonstrate how the table should be laid and place the crockery and cutlery correctly, saying clearly on the target language as you move and place items “put the cup above the plate, put the knife next to the plate on the right” etc.. 
• Muddle up the items and ask children to place the items for you – giving the children clear target language instructions .

Now ask the children to help you reset the table in a new and creative way. The children can direct you to place the items where they wish e.g. put the knife in the cup , put the spoon under the plate etc.

In groups

• Give each group a set of written instructions. Each set of instructions uses the same crockery and cutlery but the table will be set slightly differently- no table should be set like your modelled table in the previous activity . 
• Ask the groups to read the instructions and lay their tables. Now take a class tour of the tables. 
• Can the children spot the differences between the table they are looking at and your original table? 
• Can they say this is the target language? The children will need to be able to respond with  “the …..is …..to the ……” as their response. (If you teach German you may wish to return to this part of the  activity at a later date when the children are secure with their prepositions and accusative/ dative sound-spelling) 

  

In pairs

• Can the children work in pairs and direct each other to set their tables – firstly correctly and then creatively? 
• Can the children create a 3D sculpture of the crockery and cutlery piling it high rather than placing it flatly on the picnic table or mat?

Individual creative activity

The outcome of this activity is that the child creates a 2D or 3D piece of art placing the crockery and cutlery in a design pr sculpture about which they write a set of instructions so that someone else could do the same. They will use their command “put” and a variety of prepositions to do this. 

There is a choice here of delivery styles: an ICT photo story , a poster, a spoken demonstration to recreate their art work to their group, or a sculpture or painting of their work which is framed by their target language instructions around the outside. 

Making a drama out of grammar (4)

The split personality of a sentence production!

This is a great activity using familiar language, drama and grammar for children who are “moving on” in their language learning. It reinforces the literacy work that schools are engaging their children with to understand the grammar of a sentence and the construction of a sentences  . It’s an activity that demands correct pronunciation and intonation of the target language and asks the children to not just decode but also understand the message they read and to demonstrate this through performance! It’s also great fun!

Your class can explore the punctuation,the pronunciation,the meaning, relaying the meaning and the grammatical structures of a sentence through drama and language learning.

This works well with lots of contexts and content. We will be using this on Tuesday with teachers to practise language around likes and dislikes of fruits and vegetable and the use of colour as an adjective. 

We will also use this in the Summer final half term to practise ice creams(Year 4) we like to eat and to explain activities we can do at the beach (Year 5), using more complex sentences.

You will need to prepare the written sentences that the children will read and with which they will create their split personality of a sentence productions. Make sure the sentences are made up of familiar language that the children have both spoken and read before.

The sequence of activities!

Take a simple sentence and see how much  we can reinforce and learn with this!

Je n’aime pas les pommes vertes!

Let’s look at the split personality of a sentence!

• This sentence has a punctuation personality
• This sentence has a pronunciation and intonation personality.
• This sentence has a performance personality (the message and meaning of the words)
• This sentence has key characteristics. 

 Punctuation Personalities

1. Discuss with the children the personality of punctuation in a sentence.This could be an activity that you have already tried with the children in literacy.
2. Discuss the role of punctuation in a sentence. 
3. Ask the children to discuss the role of the punctuation in the sentence with you. 
4. Describe the characters of the punctuation (use the middle column in the table below to help with this).
5. Can they guess which part of punctuation is being described? Now practise the poses for the punctuation?

Play a game of simple “Simon says “ or “Do what I say not what you see”(where you may not take the pose of the punctuation you say- children need to concentrate here!)

Punctuation	Personality	Pose
Capital letter	This character is proud and stands tall and knows it’s the beginning of a sentence!	Stand tall. Hands on hips Look important
Question mark	This character is in inquisitive ,listening and always wants to know more	Hunch or bend over One pointed and outstretched index finger and the other index finger is on the cheek of the character’s face.  Inquisitive face
Full stop	This character puts an end to all the speaking. It won’t move and stands firm!	Standing firm Legs placed slightly apart. Hand out like a policeman asking someone to stop
Comma	This character wants to take a breather, collect thoughts and carry on.	Looks a bit out of breath Waving /flapping hands in front of face as if wanting to catch their breath
Exclamation mark	This character is “striking” , wants to make its’ mark in the proceedings and thinks it’s important	This character is standing upright This character has an arm stretched out in the air! The look on the face of the character is startled Mouth wide open!
Speech marks	These characters just natter on and on and are twins together.	Two characters, a slight  distance apart , looking at each other. Hands are chest height and fingers are wiggling like they are typing a message.
Brackets	These characters whisper and gossip together and look on as the other characters wrestle of position and importance.	Two characters, a slight  distance apart , looking at each other. The two characters have a hand to their own mouths as if they are whispering something to someone else.

Characteristics of the sentence

1. Ask the children to think about the role of specific structures in the sentence. 
2. Ask the children to help you brain storm the names and roles of nouns, adjectives, verbs, adverbs and prepositions in a sentence.  Again this may be something you have already used as an activity in Literacy

Nouns name items and objects. They look proud and important

Adjectives describe items and objects. They look creative and artistic.

Verbs are the machine of the sentence. They stand on the spot, pump their arms and look fit and active!

Adverbs add description to the verbs. They stand near the verb and support the verb with looking fit and active.

Prepositions add a position and a place. They point and show direction.

Pronunciation personality

The pronunciation ( and intonation) of the target language sentence helps the correct meaning to be conveyed.Discuss with the children how important this is and practise some of the key words that you know will be in the sentences they will read and with which they will create their split  personality productions.

Performance personality

Each sentence has a personality created by the meaning of the sentences. Each word plays a role in this personality.

1. Practise with the children ways to act out some of the key language they will be reading in the sentences you have prepared. 
2. Discuss with the children whether the key language is a noun, a verb, an adjective etcetra too!

Split personality of a sentence production

1. Now divide your class into four groups. 
2. Give each group a specific role so you have a group investigating the punctuation personalities , another investigating the pronunciation personalities , another investigating the characteristics, and finally a group investing the performance personality.
3. Show the first sentence. Can each group create the performance that demonstrates the personality they are investigating? 
4. Watch each performance separately.
5. Now run the performances together so you have four different performances at the same time all about the same sentence.
6.  The children must listen carefully to the group  performing the "pronunciation personality" part of the production. All the performances need to be in synch!

Change the sentence, swap round the groups and start the “Split personality of a sentence production” again!

Making a Drama out of Grammar (3)

Personal Pronouns’ Photo Shoot

In KS2,the new DfE POS expects young learners to..... 

 "understand basic grammar appropriate to the language being studied, including(where relevant): feminine, masculine and neuter forms and the conjugation of high-frequency verbs; key features and patterns of the language; how to apply these, for instance, to build sentences; and how these differ from or are similar to English."

Here we are considering physiical and expressive ways to explore and internalise the meanings and use of the personal pronouns we require when working with verbs.

Personal pronouns refer to the person or other people and things doing the action/ controlling the choice of verb ending.

Young learners need to play with these personal pronouns to understand their role in sentences and how they are the “trigger” that generally changes the ending (spelling) of the verb stem.

This is an activity for learners who have reached the stage in their use of present tense verbs in simple communication (such as questions and answers about themselves), when you think it is time to focus on the personal pronouns and how these alter the meaning of a question or answer.  

Participating in physical activities and performance has always helped my learners to internalise the key personal pronouns and to want to learn the meanings of the new words in the target language.

Below is a sequence of activities that lead to a “Photo Shoot” as if the children are models posing for the camera in a real photo shoot .There is some groundwork that has to be done first …in any good photo shoot, preparation is key!

A note for the language teacher!

Personal pronoun word choices are different depending on the target language.In French the word for "they" depends on whether it’s a masculine, mixed or feminine plural personal pronoun (ils/ils/ells) and in German there are three different meanings of the same sounding personal pronoun -sie(she),sie (they) and Sie (you when you are being polite).In Spanish we do not always use specific words for the personal pronouns when we form the verb.The meaning of the verb in Spanish is contained in the ending change on the verb stem.

However all the language learners need to know that the sound of the spoken verb and spelling of the written  verb in the target language is dependent on the personal pronoun used when creating the  message in our heads.

It's good therefore to start the physical activities below in English with our own target language pronouns first.You can discuss with the children the meaning of the pronouns in English. 

Once the children are comfortable with personal pronouns in English then we develop the “Personal Pronoun Photo Shoot” in the target language.

Steps to a successful photo shoot

Revisit and recall the personal pronouns in English.

Create symbols using stick men to simply represent the personal pronouns (I,you,he,she,it, we, you plural, they).Share your flip chart stick man pose sketches with the children. 

Here are mine. I have divided them into singular personal pronouns stick men symbols :

plural personal pronouns stick men symbols:

Ask the children with a talking partner to discuss which personal pronoun each stick man pose represents?

Now reveal your personal pronoun labelling. Where they correct?

A photographic record

Ask children to come to the front and strike a pose of a target language personal pronoun . Ask the class to take imaginary photos on their heads of these poses- just like they were real photographers keeping a record.

Strike the pose

Divide your class on to groups of four – two boys and two girls. They are now a team. In a large space, in the play ground or if it’s possible in your classroom play a game of “Stop! Go! Strike the pose!”.Ask the children to walk around the classroom when they hear  “Go!” and to find their team members and stand still when they hear “Stop”” and then as a team to strike the pose of the personal pronoun they hear!Pause and hold and then start the game again.

Now add an element of competition.Last time to take the pose is out!Who will be the last team standing and the best team to strike the poses? 

Photo shoot producers

Now two groups of four children must work together. Working with the second group, can the first group become the producers of a photo shoot? Make sure the stick men symbols and labels are clearly visible at the front of the classroom for reference). Each child takes it in turns to call a pronoun and the other group must strike the pose .Swap roles so that the second group are now the producers.Share the photo shoot performances with the class-ask each group of producers to select what they think are their best two shots.

Frame the photo shoot!

Finally back in their original groups ask each group to create a sequence of “photo shoots” to depict the personal pronouns they have been practising.

Why not create a photo shoot gallery?Take real photos – one from each group of children (their best shot perhaps?) that can then be labelled with the correct personal pronoun and be in the classroom on display as part of their photo shoot for future reference!

Making a Drama out of Grammar (2)

Word sculptors

Take a single word and sculpt a range of meaningful messages!

This simple drama and creativity idea is targeted at UKS2 learners to encourage them to manipulate simple present tense sentence structure.(You could use this in KS3 as a transferable learning tool to engage pupils in work with different tenses , more complex sentences and unfamiliar language that they have to put into a new context).

In KS2 the new DfE POS expects young learners to..... 

 "understand basic grammar appropriate to the language being studied, including(where relevant): feminine, masculine and neuter forms and the conjugation of high-frequency verbs; key features and patterns of the language; how to apply these, for instance, to build sentences; and how these differ from or are similar to English."

These ideas below are all part of the same lesson and children working in groups of four will explore how a single word can be used in a variety of contexts and using different sentence structure to convey different meanings. The children need to create interesting structures and performances so just like sculptors they create meaningful and creative spoken sculptures.Below is a chart I have created to explain the four elements of each group's language and drama activities. Each group should be given the same noun on which to base their language work. At the end of the group work , when groups share their work,part of the discovery will be to see how the different groups have used the same noun with different language and in different contexts and performances.  

 How do you achieve this?

1. Each group should be given the same familiar or unfamiliar noun.Allow the groups access to a bilingual dictionary if necessary.       
2. Ask each group to discuss and write the following:

• A sentence using the noun
• A question and answer using the noun
• A simple description with adjectives in a full sentence or sentences using the noun.
• Three  command statements using the noun

3.  They must then become the "creative sculptors". Each group must divide themselves in to two pairs and each pair is responsible for two parts of the sculpture

• A spoken sentence portrayed by different emotions several times , so the meaning changes slightly
• A question and answer that is animated and delivered by two children in character
• A simple spoken description that has added colour using actions,movements and percussion backing music.
• A three line command rap   

4. Allow the groups  time to refine their performances and to memorise their spoken language. Ask the groups to create a visual display of the language contained in their four performances. They must all freeze frame (in character) whilst one pair performs part of their word sculpture… each group must be in a freeze frame related to their performances.
5. Now they must perform  for the class. How many different performances using the same noun have the class created?