Autumn is around the corner.This week I have been in South Germany and as you drive along you find stalls by the road side selling pumpkins and squashes.This made me think about how we could be creative with culture, seasons and language and at the same time develop recognition, comprehenison,reading and recall skills. You can use this activity in any language.
Share a picture of an Autumn market / fayre or display of fruits and vegetables (because I saw this in Germany and I have selected pumpkins and squashes). The activities below probably works best with a picture of one typeof fruit or vegetables but with lots of different shapes, sizes and colours.
Step One : anticipate meaning.Share key adjectives and colours which describe what you can see in the picture (long,small, round, big, fat, thin,stripey,orange, green etc).Can the children use the picture and prior knowledge plus sensible guesses to decide what the words mean in the target language? Take time to check this in bilingual dictionaries.
Step Two: link pictures,objects and sounds, spellings and words. Ask volunteers amongst the children to help you write the target language words from activity one on "post its" and stick these on to the pictures of the pumpkins and squashes. Read aloud the words as a class and emphasise vowels and letter strings in the style of the adjective - so long , thin , fat, hard etc sounds etc.Give the children talking time with a partner, to read aloud the "post it" target language adjectives, to have fun with the sounds and to share and check the meaning of the words in English with their partners.
Step Three: read, recall and recreate.Conceal the picture and just keep the post its in place on the screen. Give each child a piece of A4 paper and coloured pens.Can the children read and recognise the target language words and recreate the picture you shared with them by drawing shapes and adding colours to represent the meaning of the words? Each shape must be in the correct position for the object it represents in the original Autumn picture.
Compare the children's pictures with the original Autumn picture and create a class display with the targtet words, the original picture and the pictures created by the children.
