Charlie Chick

Charlie Chick is a delightful pop up book, good for the end of the year when attentions are getting short as it's short but sweet, with nice large images for using in class. Or you could use it at Easter time as there are plenty of chick themed crafts out there.

Charlie Chick by Nick Denchfield and Ant Parker for Campbell 

Topic: A hungry chick eats lots of corn and gets a great big tummy. Good for using in conjunction when teaching parts of the body or reviewing.

Age: 2-5. I think only your youngest students will fully appreciate the book.

Vocabulary: mum, "Charlie Chick eats lots of barley/corn/wheat", "That's why he's got such... big/fat/strong, tummy, beak, feet"

Procedure:

• Get your students sitting in their circle time positions and sing your Hello Song. I would sing it with a tiny voice and a great big voice in keeping with the books theme.
• Gather interest: See how many part of the body the students know in English already/can remember. Drill the main parts of the body like arms, legs, hands, head making sure to include feet and tummy. Then show them the book front cover and teach eyes and beak. Test them by getting them to point to the different parts of their body when you say the word. Alternatively you could ask them to guess which farmyard animal today's story is about.
• Read the story to the students, (make sure to build some suspense before opening the pop up pages!) and elicit the parts of the body. Repeat once or twice more.
• Set up your table time extension activity. 
• Get your students back into circle time and sing Old MacDonald had a farm or Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes.
• You could finish with the video of Old Mac Donald, the following is faithful to the version that most people learnt as a child, or a more calming Animal Sounds Song by Kids TV 123.

Extensions:

Pop up chick card HERE

Another pop up card HERE

If that feels a bit ambitious you could always plump for some colouring. Get your fast finishers to add Charlie chick's mum and a pile of corn! Or you could do a colouring dictation and ask your students to colour the chicks beak, eyes, tummy and feet the colours you say.

Click on THIS LINK to download the free Easter colouring sheets or the following worksheet.

Don't forget to count your chickens after they hatch :)

There are other books in the Charlie Chick series which also look fun for doing with ESL children. A good story to follow with would be Little Red Riding Hood.

Meg's Eggs

So here's a little Easter themed lesson. I haven't got the book, so I have made my own flashcards with Meg, Mog and Owl and then three big easter eggs. The easter eggs are cut in half and have hinges so that I can open them up to show the dinosaurs inside.

Topic: Easter! Meg, Mog and Owl, who my kids will remember from their Halloween lesson, are hungry, but Meg's spell to rustle up some eggs goes a little wrong...

Age: 4-9 years

Vocabulary: Meg, Mog, Owl. Egg(s) dinosaur(s) Stegosaurus, Tyrannosaurus Rex, Diplodocus. "I'm hungry!" "Who are you?" "It's too big!" "I'm going to eat you! (optional)"

Procedure:

• Sing your hello song and say Happy Easter!
• Talk about the significance of eggs at Easter (new life) and the Easter Bunny. You will need to use some L1 here, but I think it's totally worth it, since the Easter Bunny and Easter egg hunts don't exist in Italy.
• Review or pre-teach the three main characters with flashcards. It's a good idea to associate an action with each name (meg's point hat, owl can fly, mog's a cat), so that you can elicit the names as you tell the story.
• Tell the students the story of Meg's eggs, with the book or with props (as in my case). See if you can elicit the types of dinosaurs when they emerge from their eggs (there is a dinosaur expert in every class no matter the age!) When Meg says the spell, I like to make up my own simple ones that the students can join in with.

Abracadabra three eggs please!

Spiders, frogs' legs 1,2,3!

Abracadabra!

Abracadabra make my dinosaurs small!

Their big and hungry and very tall!

Abracadabra!

• Top Tip - if you haven't got a book it's hard to get the visual laugh at the end. I ask the kids what they think Meg's second spell has done and then tell them to wait and see if they are right when we watch the video.
• Worksheet time! There are quite a few possibilities here. I've opted for an easter egg hunt worksheet.

For the Primary school students

For the nursery school students

• Finally finish the lesson with the video. You could pause and elicit some of the vocabulary if you so wished.

Extensions:

I haven't got much this week, I'm afraid as it's a one off lesson. There is an absolute multitude of Easter egg colouring worksheets and Easter cards to make online.

This and more HERE

And then there's this adorable nusery rhyme that the nursery school kids will love since it goes well with actions. I think it's the having to be still before hopping around like mad that floats their boat! Plus you will never get it out of your head again. Sorry about that.