Jana Allison, Vienna, 2010. Arrangement, Augmentation of Students’ Book: European Studies - About Us (5th Grade)
Translation of Teachers’ Book: European Studies - About Us (5th Grade) Dr. Franz Schimek, Stuart Simpson, D.A., Dipl. Pädn. Marion Serdaroglu and Dipl. Pädn.
Elfriede Vlasak, Vienna: Central European Regional Network for Education Transfer (CERNET).
Project Team
Maga. Rebecca FEYERTAG-PRESSEL, Maga. Ursula SCHWARZ, Dipl. Pädn. Marion SERDAROGLU-RAMSMEIER, Mag. Dr. Franz SCHIMEK,
A Note to the E4U Teacher Dear E4U teachers, Welcome to “The World Around Us!” This E4U toolbox should allow the teacher to pick and choose areas in which his or her own strengths lie, that are able to be done with the resources available to them and that are relevant to their school context. As the theme “The World Around Us” is extremely broad, the toolbox is in no way exhaustive.* Please feel free to use this toolbox to whatever degree you wish, as a whole or as a starting point, altering contents and adding your own creative ideas. Try to be involved with the Austrian teachers as much as you can in planning and teaching, this will be a benefit and help to you both. Each teacher is different and every situation is unique, feel free to adjust these materials to fit your needs! As a side note, if you have access to relatively simple picture books you can add reading out loud to the class as a regular activity. Your voice is your greatest asset! The Viennese public libraries have a decent selection of English children's books on diverse subjects and is worth looking into as a resource for your lessons. There is an online catalog at www.buechereien.wien.at (the website can be viewed in English), however it seems a bit difficult to find what one's looking for so it's often more efficient to go in person to a library near you. For a list of branches put the website in English and on the left side look under "branches and opening hours." The central library at Urban-Loritz-Platz is recommendable and has a large children's section. A membership card costs 18 euro per year for loaning and using on-site facilities. I wish you success and happy teaching! Your fellow E4U teacher, Jana Allison * Note that after each main section, there are subsections entitled More Activities on..., which suggest more class activities relating to the theme. The More Activities on... are, however, not included in the student's book; they are simply related activities that you might also consider trying in class.
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General Statement The general objectives of the E4U project are:
- to create an initial interest and enjoyment in modern language
learning
- to develop a positive attitude to other languages and cultures.
The E4U Teacher’s role is to be a ‘facilitator’ of learning:
- to initiate language input
- to help students to interact with each other
- to provide positive feedback
- to foster intercultural understanding.
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Teacher's Book E4U Toolbox: “The World Around Us”
Suggestions for Introducing the Project and Table of
Contents 1. Before starting with “The World Around Us” project, or the parts of it you have chosen to use, the students should fill in the pieces of information required on page 1 – their name, the name of the school and the name of the class.
2. Then you could briefly talk through what you are going to do with them in the next
two days. Use the list of contents below or modify it if you will only be using part of the toolbox.
In this project, students will: Description and Section Title TB* SB** 1. learn to talk about time in I. TIME PASSES – MEASURING TIME
4 2
2. practice talking about family and telling their own story in II. MY PERSONAL HISTORY
7 5
3. think about what surrounds them and talk about their homes in III. THE WORLD AROUND ME
10 11
4. explore their own district and town in IV. MY TOWN
12 16
5. learn about different kinds of maps and to read map symbols in V. MAPS AND MAPPING THE WORD AROUND ME
14 20
6. use their five senses and talk about them in VI. SENSING THE WORLD AROUND ME
16 26
7. discover interesting facts about animals in VII. ANIMALS IN THE WORLD AROUND ME
22 33
8. reflect on their experience of the project itself in VIII. MY OPINION
25 41
9. write specific words and phrases in IX. MY FAVOURITE WORDS AND PHRASES
25 42
* Teacher's Book (page number). Note: the More Activities on... sections located at the end of each main section are not included in the Student's Book. They are simply instructions for the teacher suggesting further relevant activities. ** Student's Book (page number).
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I. Time passes – measuring time Note: That the student speaks with the English teacher is important: vocabulary, elements of conversation (asking questions, etc.) should be checked. Goals To acquaint the students with the concept of “time.” (At this age, pupils do not yet have a concrete relationship to time. A 30, 40 or 50 year old person is for them “old.” One hundred or one thousand years of history is difficult for them to imagine.) Thus, in this section, the students will learn about the term “time” in general and also be confronted with their own immediate personal history. Introduction On the board, the teacher writes the sentence, “Why do we need time?” Together the class should brainstorm in English about time. 1) Which of these objects are for measuring and showing time? T. “Look at the pictures. We use these things for measuring and showing time. Do you know their names? Who is wearing a watch? Who has got a digital stopwatch? How many people in your family have got a watch? How many clocks are in your home? What do we need a watch for? How do we measure seconds? What do we need to measure hours? Who has got a calendar? What do we need a calendar for?” Answer the questions together and complete the fill in the blank section. “What is a year? How many months are there in a year? How many weeks are there in a year? How many days are there in a year? Are there 365 days in every year?” The teacher explains that a leap-year (Schaltjahr) contains 366 days and takes place every 4 years. “If the last two digits of a year are divisible by four, then that year is a leap-year.” The teacher can write a few years on the board and ask, “Is this a leap-year?” 2) How old are you? When were you born? Perpetual Calendar Students figure out on which day they were born. 3) Complete the time-line chart Students should fill in the time-line chart independently. Compare together. What is similar in their daily routines? What is different? If you wish to expand this section... What is the daily routine like of other children around the world? Ask children in the class who come from countries other than Austria if they know about daily routines there. You might even continue with the theme and create posters of routines in different countries. 4) Act out your day Teacher acts out his or her day. This activity allows the child to be creative and should
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simply be fun! 5) Interview your parents about their day Make a catalog of questions to ask parents together at school. At home, the students should interview their parents about their daily routines. Then, at school, figure out together how the parents' days differ from the students' days. 6) Project work – measuring time Students observe for one week how much time they need for the activities listed in the table and fill in their data. Review the results together in class at the end of the project. Help the students create a graph to visualize their results. 7) Write a report on your project work Students write the results of their observations in the form of a report.
More Activities on Time
Current events Instructions: Print several pictures and headlines in large format from English newspapers (BBC online, etc.) about major current events (or major events from the past few months). Bring them to class. Begin by holding a newspaper up for the class to see. Point to an article and explain, “In a newspaper, there are many articles. Some articles have pictures. Every article has a headline. The headline is the title of the article. It shows what the article is about.” Have the students take a piece of paper. Draw a “newspaper” on the board as a diagram and ask the class to draw the same on their paper, filling in the English vocabulary as you do. For example: draw a large rectangle (the newspaper) and write “newspaper” large over it as a title, write “headline” in the rectangle at the top, draw a box in the rectangle and write “picture” in it, write “article” swerved through where the text would be. Show the pictures you brought one at a time to the students. Ask them, “What do you see in the picture?” “What objects are in the picture?” “How many people are there?” “What are their clothes like?” “What country could this be?” “Are they happy or sad, etc?” “What is the landscape like?” “What happened here?” And so on. Stick or pin the pictures on the board after talking about each one. Then show the headlines one at a time. Ask the class, “Do you understand this headline?” Have them look up words they do not know in a dictionary. “Which picture could this headline belong to?” One by one, match the headlines to the pictures, sticking them on the board. If you wish to expand this activity... If the students enjoy this activity, you could expand it by making a TV or Radio News program. Let the students work in pairs or groups. Have them write a brief summary of one of the events you already discussed in your newspaper lesson or (if this is too difficult for them) prepare a fill in the blank text for the students to use [for example: In (country) on the (date) there was a (event)]. Help the students work out three short sentences about the event (crisis, conclusion). Then film (using props such as a large box with a square cut out to make a TV frame, a backdrop, microphone, or have the students bring costumes) or
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make an audio recording of the presentation and share the results in class. If there is no camera or recording device available, simply have the pairs or groups come to the front and present their news story to the class.
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II. My personal history Note: This section works further on building vocabulary (family, family relationships, etc.) and on introducing the past tense (was/were, had, etc.). 1) + 2) Look at Sarah's family tree, Talk about Sarah's family tree The students look at Sarah's family tree. T: “How many people are there in Sarah's family?” Then, the teacher asks the students, “We know the words “mother” and “father,” what other family words do we already know in English?” Students tell what they can learn about Sarah's family from the tree. “Sarah's mother is Sue. She is 30 years old and her father's name is Gerry. He is... Sarah has two uncles and two...” T: “Has Sarah's mother got any brothers or sisters? How many..?” 3) Make your own family tree Introduction The teacher brings photos of his/her family and a prepared family tree (similar to Sarah's) to class and tells about his/her family. Afterward, the students should work independently, drawing their own family tree and completing it by adding photos. (In case it is not wished that the students paste their actual pictures onto the family tree since these are important keep-sakes, copies could be made and used.) The goal is for the student to be able to present his/her work to the class. Suggestions for class presentation of the family trees a) make a circle of chairs in the classroom. Every student says a few sentences. “This is my...” b) Students present their work in small groups. The teacher walks from group to group... c)The students wander through the classroom with their work presenting it to each other - English only! - The teacher also wanders about and lets a few of the students present their work to him/her. (Tip: If the students present their work in front of the class as a mini report, it takes much more time and the other students will likely soon be bored with the procedure.) 4) Family – Class Survey Students walk freely around the classroom and interview one another (give a time limit!). When the students are finished look at the results together. 5) Project work – make a family album Students make the album according to the instructions at home. They have one week time for the project. If this activity would be done in school it would take far too much time. The albums will then be displayed in class and shortly presented. 6) That was me as a baby Preparation: Tell the students to bring a baby photo of themselves from home. They should
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not show the photos to any of their classmates! Have the children write their names on the back of the photos using a pencil. The teacher collects the photos and sticks them onto the chalkboard. The students must try together to figure out whom the photos belong to (faces change over time!) Afterward, pass the photos out again and let the students paste them (if necessary make copies) on the worksheet in the appropriate space and fill in the blanks in the text. The students can read the text aloud. T: “When were you born?” “How old was your mother?” 7) My teacher Teacher copies his/her own baby photo, one for each student. Pass out the photos and have the students paste it is the space provided. The teacher tell his/her “baby story” and the students fill in the text with the information. 8) Time-line Preparation If possible, the teacher should prepare a photo series of the story of his/her own past (baby, kindergarten, primary school, high school, first years as a teacher...) Teacher draws a time-line on the chalkboard, tells a bit about his/her past and sticks the photos on the board along the time-line. Students make their own time-lines on the worksheet. 9) Time passes Students fill the information in the blanks. At home they ask their parents the questions. Look at the results together in class. How many parents answered “no” to questions to 4, 5, 7, and 8? What has changed since they were young? Talk about the differences between life back then and life today. 10) Personal facts Students fill out the worksheet. Then they should “introduce” themselves to the class. They should not look at the worksheet while they introduce themselves. Give a time limit for each introduction! The students can prepare their introduction by making notes. 11) Memories Group Work Students create a “group memories” poster and present it to the class.
More Activities on Personal History All about my birthday Instructions: Have the students for homework, or in the computer lab, research how the world was when they were born or what happened on the day they were born in history. There are several websites into which you can enter your birthday and a profile of hit songs, prices of food, and what happened specifically on that day will come up. Perhaps the students will find a historical event that happened long ago on the day of their birth, or a famous person with the same birthday, any information they can gather and then present in English is fine. The information can be gathered in either German or English, but the presentation is to be only in English.
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Note: Cultural difference: Tell students if they are on an English website that the date is written opposite of the German. English = month/day/year German = day/month/year Presentation: Go around the class and let each student present his/her findings. Differentiation: This activity can also be done as extra credit, for high achievers, or for students who are already finished with other class work.
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III. The world around me 1) What surrounds me? Have the students brainstorm about what things surround them using the pictures at the bottom of the page as a guide. For example, what comes to mind when they think of their home? How many rooms. A flat or a house. Have them write the words at the arrows around the little house. Do the same for the picture of “myself,” “my town,” “my school” and “nature around me.” 2) Draw your world Students draw themselves and their environment and present their artwork to the class. The teacher helps them in their presentation by asking questions. 3) Talking about your home Introduce new words (for example: house, flat, balcony, living room) by showing pictures from magazines, drawing the objects on the board or bringing pictures of your own home. Ask the students the questions out loud and let everyone answer them for him/herself in the spaces provided. 4) Ask your friends about their homes Students walk around freely in the classroom and interview each other (give a time limit!). After they are finished, look at the results together. 5) Fill in the chart Display the results of the interviews from part 4 on a “Class Graph.” (Prepare a large version of this graph on packing paper and fill it in together, or use an overhead, then have the students fill in the chart in their worksheets.) 6) Fill in the plan of the Kay family's home Talk about the plan of the house. Have the students label the rooms. Briefly explain what the scale 1:100 means (1 cm in the plan = 100 cm in reality) 7) Measure the rooms in your home Homework: “Measure the rooms in your own apartment and fill in the chart.” Look at the results together in class and convert them on a scale of 1:100. 8) Draw a plan of a room in your home T: “Draw one room from your apartment on graph paper.” Introduce new vocabulary to the class (ex: furniture, etc).
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9) Draw your dream home T: “Draw a plan of your dream apartment/house. Describe it using sentences of your own and present it to the class.”
More Activities on the World Around Me Take a trip to visit the world around you! Explain to the class that you are going together on a trip to visit some amazing places around the world. Intstructions: 1) Plan a route. Teacher preparation: Get pictures of the seven world wonders (choose from several lists such as ancient, modern or natural) from the internet and transfer them to overheads. Make also an overhead of a world map. In class, list the locations of the world wonders you have chosen on the board, but do not show the pictures to the class yet. Have the students look up the places in an atlas. Discuss together what a suitable route would be, leaving from Vienna, and how you would travel from place to place, by plane, car, train, ship? Mark the route on the overhead. 2) Pack your bags. Play a round of "I'm packing my suitcase." Tell the students to remember where they are going...if to the desert, they'll need sun creme, etc. The first student starts by saying, "I'm packing in my suitcase an umbrella." The next student continues, "I'm packing in my suitcase an umbrella and a map.” Next, “I'm packing in my suitcase an umbrella, a map and a ...” And so on. 3) Go and see. Dim the light and show the pictures of the different sites according to the route you have planned. Act as an English tour guide and give a brief and simple explanation of each place including a few statements about its history. Go Google! If you have access to the school's computer lab and it is equipped with internet, take the class on a "field trip" around the world using Google Earth. You can set up a tour of famous landmarks around the world and act as an English tour guide (“Now follow me as we travel across the ocean to our next stop, London.”). Use Google Sky to go to different Galaxies and Nebulae! Downloading Google Earth and Google Sky is part of the preparation if you wish to do this activity, they must be downloaded before the lesson (both are free!) to be used, ask permission from your director or computer teacher and whether or not you should delete the program after your lesson. Note: This is a great way to combine your project with Computer class. Work with your class's computer teacher for extra help.
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IV. My town 1) Look at the pictures Have the students look at the pictures and think about: a) Which things in the pictures can they find in their own town/city and draw a star next to the picture (*). b) Write the number of the pictures in the circles next to the words they already know in the table. Look up the words they do not know in a dictionary and finish filling in the in the table. 2) Town project Group work – The goal is to describe the students' hometown. Each group should make a presentation about their hometown. a) Students discuss in their groups about everything they need to collect and organize and how they want their poster to look. b) Make the posters in class and present them. (an example for a poster: make a copy of a city map and paste pictures of important places or monuments on it) 3) Finding a square/building/... on a map Work with city maps or road maps (prepare maps of Vienna, or perhaps of the city you come from, or London, New York, etc. ahead of time). Search for streets and squares using the map's index. Write your findings in the table. 4) + 5) Look at the map of Vienna; School district Write the names of the 23 districts in Vienna on the chalkboard. For help, look to a map of Vienna and a map of the district your school is in. 6) Excursion – Mapping a journey through your school district Excursion: Research your district (its borders, historical buildings, etc.) and then mark these places on your map. Create a route and take a small tour. Have the students mark the route, streets, buildings, parks and other things they see on their maps. 7) Excursion – The Inner City Excursion: Get to know the inner city (either by taking a real excursion or looking at a map) and fill in the worksheet. Note: Not all of the names can be translated into English, but several of the “Important Buildings” have common English translations that are worth mentioning. Read or write the translated sites on the board and have the students guess what they are in German. Important Buildings 1 State Opera House
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2 Outer Castle Gate 3 Hofburg 4 Museum of Art History 5 Museum of Natural History 6 House of Parliament 7 City Hall 8 Burgtheater 9 University 10 Votiv Church 11 Ring Tower 12 Ruprechts Church
More Activities on My Town Where in the world am I? Instructions: 1)Teacher asks the students: “What is your address? Write your street, house number, district, city and country. Take out an atlas and find your city.” Teacher tells the students where he/she comes from and has them look it up in the atlas too. 2) Have a class discussion. Teacher asks students to “describe your environment.” What's the weather like every year? Do you live in a city or on the countryside? What are common plants and animals near you? What language(s) do you speak? What foods do you normally eat? How do you get food? Think of your neighborhood. Who are some people you see in your neighborhood? (policeman, grocer, hair stylist, trash collector, fireman, baker, etc.) 3) Have the students take their atlas again and put them into groups. Give each group a different place in the world to find. Have geography books and other books available as resources (they can be in German or English from the school library, it is only important that the answers be presented in English). Give the students a few minutes to look up information about their area. Then ask each group in turn, “What place did you have?” and a few of the questions from above describing the environment. “What's the weather like?” etc...
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V. Maps and mapping the world around me 1) Look at the ground shown in the picture Discuss the concept of a bird's eye view with the class. What can/can't you see? (ex: the top of objects, not the sides) Compare What could you see through a bird's eyes (from a bird's perspective)? What do you see/don't you see on the map? 2) Look at the maps below and name them All about maps: explain to the students what different kinds of maps exist. 3) Look at the maps below Explain what “scale” means. By examining the four maps with four different scales the students should be able to see that the bigger the number is, the smaller the map is drawn. 4) + 5) Draw your own map symbols; Find the right words Introduce what map keys, or legends, are. “What do the symbols stand for? Where is the map key on the maps in our atlas? Try to invent symbols yourself.” 6) Draw the symbols for the words below Have the students use an atlas to figure out the symbols for the words and draw them in the boxes. 7) Test yourself Fill in the blanks.
More Activities on Maps and Mapping Giving and Following Directions Telling Directions Practice Tell the class how you get to school each day. Be as descriptive as possible and use clear concise sentences that the students can remember and reuse for their own descriptions (I go downstairs, I walk down Elm Street. Then I turn right on Avery Lane. ...). After you say each sentence, write it on the board. Then, ask for a volunteer to tell you how they get to school everyday. They should be as descriptive as possible. Each student should then write how they get to school each day on a nice piece of paper. You can walk around and help them formulate the directions correctly.
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Following Directions Treasure Hunt Next practice following directions with a game. Ask for a volunteer, bring him to the front and put a blindfold on him. Make sure he can't see. Tell him he is on a treasure hunt and you will hide the treasure in the classroom (any object will do). The other children take turns giving him directions in English (turn left, go around the desk, walk straight ahead, go under the desk, etc.) and lead him to the treasure. Repeat as many times as you wish.
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VI. Sensing the world around me A) Have students name the parts of the body and say what each part does. (“I see with my eyes...”) Help the students realize that four out of our five senses are on our face/head. B) Have the students order the senses to the correct body part.
a) nose Smell
b) mouth Taste
c) eyes Sight
d) ears Hearing
e) skin (hand) Touch
1) Sight Introduction Exercises A, B and C show what the eye can do: it sees pictures (outlines, forms, colors). Through pictures, one recognizes plants, animals, objects and other people. In order to see properly our eyes need the help of our brain. It focuses at different distances, near and far. It focuses in different lighting, whether it is bright or dim. Have one student put a hand over one of his eyes for 20 seconds. Tell the other students to watch his pupil as you shine a flashlight on the same eye. The students will be able to see that in bright light the pupil contracts and in the dark it expands. A) Look straight ahead Work in pairs. One student holds the head of his partner so that he can only look straight ahead. The student should name four things he sees in the classroom. Then the partners switch roles. Both write what they have seen in the table. Compare the results together in class. Which things did all of the students see in the room (board, window, etc.)? Which things did only a few students see? Which things were not seen at all? Make a “class graph” on the board (or on packing paper or an overhead) to chart the results. B) Look at the board. How far is the board? Preparation at home: Ask the students to bring a tape measure to the next lesson. The students will learn the importance of the eye in judging distances. Each student should estimate the distance between his desk and the board and write this estimation on the worksheet. Then he should compare his estimate with his desk partner. Together, the desk partners should measure the distance from their desk to the board and write the real distance on the worksheet. C) What colors can you see in you classroom? Students should write down how many colors they can see in their classroom. A table could be made to order the data. Colors in my classroom:
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Brown Desk, chairs...
Game idea: “One, two, three – what do I see?” One student begins by saying, “One, two, three – what do I see?” The others ask questions about the color of the object in order to discover what it is the student sees. “Is it blue?” “Is it...?” The student who guesses correctly what the object is gets to go next. Tip: set a time limit for this game! Further information: Colorblindness - the teacher can research and prepare color boards that check one's ability to see color. Colorblindness is usually a blindness to red or green. Complete colorblindness is very rare. Colorblindness is a condition one is born with. D) Shapes in the classroom The students should try to recognize the forms given on the worksheet in objects from the classroom. For example, the teacher might say, “Show me a rectangle.” The students can point to books, the board, etc. Summary: To see colors, we need our eyes. Forms we can see with our eyes and feel with our hands. Visualization: Ask for a student to volunteer and have him come to the front of the classroom. Blindfold him, put an object in his hands and ask, “What shape is it?” He answers, “It is a...” Then ask him, “What color is it?” The student will discover you can see and feel shapes. You cannot feel colors. Extra activity: Try to describe colors with words (blue-cold, red-fire, etc.) E) Make a poster called “Shapes in the World” Have the students make a poster. Example:
CIRCLES RECTANGLES SHAPES IN THE WORLD SQUARES TRIANGLES
Sight Repeat the short text about Sight together. Have the students try to memorize it. 2) Hearing A) Listen a) Let's make some noise! The students clap their hands first softly, growing louder and louder. One group claps loudly, another softly. Change rhythmically between the two. (Do the same with stamping your feet, etc.) b) Make a “word chain.” The teacher says one word very loudly. The students repeat the word one after another in a chain, each getting softer until the word is no longer audible. “How fast can you make the echo go around the class? Listen!” c) The teacher makes various noises (hidden from the eyes of the students behind the desk or with his/her hands in a box...) such as crumpling paper, ringing a bell, or
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brings a CD with recordings of different noises. The students try to identify the sounds and upon hearing them a second time should write down their guesses in a table along with how they heard the noise (was it loud, soft, quite loud...). Then compare the results together. Variation: The teacher chooses a few objects (pen, eraser...), shows them to the class and writes the names of the objects on the chalkboard. Then the teacher drops one of the objects onto the floor without letting the students see it. The students should then guess which object was dropped. The students can repeat this experiment working in pairs. They can use an atlas or a folder as a screen between them on their desk, so the partner does not see, and drop the objects onto their desk. B) Why do we need two ears? Let's do an experiment. Have the students sit in a circle. Blindfold one student, so that he cannot see the source of the noises, and have him sit in the middle. The students snap their fingers one at a time and in no predictable order. The blindfolded student points to where he thinks the noise is coming from. The students should realize that when a noise comes from directly in front, from above or from the back, it is more difficult to guess the direction of the source because the sound waves reach both ears at the same time. Summary: We need two ears to know where a sound comes from. (You might also try an experiment with holding one ear closed and listening with the other.) C) How to see a sound Students work on this experiment with their partners. Hearing Repeat the short text about Hearing together. Have the students try to memorize it. 3) Touch Introduction The teacher has several smooth, rough, lard and soft objects prepared. T. shows the students the objects and describes how they feel (“The scarf feels soft, the .... feels …..,” etc.). Then T. gives the command, “Everybody touch the floor. What does it feel like? Touch your sweater. What does it feel like? Point to something heavy.” A) My classroom The students should order different objects in their classroom according to their qualities. For example:
chairs, desks, board Hard
Sponge Wet
B) + C) What is it? Have the students read the descriptions and figure out which picture it describes.
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D) Draw an object and describe it Have the students draw something and write a description of how it feels. If you wish to expand this section... Have students read their descriptions aloud and let the other students guess what they have described. E) Blind people read special books Students write their names in Braille. You might also have them write their names in Braille on a piece of heavy paper or cardboard using a pin. Touch Repeat the short text about Touch together. Have the students try to memorize it. 4) Taste Goals Our sense of taste is connected with the tongue. Taste buds send signals of how different things taste (sweet, bitter, sour, salty). The tongue can also tell the difference between warm, hot, cold and even pressure. Help the students realize the importance of the senses of smell and taste (their warning function). The teacher prepares several foods on a tray (banana, lemon, bread, chocolate, ...). He/She places a towel over the tray so the students cannot see what is on it. One student comes to the front of the class, is blindfolded and his nose is pinched closed (gently, by the teacher!). He receives a piece of banana, apple, and a piece of bread to taste. The teacher shows the foods to the class before feeding them to the student. After he/she feeds each piece of food to the student the teacher asks “What is it? What does it taste like? Do you like ....?” Results: The student should be able only with difficulty to tell the difference between the foods. He recognizes the foods only when his nose is not pinched shut. The reason? The senses of smell and taste work closely together. Cola or Fanta will be difficult for the students to recognize blindfolded. The sense of sight, color, and previous experience play a large role here. Taste Repeat the short text about Taste together. It offers further important information about the tongue. Have the students try to memorize it. 5) Smell Goal The sense of smell warns us from eating spoiled foods. Smell and taste are chemical senses. Chemical senses recognize dissolved substances and gases. Fill in the blanks. Smell Repeat the short text about Smell together. Have the students try to memorize it.
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6) The five senses A) Open learning Five stations will be prepared. The students have about 7 minutes time per station. They walk from station to station. 1) MEASURE WITH A RULER AND CHECK YOUR ANSWERS The teacher prepares printouts with optical illusions from books. The students realize that their eyes do not always perceive things correctly (“Your eyes are not always right”). 2) “FEELY BOX” T. prepares a box with a hole cut in the front large enough to put a hand through containing several varied objects. 3) SMELL MEMORY T. gets small closeable bottles (“kleine verschließbare Fläschchen”) from a pharmacy (Apotheke). Pour different aromatic oils on pieces of tissue. There should be two bottles of each sort. Mark the bottles with colored stickers on the bottom (so the students do not see which belong together). Students must discover which bottles belong together by their smell. 4) TASTE T. gets pipettes bottles (“Pipettenfläschen”), like you use for ear/eye drops, from a pharmacy (Apotheke). In these bottles you can put sweetened tea, lemon juice, sugar water, salt water, etc. Tell the students not to let the pipettes touch their tongues! 5) HEARING Recognize different sounds. (One possibility is to have a CD/cassette with different noises on it and let the student listen to it using headphones.) B) Test yourself The students test their knowledge about the senses independently. Compare together.
More Activities on Sensing the World Around Me The Five Senses Rap The rhythmic repetition of the text helps the students remember the words and making it into a rap makes it even more fun! Text: With your eyes (pause) you can see () With your ears () you can hear () With your nose () you can smell () With your tongue () you can taste () With your skin () you can feel () Five senses () oh yeah! Instructions: Write the rap on the board so the students can read it. Work in “shifts,” take 7 students at a time. Ask for one volunteer to rap the “eyes,” one to rap the “nose,” etc. Ask for one student who can drum a beat on the desk and one student who can make a vocal beat noise. Practice once through only with the “rappers'” parts.
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Then get a rhythm going, you may have to help a bit, and add the rappers by pointing to each student when he/she should say their part. Either take another 7 students or have the whole class join in speaking the rap of the first group. If the students really enjoy this you might think of having a “Rap Off” and have the different groups of 7 present their versions of the rap, being creative with the beat and changing/adding to the text, etc. Shapes in the world around me (can be used to expand on D) Shapes in the Classroom in Sensing the world around me or as an art lesson) This activity should help the students to recognize shapes all around them and learn their English names by saying, copying and drawing them. Try to help them understand that they can use their knowledge of basic shapes as an aid in drawing pictures. Knowing the basic forms can help a student break down what seems like a complex picture into its more simple elements, making it easier to draw. 1) Prepare a poster with all the different basic shapes on it and pictures (cut out of magazines, etc.) of real objects that have these shapes. (circle, oval, triangle, square, rectangle, star, crescent, heart, diamond, octagon) Go through the shapes, asking the students to name other objects that have these shapes. On a nice sheet of paper, have the students write the title “Basic Shapes,” draw the shapes and write the name of the shape in English next to it. 2) Acquaint the students also with the term “sides.” Draw a triangle on the board and ask, “How many sides does this triangle have?” Count them together, “One, two, three. “Tri” means 3 in Latin.” Draw a square, “How may sides does a square have?” Count together. Next draw a pentagon ask for how many sides it has and count together. Ask the students if they have ever heard of the Pentagon in the US? It is a building that has this shape. Emphasize that “penta” means 5 in Latin. Continue on like this with a hexagon (6 sides), (no septagon) and an octagon (8 sides, “what shape is a stop sign?”). Have the students likewise under the Basic Shapes write a new title with “Sides” and draw the shapes, writing their English names next to them. 3) Talk about 3-D shapes. Draw or bring pictures of a cube, cone, cylinder and sphere. Have the students write the heading “3-D shapes,” draw the shapes and write the English name. 4) Last, show the students how shapes fit together to make pictures. Draw an inverted cone and a sphere for an ice-cream cone. A square with a triangle on top of it for a house. Two squares and two circles, etc... for a car. A person, a horse, a cat, etc... Ask the students at the bottom (or reverse side) of their paper to draw three pictures out of shapes. Note: Have the students save their work in their English folder or art folder (ask their teacher where the most appropriate place is).
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VII. Animals in the world around me 1) Can you name these animals? Students name the animals in the pictures. Discuss as a class the difference between domestic and wild animals. What do domestic animals not have to do in order to survive? What characteristics do people change by breeding domestic animals? Why? What genetic selections does nature make? What genetic selections do people make? Note: Simply naming the animals and ordering them in the table would be too small of a task to integrate biology into the language teaching. This section should in a simple way offer further insights and information. 2) Write the names of the animals into the right groups The students write the animal names in the chart. 3) Do a class survey Review the results together in class and have a discussion about how to properly care for pets (people are responsible to care for their pets in a way that their natural needs are met). Students can make a visual summary of the discussion by making a diagram of how to care for pets properly. 4) What is the hidden pet? This game is just for fun. 5) Create a new pet The goal of this activity is actually the presentations and accompanying discussion. Thus the preparation by the students should be done at home. For homework, have the students invent a new pet, make a drawing of it and write a description of it. Let them know that the most important part of the project is the description of the pet (what does it eat, where does it live, what does it need and why,...). At school, the drawings and descriptions are hung on display. The students look at them and together decide on 4 or 5 works they would like the “inventors” to present to the class. The other students can ask the “inventors” questions. “Why does it have blue fur?” “What does it eat?” 6) How similar is the skeleton of a cat to yours? This section should offer further biological insight. There is a basic structure to the skeleton of humans, of mammals and of birds, which hints at how they are related. This basic structure is modified according to the special requirements of the different ways each animal lives. The same is true of the design of the teeth of mammals. Materials Skeletons of a human and cat
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Procedure “Look at the two skeletons. Can you name some of the bones? What kind of bones do you and a cat have? Touch your collar bone. Does a cat have a collar bone?” (Cats do not have collar bones) “What do we use our arms for? What does a cat use its arms for?” The students should realize by coloring the pictures that the build of the human is quite similar to that of the cat. The biggest difference is that the cat cannot walk upright. Where people have “arms,” cats have “fore legs” and where people have legs, cats have “hind legs.” “Cats walk on their toes. We walk on our feet.” Have the students circle the legs of the cat and the human on the worksheet in order to clarify the point. “A cat is a vertebrate.” Have the students list other animals they know are vertebrates. 7) Cats and dogs Goal The body structure of animals is conformed to the way they live. Note the body of the cat and how it is adapted to its environment (claws for climbing, sharp teeth, sensitive whiskers, eyes that see very well, graceful and quiet so it can sneak up on its prey). Also the body of the dog and how it is equipped for its life (very good sense of smell, well developed sense of hearing, fast and energetic to hunt by tiring and scaring its prey). Help the students realize how important the senses of touch and sight are for the cat as a night hunter. Try to figure out why the dog has such a good sense of smell. Both cats and dogs are vertebrates and walk on their toes. The dog has a strong build, while the cat is very light-boned. Copy pictures of a cat hunting and a dog hunting on an overhead and ask: “How does a cat hunt? How does a dog hunt? What's different?” Work out the differences together as a class. “A cat creeps up quietly and jumps to catch an animal. A dog follows a smell (a trace) and runs after the animal until it catches it. A cat's body must be supple and light. A dog must have strong, muscular legs.” 8) Look at the paws. How are they different? Solution Paws: The cat's pads are soft, its claws can be drawn in, the claws are pointed. The dog's pads are hard, they cannot be drawn in. Why? A cat creeps and tries not to be heard by its prey, she needs sharp claws to climb up trees. A dog is a running animal, he cannot climb. Skulls: Cats and dogs are meat eaters (carnivores). The molars of carnivore teeth are sharp. Our molars are dull for grinding food. Cats have a short nose, but large eye sockets and can see very well. Dogs do not see so well and rely more on their very good sense of smell, which is why they have a longer skull. 9) Match the numbers and the words Have the students complete the tasks. 10) Make an animal book Students select a mammal and draw a picture of it. On a separate sheet of paper they write a description of their animal (its habitat, how it looks, what it eats). The teacher corrects the written work. The students write the corrected description of their animal under the picture they have drawn or a picture they have found of the animal. The teacher
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collects all the students' works and binds them into a book (“Our Animal Book”) that can be put into the class library.
More Activities on Animals in the World Around Me Zoo excursion If the teachers you work with agree, take the children together on an excursion to the wonderful zoo at the palace Schönbrunn. The internet site is www.zoovienna.at, but is only available in German. Look under the tab “Tiere & Anlagen” to see what animals they have. The teachers at your school should be able to help you with coordinating times, lunches, fees, transportation, which teachers will come with you, etc. At school In preparation bring pictures of animals from all over the world to class (you can even use the pictures off the zoo's own website also under the tab “Tiere & Anlagen”). Separate them into categories: bears, bugs, birds, cats, etc. Show the students a picture and ask, What is it ?” “That is a panda bear.” (they may or may not know what it is depending on how exotic the animal is). Then ask, “Where does it come from?” “It comes from China.” Have a student point to where China is on a world map or stick the picture on a map. Then show a picture of a grizzly bear, “What is it?” “Where does it come from?” “It comes from North America.” etc. You could go further into biology and ask the students whether it is a mammal, reptile, insect, bird, etc., teaching them the differences in English (as many of them have learned it in German already). This can become a project in itself! At the zoo Stop in front of the different animals you have learned. Tell the students to remember to be quiet so they do not scare the animals. Ask the students again what it is and where it comes from in the world. Add any other information you have talked about and if you can bring their biology teacher with you have him/her also talk in German about the animal. Chat with the students about the animals casually for some quality native speaker time.
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VIII. MY OPINION Take time to reflect on the project with the students.
IX. MY FAVOURITE WORDS AND PHRASES Have the students write their new favourite words and phrases from the project into the chart.
