Special Places
SUMMARY OF ACTIVITY
Based around a Native American theme whereby pupils spend time in the outdoors on their own, but with each pupil supported by their own puppet friend. Pupils are supported in using their senses to experience the outdoors and sharing the emotions they feel with others. This activity has a strong literacy focus. Please refer to the attached notes, which detail literacy strategy links (pages 67-68).
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
1.To identify differences between habitats.
2.To describe our feelings about the outdoors.
NATIONAL CURRICULUM LINKS
English 1: 1b, 1d, 1e, 2a, 2c, 2d, 3a, 3b, 4a, 8c, 9a, 10b.
English 2: 6d.
English 3: 2b, 9c.
History: 2a, 2b.
Geography : 1c.
Art & Design: 2b, 2c.
PSHE & Citizenship: 1b.
PREPARATION
Request that pupils come in to school well prepared to spend time in the outdoors.
Identify a suitable off-site location for pupils to use as a comparison site.
Learn the Great Rock Story (page 65).
Pupils will need to examine pictures of Native Americans and create a Native American
cardboard puppet on a stick prior to this activity.
RESOURCES
Scarf.
Clipboards, scrap paper and pencils.
Sticks.
Cardboard.
Paints/crayons.
Decorative or special stick to be used as a talking stick.
Great Rock Story (page 65).
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Special Places
Key Stage 1
INTRODUCTION – GREAT ROCK STORY
1.With pupils sitting in a circle tell from memory the story about a Native American child
spending time in the outdoors on his own. NB – Native American stories are not traditionally written down and should be told to an assembled group who sit in a circle so that everyone is equal.
2.Advise pupils they will be going on their own journey in the school grounds and that they
will take their puppet friend with them.
3. Take pupils into the school grounds and play ‘How a Native American Walks’ to focus pupils on being quiet. A person sits blindfolded next to a tree with a scarf draped over their knee. Pupils form a large circle, or semi circle, around the tree and their task is to move slowly and silently towards the blindfolded person and to remove the scarf without the person realising. If the blindfolded person points towards the sound then that pupil is out of the game.
MAIN ACTIVITY – EXPERIENCE MAPS
1.Tell pupils that their Native American friend is going to help them find their own special
place in the school grounds.
2. Remind pupils of the story and ask them to search in school grounds for a gift to take to their special place.
3. Demonstrate how to make an Experience Map by creating one together as a group. Experience Maps are blank sheets of paper with a person represented in the centre and a series of symbols around the page, to depict the experience of being outdoors.
4.Give each pupil a clipboard with a sheet of paper on it and a pencil.
Pupils are told to sit in silence in their special place and create their Experience Maps. Ideally, pupils should repeat this activity in a contrasting location – perhaps in a nearby nature reserve, open space, park or garden.
PLENARY – TALKING STICK
1.Arrange pupils in a circle (outdoors if possible) and introduce concept of Talking Sticks.
Talking Sticks are a Native American tool to aid debates and discussions. The person in the group holding the stick is able to speak freely without interruption or ridicule.
2.As the talking stick is passed around the circle, pupils recount their feelings about their
Special Places through their puppet, beginning ‘Whilst I was in my Special Place I ……..’.
3.This statement might be followed by words like felt, saw, imagined, looked, heard,
FOLLOW-UP IDEAS
Pupils can use the talking stick and their puppet friends to engage in group story-telling. The teacher could start off a story, perhaps about a Native American pupil who goes out on a journey, and passes the talking stick to the next person in the circle who must then add anot h e r sentence to the story, through their puppet. The teacher can record the story for use later on during literacy lessons. See pages 67-68 for more ideas about how to link this activity to literacy.
Use sounds to describe feelings and different places. Pupils can use natural sounds or instruments made from natural materials to illustrate what the two habitats they explored were like.
Pupils can write one of the stories they imagined Great Rock told the boy, using the experience of sitting in their Special Place as inspiration.
Pupils can use the talking stick during a circle time held out of doors to discuss their school grounds and what they like and do not like.
Create word banks and use these as a stimulus for writing whilst in their Special Place.
Gather pupils together outside and use a flipchart to record collective thoughts about their Special Places. Pupils then write comparative pieces, contrasting the two locations they visited.
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Special Places
Key Stage 1
FOLLOW-UP IDEAS
Pupils can use a talking stick for group story-telling where they reflect on the original story and retell it, embellishing it as they choose.
Pupils create dream catchers or medicine shields.
Create a totem pole to decorate your school grounds. Each pupil can make a hollow section from clay which can be threaded over an upright pole.
Make a quiet area somewhere in your school grounds. Create a story-telling chair. Design and build an
amphitheatre. Why not build a willow wigwam? See pages 131-132 for ideas on creativity in school grounds.
Brother Eagle, Sister Sky(ISBN 014054514X) retells Chief Seattle’s speech which can be used as a literacy text and can be used to further explore the value of the outdoors.
Refer to Learning Through Landscapes (www.ltl.co.uk) for more ideas about activities that can be done in your school grounds.
Great Rock Story
“Would you like to hear a story?”
Many years ago, there were no stories in the world. Life was not easy for the people, especially during the long winters when the wind blew hard and the snow fell to the ground. One winter day a boy went hunting. He caught lots of birds and then started to walk home. The boy became tired and sat against a large rock for a rest. Suddenly he heard a deep voice speak.
‘I’m going to tell you a story’.
The boy looked carefully around but there was no one there. ‘Who are you?’ said the boy.
The voice came from the rock that he sat against. ‘I am Great Rock. I’m going to tell you a story’. ‘Then tell it’ said the boy.
‘You must leave me a small gift first’ replied the rock. The boy left a beautiful feather from one of the birds he had caught.
The rock then began a wonderful story about how the earth was created. As the boy listened to the story he began to feel warm and safe, even though he was sitting in snow.
‘Thank you Great Rock. I will now go and tell the story to my family’.
The boy hurried home and told his family something wonderful and exciting had happened. As the boy told the story the whole family became warm. Everyone slept very well that night and had good dreams.
The next day the boy returned to the Great Rock. This time the boy left a smooth brown nut. ‘Thank you’ said Great Rock, who then told the boy another fascinating story. From that point on the boy regularly took gifts to Great Rock and listened to amazing stories. The boy heard the stories of talking animals and monsters, tales of what things were like when the Earth was new. They were good stories and they taught important lessons. The boy remembered each story and shared them with his family each night when he returned home. One day, when the winter was ending and the spring about to come, the great stone did not speak when the boy offered his gift of a brightly coloured flower.
‘Please tell me another story’ requested the boy.
Special Places
Literacy Links
Special Places Literacy Links
Key Stage 1
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EARLY LEARNING GOALS
Communication, Language and Literacy
Enjoy listening to and using spoken and written language, and readily turn to it in their
play and learning.
Use language to imagine and recreate roles and experiences.
Use talk to organise, sequence and clarify thinking, ideas, feelings and events.
Sustain attentive listening, responding to what they have heard by relevant comments,
questions or actions.
Interact with others, negotiating plans and activities and taking turns in conversation.
Extend their vocabulary, exploring the meanings and sounds of new words.
Retell narratives in the correct sequence, drawing on the language patterns of stories.
Speak clearly and audibly with confidence and control and show awareness of the
l i s t e n e r, for example by their use of conventions such as greetings, ‘please ‘ and ‘thank yo u ’ . The following literacy links include teaching objectives taken from guidance set out in the document ‘Speaking, Listening, Learning: Working with Children in Key Stages 1 and 2’.
YEAR 1
Word level work- new words from reading and shared experiences, and to make collections of personal interest or significant words and words linked to
particular topics W12 .
YEAR 1 TERM 1
Speaking- to describe incidents or tell stories from their own experience, in an audible voice NLS text objectives 5 and 9.
Listening- to listen with sustained concentration.
Text level work- to write about events in personal experience linked to a variety of familiar incidents from stories T9.
Text level work- to make simple picture storybooks with sentences, modelling them on basic text conventions, e.g. cover, author’s name, title, layout T11.
YEAR 1 TERM 2
S p e a k i n g- to retell stories, ordering events using story language NLS text objectives 4 and 5. Listening- to listen and follow instructions accurately, asking for help and clarification if necessary.
Text level work- to represent outlines of story plots using e.g. captions, pictures, arrows to record main incidents in order, e.g. to make a class book, wall story, own version T14.
YEAR 1 TERM 3
Speaking- to tell real and imagined stories using the conventions of familiar story language NLS text objective 7.
Text level work- to write stories using simple settings, e.g. based on previous reading T14.
YEAR 2
Word level work- new words from reading linked to particular topics, to build individual collections of personal interest or significant words W10.
YEAR 2 TERM 1
Listening- to listen to others in class, ask relevant questions and follow.
Text level work - to use story structure to write about own experience in same/similar form T10 . Text level work- to use language of time to structure a sequence of events e.g. ‘When I had finished’, ‘After that...’ T11.
YEAR 2 TERM 2
Listening- to respond to presentations by describing characters, repeating some highlights and commenting constructively.
Text level work- to use story settings from reading, e.g. re-describe, use in own writing, write a different story in the same setting T13.
YEAR 2 TERM 3
Listening- to listen to a talk by an adult, remember some specific points and identify what they have learned.
Text level work- to write sustained stories, using their knowledge of story elements: narrative, settings, characterisation, dialogue and the language of story T10.
