ANORAK - Summer Special

Still on vacation? Don't miss the latest issue of Anorak magazine!

This month it is 100% dedicated to games and free-time activities. 

Your children will be amazed and entertained by more than 30 pages full of typical summer puzzles such as: find the differences, crack the code, spot the missing objects, join the dots, mazes and many more games.

As always there are great illustrated stories, book reviews and interviews with real children!

And last, but not least, kids will find out how to create peculiar characters that will inhabit their own comic strips! 

Brilliant!  

This August we won't run into any bored little faces! For sure!


More about Anorak - The happy Mag for Kids

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

Scout Finch, the narrator, is a young girl who lives with her brother, Jem, and her father, Atticus (a lawyer), in Maycomb, Alabama.

At the beginning of the book she tells us how she spends the summer time with Jem and her friend Dill trying to convince, with all sorts of tricks, their mysterious neighbour, Boo Radley, to come out of his place and let them see his face. Boo Radley lives confined in his parents' house for some behaviour problems he showed in the past, and nobody has seen him for years.

We see, or better said, we imagine this character through Scout's mind and thoughts. At the beginning she is pretty scared of him, but, as time goes by, she changes her mind, showing a sort of pity for this unfortunate man, who, maybe, has decided not be seen by his peers, to avoid their hypocrisy and prejudice.

In the meantime Scout describes her surroundings: the people of Maycomb are easy to classify. By social status and behavior.

She also talks about her father, the lawyer Atticus. The only one in town who seems not to respond to small towns implicit laws: he is an absolutely fair man, who teaches his children that before judging anyone they must spend some time in someone's shoes.

Later, the plot focuses on the main story of the book: the event that will bring to the surface what politeness and good manners have been hiding till that moment--racial discrimination.

A Negro is charged with the rape of a white girl, and even if Atticus manages to objectively demonstrate his innocence, the all-white jury convicts him, just because he's black. That was how it worked those times.

The town is divided into two groups: the one which thinks that Negroes are subordinate and must be kept in their 'place', and the smaller group that wants people of any color to be considered human beings with the same rights.

So, while she wants to tell us how Jem got his arm broken at the age of 13, she ends up painting a detailed picture of Deep South American society in the 30's.
Thanks to the first person narrator we feel exactly what she feels: curiosity, fear, sorrow, powerlessness, anger. 

Furthermore, the author gets to completely suck us into this society that looks so far away, but that in the end is still alive nowadays, everywhere.

It's an enlightening book that every child (and adult) should definitely read, to remind ourselves that every day is a good day to try to understand people instead of judging them at first sight or according to what others say of them.

Prejudice will kill the mockingbird.

Mockingbirds don't do one thing but make music for us to enjoy... but sing their hearts out for us. That's why it's a sin to kill a mockingbird.

More about racial prejudices: The Lions of Little Rock

Classroom activities:

Lesson Plan 1

Lesson Plan 2

Lesson Plan 3

Lesson Plan 4

Lesson Plan 5

  

Lucy dedicates a lot of time and love to thinking about and writing the posts she shares with all of you. Because she believes that a better teaching is the key for a better future. If you find any help, value or joy in this blog, please consider becoming a supporting reader. A donation, in any amount, will be gratefully accepted. 

                                                   

Summer Camp in Madrid - Un resumen de mi campamento de verano en Madrid

It has been a hot July here in Madrid this year, but I was able to enjoy every single day of it thanks to the shadowy garden where I was teaching English to 4 adorable nearly - 4-year- old children. 

numbers and stamps

2 boys and 2 girls. 

The old women around us were surprised by their good manners and the attention they were paying me. 

As I've already told you, it was a great experience!

First of all because I only had 4 students: thanks to that it' was much easier to do anything I wanted, from playing active games to fingerpainting, with calm, positive attitude and a smile constantly stuck on my face.

Being affectionate is definitely a fundamental aspect, if your aim is to convince a young Spanish child that he or she is going to put up with you, speaking a foreign language, for 2 and a half hours from Monday to Friday, for 4 weeks!

glittery bees and flowers shining in the sun

The second important point about teaching only 4 children is that you can really make anyone happy, presenting activities that will suit each member of the group. 

That's also really important if you don't want to frustrate them in their attempt to learn English according to their aptitudes!

Last year I had a bad experience with a Summer Camp. Small children where forced to learn by heart some English sketches just to show off, to their parents, that they had learnt something. 

But it was a real torture! For them, because repeating several times the same unpleasant things at those ages is everything but fun, and for their teachers, who had to put up with their intolerance towards the routine…

So this year, since I didn't have a boss to please, I fiercely tried to avoid all of that. 

It has meant a little bit more of work and time spent thinking about a larger variety of games and activities, but I can tell you that parents were equally satisfied, because they found their offspring singing, saying words and expressing themselves in English, at home, more than usual.

And I firmly think that this is really all we can ask those little heroes.

Finally, I can say I've learnt every week a little more about what children like. 

Here's my list:

the glittery hungry gorilla

1) Glitter!!! : Put some glitter glue on anything you want them to pay attention to and they will take part in any game you'll introduce.

5) Fingerpainting: Painting with their fingers allows them to have a better control on lines and edges.

They're always required to paint inside the edged area and this technique gives them great satisfaction!

3) Plasticine: They can't make much more than snakes, snails and balls by themselves, but you'll gain their admiration forever if you can organize their beloved giraffe's birthday party or a green grocer's store with it.

fruit and vegetables made of plasticine

4) Stamps and stencils! They love them because, since they can't really draw anything artistically valuable, they help them to produce nice pictures without struggling too much with crayons.

5) Gifts: Give them their works to take them home. They will decorate their room with them and consequently they'll be surrounded by English stuff, for at least 2 weeks. Having constant references around it's the best way to make sure that they will never forget what they've learnt.

I REALLY HAD A GREAT EXPERIENCE!

More about the Camp: English in the Garden - Zoo Animals

English in the Garden - Zoo Animals

I'm a little busy these days. I'm teaching every morning a small group of children aged 3 to 4 in the garden of their house. 

The location is pretty nice: green grass constantly watered by sprinklers and tall pine trees to keep us in the shade during the hot summer of Madrid.

Here you can see some pictures of an activity I'd like to share with you, because the children found it easy, entertaining and satisfactory.

It's basically a big poster, representing a zoo -- inspired by the book 1,2,3… To The Zoo, by Eric Carle -- that the children have decorated with stencils of zoo animals.

The result was amazing! We've got rainbow tigers too!

    

CIRCLE GAMES - The Farmer in the Dell

Do you know this song? 

And this is the game you can play with your class

Children (10 or more) join hands and dance in a circle around the FARMER who stands in the center of the circle. 

When the FARMER chooses his WIFE, following the first verse, she joins him inside the circle. 

At the end of the second verse, the WIFE takes a CHILD. 

This continues until the last verse when everyone is in the circle except the CHEESE. 

The CHEESE gets to be the FARMER

Have fun!

Lyrics

The farmer in the dell,
The farmer in the dell,
Hi-ho, the derry-o,
The farmer in the dell.

The farmer takes a wife,
The farmer takes a wife,
Hi-ho, the derry-o,
The farmer takes a wife.

The wife takes a child,
The wife takes a child,
Hi-ho, the derry-o,
The wife takes a child.

The child takes a cow,
The child takes a cow,
Hi-ho, the derry-o,
The nurse takes a cow.

The cow takes a dog,
The cow takes a dog,
Hi-ho, the derry-o,
The cow takes a dog.

The dog takes a cat,
The dog takes a cat,
Hi-ho, the derry-o,
The dog takes a cat.

The cat takes a rat,
The cat takes a rat,
Hi-ho, the derry-o,
The cat takes a rat.

The rat takes the cheese,
The rat takes the cheese,
Hi-ho, the derry-o,
The rat takes the cheese.

The cheese stands alone,
The cheese stands alone,
Hi-ho, the derry-o,
The cheese stands alone.

Anorak - We love Writing... And your kids?

Summer is very close and many children around the world will be soon on holiday--if they aren't already.

Entertaining them during the next long, hot days is going to be quite easy if you're able to get the next issue of Anorak Magazine, dedicated to writing!

Writing is the most fun and, secretly every elephant wishes it could write!

It's true, spelling isn't always easy, but your fingers could become round like sausages if you never use a pen.

Which was the first writing system ever created, who invented it and why?

How did we arrive in the digital era and its keyboards?

Find it out in the history section and then try to correctly answer the writing trivia!

After that, you will have the great opportunity to write something in Russian, just to impress your classmates!

For the youngest kids there's an alpha-forest full of letters A-a, but how many?

There's a ancient Roman inscription to crack besides a coloring page and a 'spot the animal on the bus' activity.

As always you'll find comics, rhymes, drawings and books reviewed by children.

Definitely another Anorak issue for your collection!

More about Anorak - The happy Mag for Kids

More about Writing

June Intensive Course - Update - Inglés en Madrid con niños de infantil

Hola a todos!

Un pequeño post sobre lo que estamos haciendo, yo y mis brillantes alumnos de 1º y 2º de infantil, en un colegio de Madrid, durante este mes de junio.

Hemos hecho muchas preguntas: What's your name? What's your brother/sister/ mother/father/granny/grandfather's name? What day is it today? What's the weather like? Where do you live? How old are you?

Seguimos con las canciones: hasta ahora hemos leído, cantado, bailado y jugado con The Wheels on the Bus, We're Going on a Bear Hunt y Five Little Monkeys.

We're Going On A Bear Hunt.avi

The Wheels On The Bus Action Song

Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed - Original Song

Después hemos visto varios animales de la selva: bear, crocodile, lion, bird, giraffe, zebra, elephant, hippo.

Hemos jugado a Good Afternoon Mr Jones, para aprender esta palabra' afternoon' súper complicada :o)

También hemos jugado a What's the time Mr Wolf? para repasar números y animales ( se dan ciertos números de pasos según el animal elegido) y I can see, I can see…(a red bird) …across the sea, un juego donde se necesitan a captain/pirate y a shark más flashcards (o dibujos), que resulta muy útil para empezar a poner adjetivos delante de los sustantivos.

También hemos explorado las emociones haciendo muecas y por fin…pintado!

Hemos pintado palabras que empiezan por J (jump, jellyfish, jet, juice), K (kite, king, kitten), L (leaf, lemon, lorry, lion, Lollipop) M (mitten, milk, moon, monkey) y P (penguin, pie, pig, pencil). Las hemos revisado cada día con juegos y adivinanzas.

En fin, mucho trabajo! Y mucha diversión!

..............................................

Hi everyone!

This is a little post about my June Intensive Course. I'll tell you what my young students and I  have been up to over these past 2 weeks of English classes.

First we've been asking and answering several questions: What's your name? What's your brother/sister/ mother/father/granny/grandfather's name? What day is it today? What's the weather like? Where do you live? How old are you?

Then we've been singing along to these songs:

We're Going On A Bear Hunt.avi

The Wheels On The Bus Action Song

Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed - Original Song

We've been doing many activities to learn them such as reading their books, playing musical chair, musical statue and listening to them during painting time.

We've also seen the words for many wild animals, such as bear, crocodile, lion, bird, giraffe, zebra, elephant, hippo.

We've played 'Good Afternoon Mr Jones' to learn this word 'afternoon' that seems a little tricky to pronounce. 

We've played What's the Time Mr Wolf?' to review the numbers and animals, (every turn we pretend to be an animal, and we walk and produce strange sounds).

We've played I Can See, I Can See… ( a red bird) …Across the Sea, a game that needs a captain/pirate and a shark, to learn that in English adjectives go before nouns. 

We've played Cops and Robbers and Bump the Color, also.

We've explored our emotions by pulling faces and finally… We colored!!!

We painted words that start with J (jump, jellyfish, jet, juice), K (kite, king, kitten), L (leaf, lemon, lorry, lion, Lollipop) M (mitten, milk, moon, monkey) and  P (penguin, pie, pig, pencil).

We've been reviewing them every day through quiz games.

Actually, a lot of work, but also a lot of fun!

Free Downloadable Odd One Out worksheets - Homophones

Hi there! 

More odd one out exercises for your students!

This time the new worksheet is about homophones: words pronounced in the same way but differing in meaning or spelling or both.

Challenge your pupils and have fun!!!

Download them for free!

If you're looking for more exercises, take a look at the PRINTABLES PAGE of this blog.

I design series of activities based on a communicative method that will help children to practice the grammar they're learning at school.

Many ESL activities, I see, are nothing more than 'fill in the blank' exercises that only teach kids how to fill in blanks and miss the whole point of learning to speak and understand a new language.

It's much easier and more fun to learn by doing, and you'll be surprised at how quickly you'll see valuable results. 

You can get my activities on my online store:

http://childreneslworksheets.bigcartel.com

CLASES DE INGLÉS PARA NIÑOS EN MADRID

APROVECHA LAS TARDES DEL MES DE JULIO PARA QUE TUS HIJOS 

 ¡¡¡HABLEN INGLÉS!!!

En el mes de julio, por las tardes, estaré disponible para clases de inglés, apoyo, repaso, preparación de exámenes oficiales (Starters, Movers, Flyers, Ket, Pet), clases para mejorar la competencia comunicativa y babysitting (juego, merienda, parque, mínimo 1 hora y media).

Clases individuales o en grupo, en la zona centro y sur de Madrid.

Para más informaciones, puedes contactar conmigo mandándo un correo a:

misslucysteachingfun@gmail.com

Free downloadable game about clothes WEAR or CARRY?

Have you spent the last 2 weeks teaching the difference between CARRY and WEAR? If your answer is Yes, this new post is for you! 

This is an activity I designed for my 6-year-old learners a couple of years ago. 

It's composed by several tiles, on each one the students had something to do to complete it. On one half they had to write the name of the article of clothing / accessory I had drawn, in the second half they had to draw the garments I had previously written.

In those days my class was composed of 15 students, so I prepared, more or less, 3 tiles for each one to complete.

I had also prepared 'Wild Tiles', the green ones you can see in the pictures, to keep the game going in case of some missing word/drawing.

Once they (had) completed the tiles we started to play in teams of 3 pupils each. When they were putting down their tile, they had to say:  "I'm wearing / carrying … " the object they were placing. Of course the rest of the kids had to check if he was right or not. 

If you don't have time to make it by yourself, you can find the photocopiable PDF of the same game plus a suitable version for children who cannot write by themselves yet (4-5-6 years old) on this link: 

Two different sets of free downloadable Wear or Carry Tiles

Enjoy it!

I design series of activities based on a communicative method that will help children to practice the grammar they're learning at school.

Many ESL activities, I see, are nothing more than 'fill in the blank' exercises that only teach kids how to fill in blanks and miss the whole point of learning to speak and understand a new language.

It's much easier and more fun to learn by doing, and you'll be surprised at how quickly you'll see valuable results. 

You can get my activities on my online store:
http://childreneslworksheets.bigcartel.com

CAPTAIN NO BEARD! by Carole P. Roman

Shiver me timbers!

Welcome aboard the Flying Dragon, a mighty Frigate that belongs to Captain no Beard and his hearty crew. 

There's Mongo the monkey who climbs the mast every morning to watch the horizon looking for storms, islands or big sea animals.

There's Linus the lion who's in charge of roaring the alarms.

There's Fribbit the floppy frog who can fast reach every spot of the ship whenever it  is necessary.

And, finally, there's Hallie the captain's first mate and cousin.

Together they live fantastic adventures, but also learn important lessons about friendship.

They teach each other what means to be a team and work together, even if you're the captain!

Based on a game the author Carole P. Roman used to play with her son, these books about pirates will surely inspire your children and launch them into their adventurous world of hearty pirate!

But... Look out! Being a captain is hard work!



            

More books for young readers:
THE LORAX by Dr Seuss


THE MOON IS COLD by Enrich Lluch


AT THE FAIR by Enrich Lluch


WITCH HAZEL by Enrich Lluch
 
MARY'S TOOTH by Enrich Lluch

SHAPES FOR TODDLERS

Shapes and colors are the first subjects that a child who attends
kindergarden must assimilate.

I prepared some activities, inspired by Maria Montessori's books, that
will help our toddlers learn about circles, squares, rectangles,
diamonds, stars, hearts and triangles!

Besides the classic counting, coloring tracing and bingo activities,
they will learn how to organize the shapes according to their
dimensions and hue, and about sequences.

Finally, they'll get more conscious about the physical differences
between each shape, by making their own, using some colorful bars and
pins.

You'll find this brand new worksheet (40 pages) on my online store:
http://childreneslworksheets.bigcartel.com/

As always… Have fun!


More activities for toddlers:
THE SHOE BEHIND YOU

JUMPING IN AND OUT OF SHAPES

COOTIE CATCHER

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MISS LUCY'S TEACHING FUN!!!

Birthday celebration today! Miss Lucy's Teaching Fun is 5 years old!!!

To celebrate this milestone I'm making a special offer for all readers of this blog:

If you buy the GUESS WHAT vocabulary game, writing and speaking activity pack (to prepare the Cambridge Flyers Exam) by Wednesday May 29th, on my online store 

http://childreneslworksheets.bigcartel.com/

I'll send you 2 additional worksheets of your choice!!!

Thanks a lot for making this blog a success! 

I wouldn't be here without wonderful readers like you!

Fiesta de Cumpleaños por Miss Lucy's Teaching Fun! Hoy el blog cumple 5 años!!!

Para celebrar esta ocasión tan especial voy a hacer una súper oferta para todos los queridos lectores de este blog:

Hasta el miércoles 29 de mayo, si compras el GUESS WHAT vocabulary game, writing and speaking activity pack (para prepara en examen Flyers de Cambridge), en mi tienda online 

http://childreneslworksheets.bigcartel.com/

Te enviaré 2 fichas de actividades más, de las que tú elijas!!!

Muchísimas gracias por contribuir al éxito de este blog! 

No sería posible sin lectores tan maravillosos como tú!!!