Preposition Picnic

Preposition Picnic

This is an activity that we have used with” House and Home”language learning  and also when we practise setting the table with cutlery and crockery and pretend to be” àtable” in a French Christmas sketch with Year 6.

This year I think it sitsreally well with UKS2 a  celebration ofyour French/ Spanish/ German picnics or café culture focus during Summer term.

In KS2,the new DfE POS expects young learners to..... 

 "understand basic grammar appropriate to the language being studied, including(where relevant): feminine, masculine and neuter forms and the conjugation of high-frequency verbs; key features and patterns of the language; how to apply these, for instance, to build sentences; and how these differ from or are similar to English."

It’s a series of simple activities that would work well inKS3 too when children are practising prepositions and especially in Germanwhere there is quite a lot to take in and understand.(See my comments below initalics)

You can develop some Art and DT work from this language activity too.

German :This will work inall three languages as described, however if you are working with German youmay need to use the command  “Put” withkey accusative prepositions first introducing the concept using feminine andneuter nouns. I would then introduce and share how the sound and spelling of themasculine definite article (der) has been altered when using these prepositions.Let your children be the language detectives and solve the sound and spellingriddle here. You can then continue with prepositions that are eitheraccusative/dative or purely dative as and when you feel the children are readyto strengthen their language detective skills.

Equipment

Here are my picnic items. They are nearly all red in colour-but you could have different colours so that the children had to add a colourto the noun too to increase the challenge.

When we worked on this in class all the children had accessto a plastic spoon, fork, knife, plate, cup and beaker. There was one betweentwo of everything and I just bought cheap packs from a local supermarket.

Revisit and recap

• Revisit and recap the items of crockery and cutlery for yourpicnic and reinforce the correct definite article with each noun etc). Do thechildren know that it’s “la tasse” for example.
• Using physical actions with the children create prepositionwarm up. The children need to move their hands and arms to represent theposition of prepositions e.g.

Next to – one arm out to the front bring the other arm andhand out and clap together

In front- hands in front

Under – touch the floor

Above – reach the sky

(and don’t forget “on the right”- arms to the right and “onthe left” – arms to the left)

Altogether now

• Bring the class to the front or to an area where you can layout your picnic mat. 
• Demonstrate setting the picnic mat for the class with youritems.
• Demonstrate how the table should be laid and place the crockery andcutlery correctly, saying clearly on the target language as you move and placeitems “put the cup above the plate, put the knife next to the plate on theright” etc.. 
• Muddle up the items and ask children to place the items for you –giving the children clear target language instructions .

Now ask the children to help you reset the table in a newand creative way. The children can direct you to place the items where theywish e.g. put the knife in the cup , put the spoon under the plate etc.

In groups

• Give each group a set of written instructions. Each set ofinstructions uses the same crockery and cutlery but the table will be setslightly differently- no table should be set like your modelled table in theprevious activity . 
• Ask the groups to read the instructions and lay theirtables. Now take a class tour of the tables. 
• Can the children spot thedifferences between the table they are looking at and your original table? 
• Canthey say this is the target language? The children will need to be able torespond with  “the …..is …..to the ……” astheir response. (If you teach German youmay wish to return to this part of the activity at a later date when the children are secure with theirprepositions and accusative/ dative sound-spelling) 

In pairs

• Can the children work in pairs and direct each other to settheir tables – firstly correctly and then creatively? 
• Can the children create a3D sculpture of the crockery and cutlery piling it high rather than placing itflatly on the picnic table or mat?

Individual creative activity

The outcome of this activity is that the child creates a 2Dor 3D piece of art placing the crockery and cutlery in a design pr sculptureabout which they write a set of instructions so that someone else could do thesame. They will use their command “put” and a variety of prepositions to dothis. 

There is a choice here of delivery styles: an ICT photostory , a poster, a spoken demonstration to recreate their art work to theirgroup, or a sculpture or painting of their work which is framed by their targetlanguage instructions around the outside.