Exploiting Materials for Younger Learners

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Some quick ideas

Making a game of things:

Hide things in the class for the students to find, for example pens, board markers, flash cards of animals, letters (in order to teach the alphabet.) words etc.You can say warmer, cooler etc. to help them locate the items.
Spot the difference pictures.
I am a letter, which letter am I? Teacher makes a shape with his/her body of a letter. Once students have guessed ask them to spell a word which begins with that word.
Spell with our bodies. Ask the students to make a shape with their bodies which represents a letter. Then put the students into groups of three or four and ask them to spell a three or four letter word.
Follow the teacher. Ask the students to stand in a line in front of you. Mime certain verbs and get them to follow exactly what you do.

Making music with things

Jazz Chants - from your stories, from the students’ names, from the town etc.

Look around the class; ask the students to invent a new machine using objects that you provide. For example a paper cup, a toilet roll, a can etc. The students should work in groups and then show you what they have thought of.

Ask the students to write their own versions of nursery rhymes:

Little Miss Muffet sat on a bucket,
And ate a chocolate ice-cream,
Along came a spider
And sat down beside her,
And made poor Miss Muffet scream: aah!

Making it relevant

Show and tell. Ask the students to bring something in class which they like. It could be a postcard from a foreign country that their friends have sent them, a stuffed animal that they love etc.
Get Mum/Dad to come to class.