Hi everyone,
I love how many learning opportunities there are for 'The Great Pet Sale'.
Ranging from money (in pounds), to animals beginning with 'p' to empathy and compassion.
As of writing, this book is currently out of print, but if you can find it second hand on eBay, in your local book shop or via amazon using the link at the bottom of the page, then do, it will be a fabulous addition to your library of picture books.
Learning Ideas
Communication and Language
Re-tell the story from the beginning using just the pictures.
Role-play going to the pet shop and choosing an animal. What questions will you need to find out? What it eats? Where it sleeps? How to keep it safe and happy?
Research one of your favourite pets from the story and give a 1 minute presentation.
Physical Development
Move like an animal. Snake - slithering on their belly. Gecko - crawling on hands and feet. Turtle - crawling then stopping to pull in arms and legs into the body. Parrot - flying and flapping arms. Mouse - scurrying quickly. Komodo Dragon - moving slowly and heavy.
Using an effective pencil grip while writing and drawing.
When children are first starting out with scissors they can find regular scissors difficult to use, especially with the closing AND opening action. They tend to use them like sheers to snip the paper. I like to use squeeze scissors like these ones from Easi-Grip as once they have developed their hand strength they can move onto regular scissors.
Personal Social Emotional Development
Track the moods of the mouse throughout the story. How did he feel when he first met the boy? How about after they met the Komodo Dragon? How did the mouse feel at the end of the story.
Build word power by encouraging children to use words other than happy/sad. e.g worried, upset, downhearted, miserable, dejected, cross, ecstatic, cheerful, merry, jolly, delighted, etc.
Reading
Simple CVC drawings. Ask children to draw a picture of one of the animals but you need to use one of the words to change your picture. These could be written or printed on to flash cards. Can you draw a picture of a parrot but it should be "r-e-d", or a penguin with long "l-e-g-s", or perhaps a mouse with a big "b-u-m"!
Can you think of different animals that each start with a letter of the alphabet? A for anaconda, B for bat, C for cat, D for Dog, etc.
Writing
Draw a picture of our favourite animal and write its name using phonetic knowledge. Remember in Nursery we aren't looking for spelling to be correct, mark-making is fine. If we are working with a Reception child then we would be hoping for a phonically plausible attempt to name the mouse e.g. "m-ow-s"
Numbers
Each animal in the story has it's own price in the pet shop. Children could write a list of prices that they hear in the story.
Make their own price list poster with pictures and prices.
Count out pennies till they reach the correct amount to buy each animal.
Set up their own pet shop with their own teddies and play money. (Personally I much prefer using a big bag of 1p and 2p. With nursery I tend to use 1 pence coins as each penny is worth one, which makes it much easier to count. Reception could use a combination, counting in 2's and 1's.)
Shape Space and Measures
Recognise the shape of the coins and begin to count the sides and corners (20p/50p/£1)
Invent your own money or redesign the £1 coin. What shape could it be? What about a triangle coin? How much would it be worth?
Understanding of the World
Used in combination with the animal research task talked about earlier, using the computer together can be a good introduction to the fact that a computer and/or iPad can be used to retrieve information.
You could always go on a trip to the pets shop to find out about the different types of animals they have and suggested care advice. In my experience, if you contact your local Pets At Home branch, visits can be organised with your children/class and someone will be available to talk to the children.
This might be the perfect time to get a pet if you don't already have one at home, do make sure you do your research together so children have just as much ownership of it as you do. hopefully this will make them more inclined to help out with feeding, grooming and cleaning.
Expressive Arts and Design
Make salt-dough animals and cook them. Paint them afterwards to finish them off. (Play-dough animals will be just as good.)
Make animals mask from paper plates.
Animal puppets on lollipop sticks or a little wooden spoon mouse like this one from I Heart Crafty Things.
A colourful hanging parrot again from I Heart Crafty Things.
Have a lovely week,
Big Fox
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