Activities / ‘O Fea o ‘Oe e Tīgā?TSM / Storybooks / Gagana Sāmoa / Pacific languages / Home

Before reading

Prior knowledge

Revise the vocabulary and structures for Matā‘upu 5 and Matā‘upu 12, in particular, the possessive pronouns la‘u,lo‘u, and lou.

Revising la‘u and lo‘u

Have the students work in groups of three or four. Give each group a set of cards with pictures illustrating vocabulary they have already learned on one side and the word with the correct pronoun for “my” (la‘u or lo‘u) on the other side. To take their turn, a student picks up the card, looks at the picture and says the word and the correct pronoun. Then they turn it over to see if they are correct. If they are correct, they keep the card. If they are wrong, they put the card on the bottom of the pile. The winner is the student with the most cards at the end.

Pronunciation of new language

If possible, ask a native speaker of gagana Sāmoa to model the correct pronunciation of any unfamiliar words for you and the students. This person could read the story to you and the class as the first reading, or you could record them reading it and play the recording to the class.

Introducing the book

Give pairs or small groups of students one page of the story with just the illustration and no words. Ask each pair or group to discuss what they think is happening and to list as many gagana Sāmoa words to describe the illustration as they can.

Have each group present their illustration and their list of words to the rest of the class, using only their picture and gagana Sāmoa words. After each pair or group presents, create and add to a class vocabulary list for the book. Offer some suggestions for the new vocabulary they might need in order to describe what they see in the illustrations (using the glossary as a guide).

Now show the students the cover and the title of the book. Ask them to predict what they think the story is about.

Learning intentions

Share the learning intentions and discuss them with your students. Some examples of possible learning intentions for reading this story are given below.

After reading the text, I will be able to:

read and discuss a text
read dialogue in gagana Sāmoa aloud with fluency
identify and use the everyday and the respectful terms for certain parts of the body
identify and use the possessive pronouns la‘u, lo‘u, and lou
ask and answer questions about what hurts.

Reading the text

Read the story aloud to the students. Ask them to write down any words for body parts that they hear when they listen. When you have finished reading, have the students work in pairs to:

compare their lists
put the words into two categories, everyday words and respectful words.

Give each student or pair of students a copy of the book. Tell them to look through the book for words to add to their lists of everyday and respectful terms for body parts.

Read the story aloud to the students again. This time, tell them to follow the text and look at the illustrations as you read. Read with lots of expression to help them get the gist of the story. Pause at the end of each page to give them a moment to look at the text and the illustrations and to talk to their partner.

Point out the glossary at the back of the book and tell the students to use it in the next task.

Where? Who? What?

Tell the pairs of students to work through the book together and fill in a table like the one below. They need to identify the setting (a school classroom) only at page 2 and then the setting is the same for the other pages. For each page, they need to identify the characters and what they say and/or do. Tell them that there won’t always be information in each section (for example, a character may do something but not say anything).

You may want to complete page 2 as a class before they work in pairs. Tell them to just write as much as they can understand and not to worry if they can’t understand everything. They can discuss and write notes in English, gagana Sāmoa, or any other language they know. But they need to be prepared to explain their ideas to the rest of the class. To adapt this task for different abilities, you could:

assign just one page to a pair and then ask each pair to share their information with the class
provide tables with some of the information filled in, to help scaffold students who need a bit more support.

Page number	Where?	Who?	What do they / does she say?	What do they / does she do?
2–3
3–4

When the studets have finished, go through each page together, reading it aloud and prompting the students to use familiar words, your class vocabulary list, the glossary, and the illustrations to help them understand the language. Fill in a class version of the table, using English or gagana Sāmoa. As you fill in the table, you could:

note particular phrases or sentences such as ‘O fea o ‘oe e tīgā? that you want to focus on later
check the students’ lists of everyday and formal words for parts of the body and prompt them to identify why they are used in the context of the story
point out the phrase Mānaia le gāluega. (You could use it to praise and encourage the students and tell them to use it with each other.)

Reading aloud

Invite the students to read the story aloud in groups, with each student taking a different part. Their goal is to read fluently, with correct pronunciation and expression. Each can give the others in their group feedback on this.

After reading

Ask the students to share what they liked about the story, or about the reading by members of their group.

Asking and answering questions about what hurts

Read the dialogue between Ianeta and Selaima on pages 6–9 aloud as a class, with you saying each sentence and the class repeating it after you. Tell the students to close their books. You take Selaima’s part and gesture to a student to answer as Ianeta, choosing a different student for each answer. Prompt the students and allow others in the class to help if they have difficulty remembering the answers. If necessary, put Ianeta’s answers on the whiteboard with just the pronoun and the word for the body part missing (for example, Leai, ‘e lē ‘o tīgā ______ ________.)

When you have done this twice, add Selaima’s part, gesturing to a student to ask Selaima’s question and then to another student to give Ianeta’s answer. Again, write parts of Selaima’s questions on the whiteboard if necessary (for example, E tīgā _____ _____?) Go through the questions and answers in this way several times, erasing more from the sentences on the whiteboard each time so that the students have to remember more.

Hold up a picture of someone having a minor accident. Prompt the students to ask you what hurts and if a body part hurts – Faiā‘oga, ‘o fea o ‘oe e tīgā? E tīgā ______ __________? Answer in the positive or negative, according to what is shown in the picture. Give pairs of students sets of cards showing people having minor accidents. Tell them that one student picks up the card and the pair imagines that the person holding the card is the person in the picture. The other student asks the question, using the appropriate form of address (for example, Tīna, Suga) and words for body parts according to who they imagine the person in the picture is (for example, a girl their own age or an adult neighbour). Then they change roles, with the other student picking up the card.

Reflecting on the learning

Have the students refer to their learning intentions and reflect individually or discuss in pairs whether they have fulfilled the intentions. Ask the students questions such as:

Can you explain when everyday and respectful language is used and give some examples?
What helped you understand the story?
How can you use the new language and remember it?
Is there some other language from the story that you want to learn and remember?
What do you think are the next steps in your learning?

Click here for the English version of the story.

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