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- ‘O Junior ‘o le Ui‘i TSM >
- Activities
Activities
Before reading
Prior knowledge
If it is some time since you completed Matā‘upu 15, revise the sports and activities vocabulary your students learned in that unit.
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
Brainstorm all of the sports and activities the students can remember in gagana Sāmoa.
Tell the students they are going to listen to and read a story that includes some sports and activities.
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:
- identify the main ideas or themes in the text
- describe which sports someone cannot play and give a reason, using adjectives or adverbs.
Reading the text
Tell the students to listen for any sports and activities as you read the story aloud. After this first listening, have them consult with a partner about which sports and activities they heard. For students who need support, list them on the whiteboard so they can just tick their list in the listening activity. For students who need less support, don’t write them down and ask the students to write them after the listening.
Read the story again and tell the students to check their sports and activities, as well as to listen for characters in the story, including names of people or groups of people. After this second listening, identify the sports and activities in the story as a class. Also identify the verbs that go with them, ta‘a‘alo, and ō e.
Put the students into groups of three to discuss what characters they identified in the story and anything else they picked up in the two listenings.
Give each group copies of the book and tell them to just look at the title and the cover illustration and to discuss what they think the title means and what they think the book is about. Discuss their ideas as a class. Confirm that the title means “Junior Is the Youngest” and write their predictions on the whiteboard to refer to after they read the story.
Have the students read the story and then work in pairs to fill in a table like the one below, using the words and phrases from the book (two example answers are given below). Ask them not to look at the glossary at the back of the book yet. Tell them to record words and phrases they don’t understand.
| Sport or activity | Junior can or can’t | Reason why |
|---|---|---|
| lakapī | e lē mafai ona ta‘alo Junior | E la‘itiiti tele ‘o ia. |
| ō e tāmomo‘e ‘i le paka | e lē mafai ona alu Junior (or e lē mafai ona ō e tāmomo‘e ‘i le paka Junior) | E telegese tele ‘o ia. |
When the pairs have completed their tables, discuss the correct answers as a class. Ask the students what words or phrases they had difficulty understanding. Prompt them to use the illustrations and the context to make guesses about what the new language means.
Point out the glossary at the back of the book and tell the students to use it in the next task. Assure them that you will go over other new language after the next reading, and encourage them to keep trying to work it out.
Have the pairs read the story again and complete the right-hand column in the table below (some example answers are given).
| Adjectives and adverbs | Reason why |
|---|---|
| la‘itiiti, telegese, pu‘upu‘u tele ‘o ia | ‘o Junior o le ui‘i |
| fiafia lava | mai mātou tinā matua ma tamā matua e tāfafao |
| pele lava ia | ‘o Junior o le ui‘i |
| pito sili ona lelei | e taumafai mālosi |
Have each pair answer the following questions in English or in gagana Sāmoa, as appropriate for your class.
- When is Junior unhappy? Why?
- When is Junior happy? Why?
- Who thinks Junior’s great? Why?
When the students have finished, go through each page together, reading it aloud and prompting the students to use familiar words, the glossary, the context, and the illustrations to help them understand the language. Fill in the table and answer the questions, using English or gagana Sāmoa. Note particular phrases or sentences, such as e lē mafai ona ________, and E ________ tele ‘o ia, that you want to focus on later.
After reading
Discuss the predictions the students made before reading and ask how they were the same as or different from the story.
Have the students discuss, in pairs or small groups, the advantages and disadvantages of being the youngest. Share your ideas as a class.
e lē mafai ona …
As a class, brainstorm all of the sports and activities the class can name in gagana Sāmoa. List these down one side of the whiteboard. Brainstorm all of the gagana Sāmoa adjectives that they know to describe people, and list them down the other side of the whiteboard.
If necessary, revise the words for family from Matā‘upu 7.
Introduce, in gagana Sāmoa and with a photo if possible, one of your friends or family. Make two sentences about them and a sport and an activity, using these structures from the book.
“E lē mafai ona ta‘alo ________ ________ . E ________ tele ‘o ia.”
“E lē mafai ona ō e ________ _________. E __________ tele ‘o ia.”
(Explain that with these sentences you are using the sport or activity as well as ta‘alo and ō e because there’s no opening phrase giving this as there is in the book.)
Write your two sentences on the whiteboard, leaving gaps for the sport or activity, the person’s name, and the adjective. Tell the students to work in groups and make similar sentences in gagana Sāmoa about their friends or family. As they are working in their groups, rub off more and more words from each of the sentences on the whiteboard, and perhaps from the vocabulary lists too.
If you would like to do this activity twice, or you think your students would find it difficult to talk about their friends and family, you could first do the activity with the set of sports cards you used in Matā‘upu 15. (Note that it’s probably best not to have them make sentences about classmates, because they could be insulting.)
To extend students, you could draw their attention to the use of ‘auā in the last sentence of the story and have them use this to join the two sentences.
When the groups have finished the activity, have them share some of their sentences with the rest of the class. Alternatively, you could support the students to group the people they talked about with the adjectives that describe them and write a summary of their descriptions.
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:
- 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?