Foundation Class 

Storytelling in the Prep Room

Oral language in the classroom is important. 

In the Prep classroom we have been making oral language experiences meaningful in a way that enables me to help student develop different skills. 

Picture books have been a terrific source of language modelling in our class. They contain much more complex vocabulary and sentence structure than spoken language. They also engage the student’s imaginations. 

We have a lovely selection of picture books in our school library which I use as a ‘jumping off point’ for learning.

Last week our story of the week was ‘Room on the Broom’. The students listened to the story, we explored some of the vocabulary in the story and discussed how to retell the beginning, middle and the end.

The students were then given an opportunity to retell the story by becoming the characters and acting out the story.

Storytelling/story acting supports the student's language and literacy skills, social and emotional development, and creativity. Allowing the student’s to act out these stories has assisted them to build their comprehension and make the story their own. The student’s gained an understanding of the characters, the structure, and the themes in this picture book.

It was also great to see the confidence of the students start to progress. They will all get an opportunity to be a character in one of our story books this term. I definitely have some Logie award winning actors and actresses in this class! 

(L to R )    Bridget was a fantastic witch with her friend the cat played by Eliska who purred like a real cat. Ted played a great dog and was able to join the witch and cat on her broom. Savannah played the bird and she added her own bird calls to make the character her own. Nate was the frog who came out of the bog. He jumped around and was very excited when the witch made a new and improved broom, adding a shower for the frog. Evie's award winning performance of the dragon was fantastic.