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Washing Line
Subject: Foreign Languages
(This idea was contributed by Holly Evans)
Age Range: 5 to 11

A great way to learn the clothing vocabulary is to make a mini washing line. We use this with 3 years + in our lingo learners classes.

Two children hold the string and miniature pegs and felt clothing items are produced. If a child can tell you what an item is (e.g. jumper, sock etc) in the chosen language then they get to hang it on the line. We take turns with all the children having a go including the holders who swap and have a try too. This is also for revision of colours as the felt clothes can be cut from different colours.

Some other ideas...

Take an A4 sheet of paper and lay it 'landscape'.

Draw two posts and a line connecting them. We find it best to laminate these to avoid reproducing them time and time again. Clothes are cut from coloured card or alternatively made from fimo, which the children seem to love. One of our tutors even knitted little jumper shapes!

Then there are options. You can either play a lotto / bingo game using the vocab for clothes and colours seeing who gets a full outfit first or other ways are to get children to select an item from a bag and identify it before they put it on the line. If they can't identify it they have to pass it along and the child that gets it right gets to put it on their line. Again, the first one with an outfit wins. I am sure there are many other ways of playing this.

This alternative to the traditional hanging out game can be used in pairs / teams or if space is limited for using a 'real' washing line!


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