Do you have any favourite activities that are always effective? How do you review the learning that has taken place throughout the year?
Explore the ideas below and then add your own suggestions in the comments!
Mark Warner:
Here are some ideas to try:
- Make a timeline or diary of the events / activities that have taken place over the course of the academic year.
- If you have digital photos that have been taken throughout the year, the children could make a photo slideshow of their year. If you have software like Comic Life, they could make their own comic strips.
- Ask children to review what they have done well this year and what they would like to achieve in their next year.
- Get them to write a letter to themselves in a year’s time, telling them about the exciting things that they have done this year and what they hoped to do in the coming year.
- Could they write a guide to being in the current year group for the children coming into your class next year?
Phil Wright:
I’m a big fan of using current affairs in quiz type activities and looking at issues that aren’t covered normally. I often give kids the chance to look at one aspect of history they’ve always wanted. We have done lessons on Who killed Kennedy? What’s going on in the Bermuda Triangle? Who was Jack the Ripper? The kids really got into being investigators.
Jbeddington:
Evaluate the reaching or not of goals. Set some new goals and plan how to achieve them.
Michelle:
Ask students in groups to brainstorm ideas for keeping up their level of English over the summer. They’ll come up with lots of ideas from watching DVDs in English, reading magazines/song lyrics, using online websites, etc. Put their ideas on the board and then get students to decide which ones they’ll definitely try to do, which ones they might do and which ones they won’t do, and give reasons for their choice. This always creates a lot of discussions and works well as a way for setting goals for the summer hols.
Calix:
Maybe at the end of the year, you could play a song or songs (e.g. The future has arrived, I can feel it, I can go the distance, Be the change, Don’t stop believing).
Do you have any other suggestions? Let us know in the comments…