Patterned Paper Snakes (Cooperative)



I hanged the snakes outside the classroom with children's help



During this activity I tried to integrate numeracy with literacy, the numeracy target is to complete a  pattern and the literacy is to Identify different letters in  (Snake) word e.g. I say the /s/ sound and the child have to point at the letter. It’s  simple and the children enjoyed it.

Materials needed :

·       Colored card papers

·       Tape

·       Yarn

·       Googly eyes

I did this activity in pairs because through my observations I noticed that most children cooperate better while they work in pairs. I showed the children a model and then I asked them to do it independently each child choose a color and then I started the pattern for them and they have to complete it to create a patterned snake. They were talking and when they finished they had to glue the snake eyes, they decided that each will glue one eye!

 

two children  making a snake



After they finished the task I asked them to play cooperatively with the snake and I added two tales for the snake so they can play with it. During this activity the children were familiar with cooperative activities because they were experiencing it during the three weeks. They cooperate very well and my mentor noticed that too and she add cooperation in her activities too.



   

children playing with the snake togather





   I think  that this activity was good because the children were doing the activity together and they play with it afterwards. This adds to the activity more interaction not just during the task. This activity can be done with the whole class during the circular time by giving each child colored papers and start the pattern and let children complete it and then we can add yarn ends for each child and they can play with it all. It sounds risky but why not !

 

Finger Paint

Another pattern activity that I did was the finger paint cooperative activity. I started the activity by asking two children to work together in one paper. Each have to choose one color and they have to make a pattern by finger painting, they have to take turns in order to complete their pattern.

After each pair finished their pattern, I asked them all to do a finger paint pattern in one paper. Each choose their favorite color. My target was to encourage cooperative learning and review pattern. The children cooperated well, they were taking turns in order to complete the pattern the activity was very simple and they knew how to work with each others. It was more challengeable when I asked the whole group to work together in one paper and they missed the pattern however, they were excited about doing this activity together.

 I could take this activity a step further by differentiating it. The low ability children choose one color but the high ability children choose two or more colors because I noticed that the activity was easy for the high ability children so by differentiating it  would  be more challengeable.