Farm animals talking box

Target: attention and listening

• Who's talking?

  You will need all the grown-up animals in the box for this activity. 

  Take the lid off the box (keeping the contents hidden from the children). You can use this as the introduction to the box. 

  Make it enticing, “I wonder what’s in here? What could it be? I can hear something talking. Let’s listen!” Put your hand to your ear to show the children that you’re listening.

  Make the noise of 1 of the animals, such as “moo”. Ask the children, “Who’s talking?” 

  If they don’t answer immediately, make the animal sound again and say “Listen, again”. If they still are unable to guess correctly give them a choice of what it could be. For example, “Is it a cow or a pig?”

  When they’ve identified what animal is talking, take the animal out of the box.

  Continue making the sounds of the animals until you have identified all of the animals in the box.

  To extend the activity, leave all the animals in the centre of the group. Allow the children to take turns making an animal sound for the other children to guess. Each time they guess correctly place the animal back in the box.

• Let's hide

  You will need all the grown-up animals in the box for this activity. 

  Take the animals out of the box 1 at a time. Talk about what each animal is called. You could start this activity with “Who’s talking?” to tune in the children’s listening.

  Place the animals around the room (so that they are still visible). Make it into a hiding game by saying “All of the animals are hiding from us. I need you to go and find them for me. Jo (gain the child’s attention first by calling their name) can you go and find the cow”.

• Let's hide top tips

  • Repeat the instructions, 'Find the cow. Where's the cow?" Emphasise the key word (cow).
  • Use pointing to show the child which direction to go in. 
  • Ask another child to go with them to help.

• Where do I live?

  Equipment needed in the box:

  • field
  • barn
  • grown-up animals

  You will need to make sure the children are familiar with the names of baby animals if you want to use them too.

  Help the children to make a field for animals to live in. You could get a large piece of paper and colour it in green or stick green tissue paper on it. Or you can even go outside and get some grass. If you have fence pieces from a toy farm you could also use them.

  Keep talking about how you are making a “field” throughout this process. Talk about how animals live in fields. Have the children ever seen animals in a field? What animals have the children seen in a field? You could use photographs of animals in a field to show the children.

  Next, you need to make a barn. Again you could use a barn from a toy farm already available in your setting, or make one out of a box. Emphasise to the children that you are making a “barn”. Talk about how the animals go in the barn when it’s cold or wet.

  Once the field and barn are ready, start taking the animals out of the box. Talk about each animal and their name. Explain to the children that you are going to put them to live somewhere. Give each child a turn. Ask them things such as “Put the cow in the field”. The child needs to understand the 2 keywords, cow and field, in order to complete the instruction.

  Once they have done this, talk about what the cow is going to do. For example, “She wants to eat some grass”.

• Where do I live top tips

  • Make sure the child is looking at you before giving the instruction.
  • Repeat the instruction again if they do not respond.
  • If they pick up the wrong animal or put it in the wrong place, encourage them to “listen again” and then repeat the instruction.
  • If they are still unsure then break the instruction into 2 parts. For example, “Find the cow”. When they have found the cow then say, “Put it in the field”.

• Big and little concepts

  Place the following items into the box:

  • field
  • barn
  • grown-up animals
  • baby animals

  Before starting this activity, talk about the animals in the box, sorting them into big and little animals (grown-up and baby animals).

  Complete the 2 key word level activity, but this time you can add the concept of big/little. For example, "Put the little cow in the field”. The 3 key words are little, cow and field.

  This activity has been taken from Language Steps by Amanda Armstrong.

Target: using language

• What's in the bag?

  You will need all the grown-up animals in the box and a cloth bag. 

  Encourage all the children to close their eyes. Place one of the animals from the talking box in a cloth bag. The children can open their eyes again and as the children pass the bag round everyone sings:

  This is the way we pass the bag, pass the bag, pass the bag
  This is the way we pass the bag,
  I wonder what’s inside?
  (Sing to the tune: Here we go round the mulberry bush)

  When the song stops, the bag stops with that child. The child needs to take the animal out of the bag, and say what it is. All of the other children make the sound of the animal.

  Then encourage the children to close their eyes and you can swap the animal in the bag for a new animal. Then sing again.

  Don’t force children to name what it is. If they are unsure, offer them a choice, like "Is it a dog or a cow?".

• It's story time

  You'll need some story books in your setting for this activity. 

  Link the animals in the box with a story from your setting. Each time one of the animals is mentioned in the story, take the animal out of the box.

  Make comments about what happened in the story, like "That was a big horse". This will encourage children to use language more than it would to ask them questions. But here are some questions you could ask about the story.

  Easy questions include:

  • What is this?
  • Who is sleeping? 
  • Where's the cow?

  Harder questions include:

  • How did the horse feel?
  • What will happen next?

  Asking 'why?' questions are hardest. Remember, there could be lots of different answers. 

  Extending the activity

  Once you know children are familiar with a story, encourage them to retell the story to you. Let the children use the animals in the box to help tell the story.

  Taking 1 animal at a time out of the box, encourage children to tell their own story. You could bring in other items from around your setting to link into the story. Or encourage children to go and find something. This activity has been taken from the Nursery Narrative Pack.

• Velcro or magnetic board

  You will need:

  • pictures of Old MacDonald
  • a barn
  • a tractor
  • a tree
  • farm animals

   You could use real objects instead, without the Velcro board.

  Place Old MacDonald on the board. Allow 1 of the children to choose between the barn, tractor and tree. Place the object they have chosen on the board next to Old MacDonald.

  Allow another child to choose 1 of the animals, like the cow. Ask them, “Is the cow going under or in the tree?”. Show them with the pictures how this looks as you say it. This is meant to be funny.

  Then sing:

  Old Macdonald had a tree
  Ee i ee i o
  And in that tree he had a cow ee i ee i o
  With a moo, moo here

  Emphasise the words "tree", "in" and "cow", and point to the items as you sing the names of them. For example, point to the tree as you sing "tree". 

Target: extending vocabulary

• Baby animals

  You will need all the grown-up animals and baby animals in the box.

  Take the animals out of the box, and help the children to match the baby animals with their parent.

  Encourage the children to talk about what the animals look like to help them to match correctly. Then introduce the vocabulary for the baby animals. 

Target: play and imagination

• Let's pretend

  You will need all the animals in the box.

  Encourage 1 of the children to put their hand into the box and select 1 of the animals. Name the animal or encourage the children to name it, such as “Cow”.

  Talk about what sound a cow makes. How do they move? How many legs? What do cows do?

  Encourage the children to pretend to be cows. This may look like moving around the room on all fours, mooing and pretending to eat grass. Continue with other animals from the box. 

  If the children aren't joining in, use the adults in the room to model or choose a confident child to take the lead.

  To extend the activity, allow 1 of the children to pretend to be an animal out of the box. The other children have to guess what animal they are. 

Target: speech and sound awareness

These activities are for older children.

• Let's clap

  You will need all the grown-up animals and baby animals in the box.

  Open the box. Take 1 of the animals out of the box. Encourage the children to name it, such as “horse”. Show the children how you can clap the name, for example “horse” has 1 clap (1 syllable). 

  Some children will be able to count the number of claps immediately. Other children will need some support. Use something visual for the children to see as you count, such as bricks. Use 1 brick for each syllable/clap. As the children become more confident, encourage them to take the bricks out as you say the word. 

  • Donkey has 2 syllables/claps.
  • Sheep has 1 syllable/clap.
  • Pig has 1 syllable/clap.
  • Dog has 1 syllable/clap.
  • Horse has 1 syllable/clap.
  • Cow has 1 syllable/clap.
  • Calf has 1 syllable/clap.

  Be aware of other versions of the word that children may use. For example, “piggy” has 2  syllables/claps and “horsie” has 2 syllables/claps.

• Rhyme

  You will need all the grown-up animals and baby animals in the box.

  Take the animals out the box 1 at a time, and and say rhyming words for the animals name. You could make up silly sentences with the more competent children incorporating these rhyming words. You can use words and non-words.

  Examples of rhyming words include: 

  • sheep: beep, cheep, deep, heap, jeep, keep, leap, peep, reap, weep
  • pig: big, dig, fig, jig, wig
  • dog: bog, cog, fog, hog, jog, log,
  • cow: how, now, row, sow, wow

  Remember that words may be spelt differently but still rhyme.

  To extend the activity you can start up a rhyme box at pre-school of things that rhyme. Objects are best but you can use pictures too. Start with a simple everyday word or object (simple consonant-vowel-consonant words are best). For example, cat, hat, rat, mat, bat, sat.

• Let's sing

  5 little ducks

  You will need 5 plastic ducks and a mummy duck to use as props as you sing.
  

  5 little ducks went swimming one day
  Over the hill and far away.
  Mother duck said QUACK QUACK QUACK QUACK
  And only 4 little ducks came back.

  4 little ducks went swimming one day 
  Over the hill and far away.
  Mother duck said QUACK QUACK QUACK QUACK
  And only 3 little ducks came back.

  3 little ducks went swimming one day 
  Over the hill and far away.
  Mother duck said QUACK QUACK QUACK QUACK
  And only 2 little ducks came back!.

  2 little ducks went swimming one day 
  Over the hill and far away.
  Mother duck said QUACK QUACK QUACK QUACK
  And only 1 little duck came back.

  1 little duck went swimming one day 
  Over the hill and far away.
  Mother duck said QUACK QUACK QUACK QUACK
  And all her 5 little ducks came back.

  ---

  Baa Baa Black Sheep

  Baa, baa black sheep,
  Have you any wool?
  Yes Sir, yes Sir, 3 bags full.
  1 for the Master,
  And 1 for the Dame,
  And 1 for the little boy who lives down the lane.

  ---

  Old MacDonald

  You will need a cloth bag for this activity. You can also choose to use a Velcro board if you want.

  Place animals from the box into a cloth bag. Find a picture or draw a picture of old MacDonald and make him a farm. For example, some fences for fields and a building for a barn. Take an animal out of the box, such as a cow. “Look, Old MacDonald has a cow! What sound does the cow make? Moo!” Then sing “Old MacDonald had a farm ee i ee i o, And on that farm he had a cow...”

  You could whisper the sounds for the baby animals.