'Giraffes Can't Dance' is an entertaining story that highlights the fact that everyone is different and self-confidence. It has a fun rhyming structure and is about Gerald, a giraffe, who learns to dance to the beat of his own drum and the other animals celebrate this.
This activity pack includes activities to support this text, which allow students to discuss, comprehend, make connections and understand the importance of never giving up and accepting everyone for the individuality. There are various activities that can be adapted and cater for Pre- Year 6.
Included in this pack:
*Tiered Vocabulary table- students can identify the varying complexity of words used in the story.
*Character Traits T-Chart- students can identify personal and physical traits of Gerald and use this to build other characters.
*Nouns, Adjectives and Verbs activity- students can brainstorm adjectives to describe various animals and verbs to describe the actions of the animals.
*Silly Sentences- students can choose a picture card (noun), an adjective card and a verb card to create a sentence. These may turn out to be silly and not make sense.
*2 x Rhyming activity cards where students can locate and match the rhyming words in the story and also think of some of their own.
*Compare Information T-Chart- students can record information about giraffes that are imaginative or factual and compare the two.
* Alliteration Activity Card- students think of adjective and verbs that have the same initial sound as the animal pictured.
*Perseverance Activity- students can make self-to-text connections and think about something they are already good at and something they may need to work on achieving.
*Giraffes Can't Dance Colouring sheet- this is a fun activity for students to colour and identify things from the story.
*Label the Diagram- students can research the physical features of giraffes and label the diagram.
Australian Curriculum content descriptions
Discuss how authors create characters using language and images (ACELT1581)
Listen to, recite and perform poems, chants, rhymes and songs, imitating and inventing sound patterns including alliteration and rhyme (ACELT1585)
Identify the parts of a simple sentence that represent ‘What’s happening?’, ‘What state is being described?’, ‘Who or what is involved?’ and the surrounding circumstances (ACELA1451)
Compare different kinds of images in narrative and informative texts and discuss how they contribute to meaning (ACELA1453)
Discuss texts in which characters, events and settings are portrayed in different ways, and speculate on the authors’ reasons (ACELT1594)
Discuss the characters and settings of different texts and explore how language is used to present these features in different ways (ACELT1591)
Draw connections between personal experiences and the worlds of texts, and share responses with others (ACELT1596)
Discuss how authors and illustrators make stories exciting, moving and absorbing and hold readers’ interest by using various techniques, for example character development and plot tension (ACELT1605)
Understand, interpret and experiment with sound devices and imagery, including simile, metaphor and personification, in narratives, shape poetry, songs, anthems and odes (ACELT1611)