Week commencing 1st June

Activity 1

The book for this week is ‘The Big Carrot’ by Alison Hawes and Stuart Trotter. I have chosen this book because it is a simple retelling of the familiar book ‘The Enormous Turnip’, but, in this story, a big carrot replaces the enormous turnip.

Read the book together with your child. Look at the cover and ask: What do you think the man on the cover wants to do? What do you think is going to happen in the story?

Read the title together. Ask: How big do carrots grow? Have you ever seen such an enormous carrot?

Look at pages 2 and 3 and talk about the characters. Ask: What do you think the characters are asking or saying? Do you think they are being helpful?

Activity 2

This is a great video of ‘The Big Carrot’ as read by a great storyteller. He does not use the actual book or any props but, instead, he uses different voices and actions to make a very simple story much more exciting. He does not even say the title, so you can ask your child if he knows the story. Also encourage them to copy the actions and the repeated phrases, using the same intonation as the storyteller (my favourite is THE BIIIIIIIG CARROT!).

Activity 3

Read the story together one more time. Ask your child to tell you who helped to pull the big carrot. Can they remember the order in which the characters joined the line?

Ask: Who finally helped to pull out the big carrot? Was it who you expected to be able to help Tom and the others?

Look at pages 10 and 11. Ask: What are they doing on page 11? Why do you think Tom made carrot soup for everybody?

Activity 4

Use the story map below and yesterday’s conversation about the book for your child to retell ‘The Big Carrot’. He may choose to add the actions from yesterday’s storyteller.

Activity 5

This week’s book is very simple, and your child has been learning how to read many of the words in the phonics activities. Today is their turn to read the book to you! Chances are they will try to retell the story using their own words; this is great but encourage them also to read words with as much help as they need. They should feel amazed of how they are able to actually ‘read’, and you should be very proud!