Book Club: The Pirates Next Door by Jonny Duddle

June 27, 2017

Written by Alison

We have been working on inserting reading books during FunLab English classes with varying levels of success. As a rule we have found that in the bilingual setting children do not have sufficient vocabulary to follow more difficult story lines. However,the children loved the idea of the books and listening to stories in English. So after several different attempts to make book reading a success, we have created BOOK CLUB. BOOK CLUB is developed in three different parts:

Part 1: Introduce the relevant vocabulary for the children to understand the book you would like to read. We tend to use flashcards and different games such as “Take a picture” and “Memory”. Click here for the flashcards to use in “The Pirates Next Door”.

Part 2: Read the book. We suggest to create a reading corner. The children should sit in a circle around the teacher. We suggest that the teacher sit on a low chair. DO NOT TRANSLATE!!!! Read the book and use different voices, the images on the pages and ask the kids questions as you go along to make sure they are following but this needs to be done in English.

Part 3: Have the kids do a simple craft project which works on following instructions and the vocabulary introduced during the beginning of the lesson.

This type of approach works well with groups of 8 to 12 kids of the same age level. Remember to leave yourself time – we find that an hour and 15 minutes to an hour and a half is what it takes to be able to develop the book.

You will need:
A copy of The Pirates Next Door by Jonny Duddle
Corks
Craft Sticks
Black Paper
Pirate Stickers
Rubber Bands

The Pirates Next Door vocabulary development: shoes, summer, winter, pirate, eye patch, pirate boat, cannon, cutlass, treasure, to dig, rubber bands, corks, sail, craft stick, flag

Let’s get started:
Step 1: Join three corks together using two rubber band.