Fruit salad

Handa’s Surprise by Eileen Browne - but if you don’t have a copy you will be able to apply the activity ideas to a text of your choice or access a free version as a signed story at www.teachinglibrary.co.uk. 

Develop pleasure in reading, motivation to read, vocabulary and understanding by: 

• becoming very familiar with key stories … , and retelling them 

Understand both the books they can already read accurately and fluently and those they listen to by: 

• drawing on what they already know … 
• discussing the significance of the title and events 
• making inferences on the basis of what is being said and done 
• explaining clearly their understanding of what is being read to them

Before reading the story, look at the cover of the book and ask questions such as these: 

• Where is the story set? 
• Who is Handa? 
• Why is she carrying fruit on her head? 
• Predict what the surprise might be. 
• Look at the blurb on the back cover. Does this give us any more clues? 

Then share the text with the class if you have it in print or online. The suggested text introduces seven different fruits (banana, guava, orange, mango, pineapple, avocado and passion fruit; tangerines are mentioned too) which Handa puts in her basket to take to her friend as a surprise, but on the way various animals are tempted by the fruit. This story works well alongside the recipe related to this lesson, Fruit Salad.

 After reading:

• Talk about each fruit with the children and ask which ones they have heard of or tasted.
• Ask the children to help you to find the descriptive words. [e.g. soft, yellow banana, tangy purple passion fruit]
• Which fruits did each animal take? [e.g. monkey: banana, elephant: mango]
• Who got the biggest surprise at the end? [Handa, as her basket is full of tangerines]

Retell the story in different ways: 

• Role play. The children could make or download masks to help them play the different characters and animals.
• Get the children to create a series of pictures to sequence as an aid to retelling the story or to make their own story maps to reinforce the characters, sequence and events.

Read words of more than one syllable that contain taught GPCs 

• Read a suitable book that tells a story about fruit; e.g. Handa’s Surprise by Eileen Browne.
• Prepare some picture cards linked to the story you chose.
• Have pictures of fruits from the story (in Handa’s Surprise these are banana, guava, orange, mango, pineapple, passion fruit, avocado and tangerine) in a basket or other container. A download is provided.

Invite one child at a time to pick a fruit picture from the basket:

• Ask them to name the fruit.
• Get all the children to say the name and clap it.
• The child holding the fruit needs to identify haw many syllables there are in the name of the fruit. [mango – 2; pineapple – 3; etc.]
• Continue until all the fruit names have been explored in terms of syllables.

 The cards could also be used for other games, such as ‘Snap’ and ‘Pelmanism’.

Write sentences by: 

•  Saying out loud what they are going to write about 
•  Composing a sentence orally before writing it 

 Discuss what they have written with the teacher or other pupils 

• Make lists of vocabulary together to name and describe the fruits that are in the story and/or on the recipe card for Fruit Salad.
• Use the lists to model how to say and then write simple repeating sentences about the fruits in your list – e.g. My guava is sweet smelling. My apples are crunchy. My strawberries are juicy. 
• You may ask children to repeat this independently by writing signs with descriptions of the fruits for a fruit stall or grocers’ role-play area.

Pupils should be taught to: 

• Develop their understanding of question marks 

Handa's Surprise is a story that contains lots of questions – e.g. ‘I wonder which fruit she’ll like best?’, ‘Will she like the soft yellow banana … or the sweet-smelling guava?’

• Display the text to find the questions and question marks in the story with the children.
• Ask the children to think of other questions they could ask– e.g. ‘Which is your favourite fruit?’, ‘Do you prefer oranges or bananas?’
• Model the formation of a question mark. Ask the children to write it in the air and then on the board / a mini whiteboard.
• Write some simple sentences on the board and ask the children to read them for you, identifying which need a question mark.