Talk Box ─ Activities for Teaching Oracy With Children Aged 4-8

Talk Box offers teachers tried and tested ways of developing children's talk skills, and provides inspiring lesson plans and fresh, curriculum-based activities which will help children to learn collaboratively through their talk with classmates. At the heart of the activities is the ‘Talk Box' - a box of ever-changing interesting objects which provide a focus for class and group discussion.

Talk Box activities are based on these linked ideas:

• Young children need their teachers to help them make sense of the world;
• Talk is children's most effective medium for explaining, discussing and describing;
• Children learn very well from one another when taught how to do so, and are a good resource for one another in the classroom;
• Children may be able to talk, but they are not often aware what sort of talk can help them to get the best from the education they are offered;
• Straightforward teaching of essential talk skills and understanding should be undertaken in every primary school classroom.
• By becoming articulate speakers, children develop their thinking and reasoning skills.

The activities included in this book are built around specific learning objectives for speaking and listening and use talk contexts involving subjects such as literacy, numeracy, science, humanities, citizenship and IT. Each activity includes a resources list and suggestions for plenary discussions and extension activities. There are photocopiable worksheets and suggestions for further reading.

Talk Box will help you teach children to engage in the educationally effective kind of discussion known as Exploratory Talk, where everyone's viewpoint is considered, opinions are justified with reasons, and decisions are made together. This revised edition includes new activities, updated curriculum links, current classroom research findings, a home-school link section and a comprehensive introduction to the theory on which Talk for Learning is based.

Lyn Dawes has taught science and literacy for PGCE and BEd courses at Bedford, Northampton and Cambridge Universities and is a school governor.

Claire Sams has a focus on Special Needs in Education and is currently involved in teaching the Open University course for Teaching Assistants.

Both write from first-hand experience, having taught in primary schools for many years.