Pantomime-a-tale

Pantomime-a-tale

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What is Pantomime-a-tale?

Pantomime-a-tale is an excellent cooperative learning SDAIE strategy where a teacher reads a text aloud, and students react to the story by miming the story or concept.

How does it work?

There are several different ways in which this strategy can be implemented: 1) a teacher can go through a text piece by piece, and have students elect a TPR movement for each concept or story progression. (Story vocabulary should most definitely be given a specific movement.) The teacher then reads the story aloud and the students respond by pantomiming what the teacher is reading. 2) Students are broken up into groups of 3 to 5 students, each group is given a character to pantomime actions for. Each group generates their own actions and the class performs the story while the teacher reads. 3) The students are broken up into small groups, they read through the story, generate actions for the text and read it within their group, while the rest of their team pantomimes the story.

Why should I use Pantomime-a-tale?

Pantomime-a-tale quite an adaptive SDAIE strategy, it can be used in non-fictional concepts like a frog's life cycle, or in a work of fiction. Pantomime-a-tale is great for ELLs because they are able to act out the vocabulary and move towards using academic language (CALP). Pantomime-a-tale is also a fun use of TPR which is great for student engagement.