The project was successfully executed in the five Saturdays of August 2020. During this period, children were taken through a minimum of a 45-minute reading and another 45 minutes activities session with about a 30 minute break interval. The first month’s session was headlined with the book ‘The Good Dinosaur’ which comes along with its activity book.
Monitoring
The first Saturday was very encouraging as children displayed their eagerness to participate in the sessions. However, it was observed that some of the children dozed off, apparently, not conversant with what was going on.
The second session significantly improved as children made time to find words they did not understand from the reading. A collaborative environment was created in the next 45 minutes of the session when children were encouraged to share results of their activities with their colleagues in a presentation.
Much more factors affecting the flow of the sessions were taken into consideration in the third session. For example, it was observed that the seating arrangements of the children affected their confidence in reading aloud. As such, all children in the lower classes were grouped in one section while the other children in the higher classes were grouped in a different section.
The fourth week saw the completion of the book for the month ‘The Good Dinosaur’ coupled with finding, understanding and construction of sentences with new key words from the book. Also, kids were given the free will to choose any activity from the activity book for creativity. The fifth and final session in August, the kids took the first 1 hour 30 minutes to watch the movie ‘The Good Dinosaur’ after which the moral lessons and general review from the first week to the final sessions were discussed.
Evaluation
Means of verification
- Children were asked to produce a list of new words they have learnt and give their meanings.
- Children were asked to form sentences with new key words.
- Children were encouraged to use new key words in conversations among themselves.
Outcomes
- Children can construct sentences using new key words.
- Children can confidently converse among themselves using new key words.
- Children can produce new words and give their meanings, respectively.