Elmer
Personal Social and Emotional
Discuss the character of Elmer. Why does he want to be a grey colour? How might he be feeling? Discuss being different, unique, and special. Hide some elephant soft toys or pictures around the outdoor area. Encourage the children to work as a team to find them.
Communication and Language
Encourage the children to look at the story-themed Elmer poster and talk about what they can see. Create a safari soundtrack featuring the noises of a range of safari animals. Play the sounds for the children and encourage them to identify the safari animal. For example, a lion roaring, an elephant trumpeting and a snake hissing.
Physical Development
Create an elephant wash! Provide some small-world elephants, some mud and some soapy water. Encourage the children to help clean the muddy elephants! They could use sponges, scrubbing brushes and pump soap dispensers.
Literacy
Read the story of ‘Elmer’. Ask the children to recall what the story was about.
Mathematics
Make a collection of small-world elephant toys. Talk about the different sizes of the toys and they could then be used for a variety of counting activities. Challenge children to explore and create repeating patterns to decorate Elmer.
Understanding of the World
Learn about elephants and where they live. Encourage children to share their own experiences of seeing elephants in a zoo or safari park. Use an atlas or a globe to look at places around the world where there are jungles and where elephants live in the wild.
Expressive Art and Design
Children could make a handprint elephant. They could print and decorate an elephant using colourful paint and then add sequins or plastic gems for extra decoration. Talk about colours with the children. Encourage them to mix their own paints and to mix colours to create new colours and shades.
Focused Vocabulary
Elephant, Elmer, Different, Unique, Patchwork, Colourful, Red, Green, Yellow, Blue, Pink, White, Purple, Black.