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Why I Use This Lesson

I use this lesson as around this time of year my grade 2 elementary school students are doing lessons centred around weather, seasons, clothing for the seasons and animals that live in water etc. This allows me to bring all that they have learnt together in a fun and topical way. Let me know if you’ve done similar things with either elementary or older students as well.

Lesson Plan: Rainy Season Detective

Topic: What can you see in the rainy season?

Age: Grade 3-5 Elementary School

Lesson Length: 50 minutes (can be shortened if needed)

Learning Objectives: By the end of the lesson, students will be able to:

• Identify common rainy season vocabulary.
• Ask and answer simple questions using:
  • What can you see?
  • I can see…
• Describe a picture using simple English.

Target Language

Vocabulary: taken from the textbook I use and is not exhaustive but this could be shortened or expanded depending on your situation

• rain
• umbrella
• raincoat
• boots
• puddle
• frog
• snail
• hydrangea
• rainbow
• cloud

 Sentence Patterns

Teacher: What can you see?

Students: I can see a frog. I can see two umbrellas. There is a rainbow.

Materials to Prepare

• Flashcards (rainy season vocabulary)
• Picture cards
• Whiteboard
• Worksheet with a rainy-day scene

1. Warm-up (5 minutes)

Show today’s weather.

Teacher asks: How’s the weather today?

Students answer:

• It’s sunny.
• It’s cloudy.
• It’s rainy.

Teacher follow up: Do you like rainy days?

Students vote by raising hands.

2. Vocabulary Introduction (10 minutes)

Introduce vocabulary one picture at a time.

Example:

(show frog)

Teacher: Frog!

Students repeat.

Use actions whenever possible to get the students more engaged.

Rain – fingers falling

Umbrella – pretend to hold umbrella

Boots – stomp feet

Frog – jump

Snail – move slowly

Then shuffle the cards and play the next game.

“What’s Missing? Game”

1. Put 8 cards on the board.
2. Students close eyes.
3. Remove one.
4. Students guess.

Is the ____ missing? etc

3. Detective Search Game (10 minutes)

Hide vocabulary cards around the classroom before class or dueing class by asking students to close their eyes.

Students work in pairs.

When they find a card they must tell the teacher: I can see a snail!

Teacher responds: Great detective work!

Collect points for each pair.

If the class is large then this activity can be done with a printed worksheet with animals hidden around the picture. Make it hard to engage students more.

4. Rainy Picture Talk (5-10 minutes)

Give each pair a large rainy-day picture.

Example picture contains:

• frogs
• umbrellas
• puddles
• children
• rainbow
• flowers
• snails

Students ask each other:

Studnet A: What can you see?

Student B: I can see three frogs. I can see two umbrellas.

Teacher walks around helping.

Extension for stronger students:

Student A: What colour is the umbrella?

Student B: t’s yellow.

Note: this can be done with the previous section if the class is large or to save time.

 

5. Create Your Own Rainy Day (10 minutes)

Students draw their own rainy-day picture.

Challenge:

Include at least:

• 3 vocabulary words
• one animal
• one person

Then write 3 sentences either below or on the back of the worksheet.

Example:

I can see a frog.

I can see an umbrella.

There is a rainbow.

Early finishers can decorate with extra details (maybe stickers if availablea).

6. Presentation & Wrap-up (5-10 minutes)

Invite volunteers.

Student shows picture.

Teacher asks: What can you see?

Student replies: I can see two frogs.

 

Finish with a quick review game:

Teacher holds up flashcards rapidly.

Students shout the English word.