Discovery learning activity with Estonian story

Theme: "How the fox punished his tail"

Children age: 2-3 years old

Objectives: The child names the best-known forest animals and their characteristic features. The child knows that dogs are domestic animals. The child knows that dogs protect domestic animals from the other forest animals. The child monitors the fairy tale and is able to visualize its development. The child knows the fox's body parts and is able to show and tell what something is needed for. The child counts to three and is able to answers the question: how many there are?

Tools: real fox fur coat, mask for the teacher, hand puppet (dog), paper tail with cotton watt tip for each child.

Activity:

The teachers and teacher assistant are staging the Estonian fairy tale "How the fox punished his tail". The teacher is dressed like a fox in pretty orange and wearing real fox fur coat and tail. The teachers assistant has hand puppet and is dog. The other teacher is storyteller. The teacher, who is dressed as a fox, is among children and acts as the story goes. At first the dog is chasing the fox (they run a little in the classroom) and the fox is running to the cave (the cave is a playing corner) to hide. There they start to ask what each body part was doing during the chase. And with children they also show the body part and mimic the activities. When they come to the tail, they all show how the tail goes hop to one side and hop to other side. And the puppet dog pulls every child tail (the cotton watt tip comes off easily) and ruffles them like a dog. The fairy tale game sparked exitement among the children.

The same activity can be done also outside.