1. (Listen and Draw a Route)
The Pied Piper
(Listen and Draw a Route)

2. Level : 2,3 Age group : B,C Time : 30 minutes
Aims : - Language: to practice listening for detail, prepositions of movement.
- Other : to practice map skills, spatial awareness
Description : The teacher tells the story of the Pied Piper of Hamelin. The children listen and draw where he led the rats on map.

3. Preparation :
Make two copies of the map for yourself, and a copy of the map for each child.
Draw the route on one of your copies of the map. Leave the other one blank to show the children.
Practice telling the story.

4. In Class:
Show the children a picture of a tall man with a flute and lots of rats. Ask the children if they know who he is.
Tell the story of the Pied Piper (see the story at the next slide)
Give the children their copies of the map and check that they understand the English for the main features (bridge, hill, castle, road, house, wood, river). You can ask them to write the words on their own maps.

5. 4. Explain that you are going to tell them where the Pied Piper took the rats and that they must draw it on the map. 5. Describe the route in English, once before they start to draw, so that they get a general idea, then again a couple of times while they are drawing. 6. Let them compare their routes, then describe the route once again, and finally show them your master copy so that they can check their work.

6. The Pied Piper
Once upon a time there was a town called Hamelin. The people in the town had a problem: the town was full of rats. There were in the streets, in the houses, in the schools, in the shops, even in their beds. ‘We must get rid of the rats!’ the people said. But how? Then one day, a strange man came to the town. He wore a tall hat and had a flute. ‘I can get rid of the rats’, he said. ‘What will you give me if I take them all away?’ ‘Lots of money!’ said the people.

7. So the Pied Piper started to play his flute
So the Pied Piper started to play his flute. Strange music came out of the flute, and soon rats came out of all the shops, houses, and schools. The road was full of rats. They all followed the Pied Piper. The Pied Piper led the rats: Over the bridge, up the hill, down the hill, round the castle, along the road, past the little house, through the garden of the big house, into the wood, out of the wood, and into the river.

8. Follow-up 1 :
give the children sentences from the story with words missing. They have to look at their maps to guess the missing words.
Follow-up 2 :
ask the children to make up their own routes and describe them to each other.
Follow-up 3 :
move the classroom furniture to represent the map and get the children to act out the route as you tell the story

9. Comment
Remember that you can make this activity easier or more difficult by using more or less complicated language. to make it easier you can repeat words or sentences, or to make it more difficult you can add details that are not necessary for drawing a route, such as ‘and there were brown rats an black rats and big rats and small rats’- the children have to listen harder.

10. GOOD LUCK