Tell me about the sea

Tell me about the sea Objective: Show the diversity of life. There are not just fish in the sea. There are animals of all shapes and colours. Some of them have carapaces, others have shells or hairs or feathers. The animals need food in order to grow. They eat algae and other, smaller animals. They have all adapted their lifestyles to suit where they live - on the sand, on the rocks, under the water and/or above the water. Material:. Pack of cards: «Maria s Friends». 11 cards: Maria, shark, dolphin, skate, crab, sealion, penguin, seal, lanterfish, Moray eel and jellyfish. Cuddly toys can be used in place of the cards.. 2 stories enclosed: «Maria s Dream» and «Martin, the Little Shark».. CD: «A la mer».. A bull shark tooth.. A piece of sandpaper.. Pack of cards: «Shark». 6 cards: dwarf shark, leopard shark, whale shark, lemon shark, bull shark and hammerhead shark. Rules: This worksheet is a teaching aid to help you tell the children a story. There are two stories available - «Maria s Dream» and «Martin, the Little Shark». You can change them and stage them in any way you prefer. You can find other stories (in books, on the Internet etc.). You can even make up your own or write one with the children. NAUSICAA Centre National de la Mer - Educatif - Boulevard Sainte-Beuve - BP 189-62203 Boulogne-Sur-Mer Cedex France - Téléphone : 33 (03) 21 30 99 99 - Fax : 33 (03) 21 30 93 94 - Site web : www.nausicaa.fr - E-mail : education@nausicaa.fr - N habilitation : IM 062100013 Société d exploitation du Centre National de la Mer - SAEM au capital 1 809 560 - RCS Boulogne-sur-Mer B 378 074 744 00020

1 - Maria s Dream Material. Pack of cards: «Maria s Friends» and «Sharks» or use cuddly toys instead.. A doll belonging to one of the children.. CD: «A la mer».. A bullshark s tooth. It s half past eight, time for Maria to go to bed. Maria goes up to her room. Mummy brings her cuddly toy and slowly Maria falls asleep. Then she begins to dream. She dreams that she s walking along the beach. The sand is soft under her feet. It s a sunny day! She listens to the sounds of the seashore... Ask the children to close their eyes, listen to the sounds of the seashore and try to recognise them. (Tracks 17 «Waves on pebbles» and 27 «Seagulls», on the CD). An extra touch... 1)Use one of the children sdolls as Maria. 2)Make a stage set withlarge pebbles, a sandpit, kitchen paper rolls and blue cloth. Put the crab cuddly toy under a stone. 3)Get each of the childrento draw and cut out a large colourful fish. Put a string on it so that they can hang it round their necks during the «Little Fish» part of the story. Get each child to draw and cut out a shark, a Moray eel, a jellyfish and a skate. They will be used during the story. 4)Play at «Spot the Difference» with the cuddly toys or cards. Compare a shark and a dolphin, or a sealion and a seal. A setting for a story... Nausicaá Maria wonders if it s the same under the water. She d love to go and see. How could she do that? Suddenly, a pretty fairy appears and says, «Would you like to swim beneath the waves, Maria?» «Oh yes!» replies Maria. «But I can t breathe underwater.» «I ll give you a magic power so that you can breathe underwater like a fish. Abracadabra!» With a swish of a magic wand, Maria dives into the water, breathing like a fish. «There s not as much light,» thinks Maria. «And noises sound different.». Get the children to mime a fish breathing. Place one hand, flat, on each side of the face then lift each hand and open the mouth alternately. Maria swims and swims and swims. Suddenly, in front of her, there are crowds of little fish of all colours swimming here and there in every direction. Get the children to «swim» to music like little fish (tracks 1 «The Extraordinary Fish» or 16 «Cavalcade» on the CD). Ask them to keep standing and to move using their arms as fins. Remind them to open and close their mouths so that they breathe like fish. (For an extra touch, get each child to hang their coloured fish round their necks). Mind out, little fish! Martin the shark is on the prowl. And what does a shark do with little fish? He eats them! So what are they going to do to avoid being eaten? All the little fish group together to make themselves look bigger. They become a shoal of fish. Ask the children to swim again to music (tracks 1 or 16 on the CD), like the little fish. Use the shark cuddly toy to swim among the fish. As soon as the shark arrives, all the children must move together to form a group. Move around and get the little fish to swim away as soon as they see the shark arriving. QUICKLY, LET S MAKE A SHOAL! Any little fish that is not with the group is sure to be chosen by the shark and eaten. A shark will often attack a fish on its own, or one that is weak, old or ill. Maria watches the shark from a distance and learns how to recognise it. Use the shark cuddly toy to show how to recognise it - the fin on the back, the pointed tail that is larger at the top than at the bottom and the gills on the side through which it breathes. A shark has large pointed teeth with which to eat the little fish. Let the children touch a real shark s tooth. Martin has finished eating. He swims away. Fold up the shark drawn and cut out by the children accordion style. 2

Where s Maria? She s hiding behind the rocks. Maria hears a little voice coming from under a rock. «Mind out! I m here!» «Oops, sorry. I didn t see you there. What s your name?» asks Maria. «I m Craby the crab.» «My name s Maria. What are you doing under the rock?» «I m hiding so that I don t get eaten. I m protecting myself from the sun too. This is my home. Have you seen my friend, Kate the skate? She hides just next door to us.» «I can t see her.» says Maria. «Take a good look.» replies Craby. «Oh, she s the same colour as the sand!» «Then there s Trish the jellyfish in the water.» «And she s transparent! Just like the water!» says Maria. «And Morag the Moray eel in her pipe.» The children each place the drawing that they have cut out in the right place on the background. Every animal has its special place. The crab is under a stone, the skate is in the sand, the jellyfish goes on the blue fabric and the Moray eel is placed in a kitchen paper roll. Maria is starting to get worried. «It s getting darker and darker.» she says. «Yes, the deeper you go in the sea, the darker it gets.» replies Craby. «But there must be monsters down at the bottom of the sea.» shrieks Maria. Craby laughs. «No, no. There are just some rather weird-looking fish.» «Ooh, I d like to go and see them.» says Maria. «Well, I prefer to stay under my rock. See you!» Maria swims down towards the dark. She sees a tiny light flashing. What is it? Oh, it s coming from a fish. Maria would like to get closer but she hears some strange noises above her, like a dog barking. «That s a pity but I ll go and see the fish that live in the dark another time.» murmurs Maria. And she swims back up. «Is that you barking like a dog?» asks Maria. «Yes.» «What s your name?» «I m Speedy the sealion.» «And I m Maria. You look like a dog with your little ears and whiskers!» says Maria. «Yes, but I m not a dog.» replies Speedy. «Are you a fish?» «No, because I ve got hairs, not scales - and I can t breathe underwater either. I have to come back up to the surface to breathe, in the fresh air.» «Just like me!» says Maria, excitedly. «Would you like us to swim back up to the surface together to breathe, out of the water and in the fresh air?» asks the sealion. «Love to» replies Maria. So here we are, back on the beach where there s more light. Maria says goodbye to Speedy and the sealion returns to the depths to play. He dives and jumps to say goodbye to Maria. She is just waving back when she hears, «Psst, psst!» She gently lifts up the rock and there s Craby. «Hey, Maria, you are coming back, aren t you?» «Of course I am,» replies Maria. «We re best friends.» Maria puts the rock back as it was before to protect Craby from the sun and give him a hiding place. Craby shouts : «Watch out for Martin the shark!» Maria wakes up. Her cuddly toy is at the foot of the bed. It s a big crab called... Maria gets up. She s in a great mood as she sings: (To the tune of «Who s afraid of the big bad wolf») Who s afraid of Martin the shark? No, not us! Oh no, not us! Who is friends with Craby Crab, That is us, yes, us! Who s afraid of Martin the shark? No, not us! Oh no, not us! Who is friends with Craby Crab, That is us, yes, us! 3

2 - Martin, the little shark... Material. Pack of cards: «Maria s Friends» and «Sharks» or use cuddly toys instead (shark, dolphin, crab, auk).. CD: «A la mer».. A bullshark s tooth.. A piece of sandpaper. An extra touch 1) Make a set with largepebbles and blue fabric. Place the crab cuddly toy under a rock. 2) Get each of the childrento draw and cut out a large colourful fish. Put a string on it so that they can hang it round their necks during the «Little Fish» part of the story. Dwarf shark Leopard shard Bull shark Martin is a little white shark. Like all sharks, he has a fin on his back. His tail is bigger at the top than at the bottom. What else has Martin got? He has fins that help him swim, from left to right and right to left. He has eyes. He has a mouth to eat and breathe with. On his side are... let s count... 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 lines. They re gills. He uses them to breathe with. Martin breathes underwater so he s a fish! And if he s a fish... Yes, he has scales all over his body. They re tiny and very close together. They help him to glide through the water. Ask the children to close their eyes and touch a piece of sandpaper. It gives the same impression as touching sharkskin. It s rough (like a cat s tongue). Martin the shark lives underwater. There are sharks in all the world s seas and oceans. Martin enjoys swimming from the surface of the sea down to its depths, looking for food. And what does Martin eat? Fish! In the sea there are fish of all the colours you can imagine, swimming together. Get the children to «swim» to music like little fish (tracks 1 or 16 on the CD). Ask them to move standing up, using their arms as fins. Remind them to open and close their mouths so that they breathe like fish.(for a little extra touch, get the children to put their coloured fish round their necks). Martin glides silently through the water, looking for a small fish to eat. Watch out, little fish! What can they do to avoid being eaten? All the little fish group together to make themselves look bigger. A group of fish is called a «shoal». Ask the children to swim to music again (tracks 1 or 16 on the CD), like the little fish. Use the shark cuddly toy to swim among the fish. As soon as the shark arrives, all the children must move together to form a group. Move around and get the little fish to swim away as soon as they see the shark arriving. QUICKLY, LET S MAKE A SHOAL! Any little fish that is not with the group is sure to be picked out by Martin and eaten. Sharks often attack fish that are on their own, weak, old or ill. Martin the little shark has good, pointed teeth to eat with because he doesn t have a knife or fork. He often loses his teeth but new ones grow in, pointed and sharp. When a tooth is worn out, it falls out and a new one grows in its place. When this one is worn out, it will fall out again and a new one will grow, and so on throughout the shark s life. It s not like us. When our baby teeth fall out, the new teeth have to last us all our life so we have to take care of them by brushing them and going to see the dentist. Martin also has more teeth than us. He has three rows of teeth at the top and three rows at the bottom whereas we have one row at the top and one at the bottom. Martin the little shark looks evil with his big pointed teeth but he s not really evil. He doesn t mean to hurt; he just uses his teeth to eat with, that s all. He is dangerous with his sharp teeth but he s not evil. Let the children touch a real shark s tooth. Lemon shark Whale shark 4

Everybody s afraid of Martin the little shark. He s sad and lonely so he decides to set off in search of his family. He d like to find other sharks like him. So he swims and swims and swims until he meets Mr. Craby. Listen, sing and repeat track 18 («The crab») on the «A la mer» CD. Martin asks Mr. Craby, «Are you like me?» «Oh no, I m not a shark; I m a crab, I ve got pincers and walking legs that let me move sideways.». Martin is disappointed so he swims and swims until he meets Dicky. Listen, sing and repeat track 19 («My three dolphins and me»). Martin says, «You re like me! You have a fin on your back, just like me.» «But I m not a shark; I m a dolphin. I have a fin and I swim but I can t breathe underwater.» Martin is disappointed so he swims and swims until he meets Jimmy. Martin asks, «Are you like me?» «Oh no, not at all. I ve got feathers. I m a bird but I can t fly. I m an auk, not a penguin, though penguins are my cousins.» Martin is disappointed so he swims and swims, looking for other sharks. Martin meets Sebastian. Martin ask, «Are you like me?» «Yes, I m a shark but I m not as big as you. I m the smallest of all sharks. I m Sebastian the dwarf shark. «Martin asks: «Are you like me?» «Yes, I m a shark but I m not the same size as you. Martin s happy because he s met another shark but Sebastian is different to him. Who has Sebastian? Show the «Sharks» cards one at a time. Or give the cards to the children and let them find the right one. Martin continues to search, swimming and swimming until he meets Dale. Martin asks, «Are you like me?» «Yes, I m a shark but I m not the same size as you. I m the biggest of the sharks. I m Dale the whale shark.» Martin s happy because he s met another shark but, again, it s different. Martin continues to search, swimming and swimming until he meets Hugo. Martin asks, «Are you like me?» «Yes, I m a shark but my head is different to yours. I m Hugo the hammerhead shark. «Martin s happy because he s met another shark but, again, it s different. Who has Hugo the hammerhead shark? Martin continues to search, swimming and swimming until he meets Bobby. Martin asks, «Are you like me?» «Yes, I m a shark but my teeth are different to yours. I m Bobby the bull shark.» Martin s happy because he s met another shark but, again, it s different. Who has Bobby the bull shark?` Martin continues to search, swimming and swimming until he meets Lenny. Martin asks, «Are you like me?» «Yes, I m a shark but I m a different colour to you and I have black spots on my body. I m Lenny the leopard shark.» Martin s happy. He s met another shark but it s different. Who has Lenny the leopard shark? Martin continues to search, swimming and swimming until he meets Lemo. Martin asks, «Are you like me?» «Yes, I m a shark but I m a different colour to you. I m yellow, like a lemon. I m Lemo the lemon shark.» Martin s happy. He s met another shark but it s different. Who has Lemo the lemon shark? Sort the sharks from smallest to biggest. Show their real sizes with string. Martin the little white shark is happy. He s made lots of new shark friends so he invites them all to a party, the Festival of the Sea! Everybody will be able to dance - Craby the crab, Dicky the little dolphin, Jimmy the auk and all the little coloured fish. Right, it s time to get moving now. Dance to the music or get ready for a party. 5

Craby, the crab Dicky, the dolphin

Martin, the shark Trish, the jellyfish

Kate, the skate Morag, the moray eel

A seal Jomo, the auk

Speedy, the sealion Maria

Bernie, the lanterfish

A dwarf shark A leopard shark

A bull shark A lemon shark

A hammerhead shark A whale shark