Activities in What’s Up
• Contest: A Mythical Adventure – page 20
• Fallen Letters Puzzles – pages 16 & 23
• Southeast Asia’s Nature Parks – page 17
Activities at ideas.whatsup.sg
VIETNAM’S PRECIOUS PRIMATES (page 16-17)
What is being done in Vietnam to protect primates. Followed by an engaging “Primates of Vietnam” poster celebrating primate diversity. More about wildlife with “The magic of starfish” (page 14–15), a photo essay about their resilience as well as vulnerability.
Synthesis and Transformation – For English, level 1 DOWNLOAD
Individual exercise. To practice creating complex sentences. The student forms compound sentences with the given simple sentences from the primates story. Provided: connecting words. ⭐
Singapore’s Special Birds – For English & Science, level 2 DOWNLOAD
Pairwork. To experience observing species diversity. Students (i) watch a video featuring birds found in Singapore (ii) do a bird count in a location of their choice (iii) choose one bird species to study in greater detail. With two graphic organisers. ⭐
Amazing Starfish Mosaic – For Science & Art, level 2 DOWNLOAD
Individual activity. To experience creating scientifically-correct artwork. Steps for learning about starfish and making an eggshell mosaic depicting one type of starfish accurately.
WHY NATURE LIKES PATTERNS (page 19)
Explains why nature has produced hexagonal rocks and other geometrical formations. Going from the factual to the mythological, “Why people love mermaids” (page 20), inspired by the Little Mermaid remake, looks at human fascination for mermaids.
Snowflakes and Triangles — For Math & Art, level 2 DOWNLOAD
Individual exercise. To explore drawing fractals. Students (i) sketch as many patterns as they can find in nature (ii) learn about the Koch Snowflake and Sierpinski Triangle (iii) use the starter templates to create bookmarks with this fractal artwork.
YOUNG BUT NOT HELPLESS (page 1)
The cover page introduction leads into “Children spend 5 weeks in the jungle after their plane crashes” (page 6–7) about the four children who used their ancestral knowledge to survive in the Amazon forest. With side bar “Formula for survival”. “Good things happen when people reach out and help one another” (p22-23) is about reaching out and helping beyond one’s family,
My School’s Community Spirit — For English, level 2 DOWNLOAD
Individual exercise. To make meaning of “community spirit”. A comparison table to (i) describe minga and gotong royong (ii) articulate what “my school’s school community spirit” means to the student. ⭐
ARCHITECT HELPS TO FLOODPROOF PAKISTAN, ONE HOME AT A TIME (page 9-10)
A retired architect, Yasmeen Lari, returns to work to help floodproof homes in Pakistan. More stories about inspiring individuals and groups: “Sam Kerr: the Mbappe of women’s football?” (page 25), “This father will not leave his disabled son behind” (page 27), and “Volunteers save desperate migrants at sea” (page 7–8). Even “Tee & Boba” (page 28) try their best to save the world!
Unexpected Superheroes — For English & Art, level 2 DOWNLOAD
Individual work. To use first-hand observations to generate ideas for character description. The student (i) observes three people (ii) uses the observations to create an alter ego and superhero (iii) writes a brief essay how the created superhero saves the day.
Standing Strong in Hard Times — For Social Studies & CCE, level 2 DOWNLOAD
Groupwork. To practice perspective taking from various standpoints. Students (i) complete a cloze passage (ii) watch a video about floods in Pakistan, write journal entries from the standpoints of flood survivors (iii) reflect on what enables people to stand strong in hard times.
MY STUFF: BACKPACKS (page 18-19)
How the trusty backpack evolved to become the great organiser it is today. Side bars: “Backpacks that turn into desks” and “The Japanese randoseru”. Then, we shift the focus to a far greater organiser, the human brain. Read “The voice in our head when we read” (page 21) to find out more.
More Than Just A Backpack – For English & Art, level 2 DOWNLOAD
Individual activity. To explore ways of improving on an existing product. After watching a video about a backpack innovation, students imagine, draw, and write about their dream backpack.
Bag of Stories – For English & CCE, level 2 DOWNLOAD
Groupwork. To strengthen the classroom community. Every student lists backpack contents in the given diagram. In small groups, they share stories about some items in their backpacks. Each group then presents to the class something interesting, heartwarming or delightful about the show-and-share by members.
DANGEROUS TOURS: SPACE TOURISM TAKES OFF (page 11)
Captures the excitement of Virgin Galactic’s first commercial flight. “Other dangerous tours, from mountain heights to ocean depths” (page 12–13) reports on the growth of other high-risk tourist travel. With side bar “A deep-sea dive that ended in tragedy” (page 13), about the infamous Titan submersible.
True or False? – For English, level 1 DOWNLOAD
Individual exercise. To improve reading comprehension. An exercise of ten true-or-false statements about the Virgin Galactic story. ⭐
Past Tense Writing – For English, level 2 DOWNLOAD
Individual. To practice changing words from present to past tense. A portion of this story was written in present tense to make the event more vivid, and this lends itself well to letting students apply their grammar skills outside of an exam paper context. ⭐
To Go or Not To Go – For English & CCE, level 2 DOWNLOAD
Individual exercise. To develop decision-making skills. Based on the article, the student lists pros and cons to decide whether to spend half a million dollars to fly in Virgin Galactic.
⭐ Answers to these activities will be emailed to teachers on the IDEAS mailing list. To join the mailing list, please email your name, designation, and school to ideas@whatsup.sg.
