Pig the Pug

I choose a favourite children’s book, Pig the Pug by Aaron Blabey.  The story follows a day in the life of Pig (who is a rather selfish pug) and his play time with Trevor the sausage dog.  All Trevor wants is one toy, but Pig refuses to share. As a poor Trevor’s luck would have it, Pig goes into a toy-snatching frenzy and makes a rather large pile of toys. In his blind selfishness, Pig gets what’s coming to him.

This book is a great way to introduce the different types of emotions through the two characters Pig and Trevor. The humours facial expression on the two dogs make the story engaging. I would read aloud this book to the class.

I then used Voki to create a digital avatar, and used my own voice (a gruff voice) to represent Pig.   The only thing lacking was the great facial expression that make the book Pig the Pug such an engaging story.

Please find my link to my version of Pig the Pug on Voki.

http://tinyurl.com/yxmwyyz7

This book as a gateway into exploring the different emotions of the students. How do you think Pig would be feeling here?  Why?  (Using facial expressions, stance, movement and direct speech as indicators). What about Trevor?  How do you think he will be feeling when Pig takes all the toys? Students are to as a group explore different emotions with their facial expressions, body language, movement, and voice.

• How do we show anger is our face? In our stance? In our movement? In our voice?
• How do we show happiness in our face? In our stance? In our movement? In our voice?
• How do we show sadness in our face? In our stance? In our movement? In our voice?

The aim of this exercise is to:

• Explore student’s emotional and social understandings, how they feel and express emotions through their face, body language, movement and voice.
• Build empathy and social skills as children recognise and respond to other people’s emotions and feelings;
• Develop children’s capacity to represent human emotions and feelings through drama.

Then students would take turns at a hot seat role playing the two charters Pig and Trevor.  Hot Seating is a strategy in which characters, played by the teacher or a student, are interviewed by the rest of the class.  This activity invites students to recount the events in the book, explore motivation and two perspectives highlighted in the book.  In this case students are told that a detective has come to investigate, as someone said that Pig was pushed out the window, not fell. 

It is important to first prepare the student/s who will be in the hot seat to successfully take on their role, in this case there are two main characters, Pig and Trevor (Neelands and Goode, 2019). The teacher/student in the hot seat needs to determine who they are in the interview, where they are, and why they are in the hot seat. The students (audience) not in the hot seat can take turns asking questions. These student’s may need support to prepare questions from their personal view point to ask the character in the hot seat. 

The aim is for students to deepen their critical thinking about the characters, including their emotions, thoughts and motivations. Students are to remain in character whilst they are in the hot seat.

This fits well into the Australian Curriculum for Foundation to Year 2: Drama:

Content Description: Use voice, facial expression, movement and space to imagine and establish role and situation (ACADRM028)

• communicating verbally by using the voice to explore and show role and situation
• communicating non-verbally by using facial expression and movement to explore and show role and situation
• practising movement within a space to create the difference between their performance space and the audience space

References:

 Australian Curriculum Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA). (2018). The Arts: Drama.  Retrieved 5^th April 2019 from https://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/f-10-curriculum/the-arts/drama/

Oddcast. (2019). Voki.  Retrieved 5^th April 2019 from https://www.voki.com/