The following theme plans use greeting cards as the stimulus for a range of cross-curricular activities that have relevance for children aged 5 to 11 throughout England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales.
Through participating in the activities children will have the opportunity to:
- develop their knowledge and understanding of different faith groups and nationalities within their school community
- write rhymes/greetings for a variety of purposes
- handle data
- develop their knowledge and understanding of money and measuring
- develop an understanding of the importance of written social communication
- use written communication to reinforce friendship and develop social skills
- enjoy creativity, exploring, generating ideas, designing and making greeting cards
Amanda Fergusson,
Chief Executive, Greeting Card Association
Barry Wiles,
Education Manager, Royal Mail Group
Using the plans
The plans can be used as a source of ideas for units of work on communication and celebrations, for ‘one-off’ lessons on measuring, handling money, writing rhymes and designing and making cards, or for special end-of-term/year activity weeks/days.
Each plan provides learning intentions, a resource list and outline for a number of activities for the given theme. Teachers can adapt the ideas to suit the individual needs of the children they teach and it is left to teachers to decide on the most suitable class within a school for a given activity. Depending upon the way the task is introduced, the level of independence expected of children and the time allowed for each activity can be adapted to suit the individual needs of children throughout the primary age range.
Copy Masters are included on: sizing cards for postal charges, ideas for card making, a design sheet for Design and Technology and one showing how to write ‘Happy Birthday’ in a variety of languages. In addition, a list of challenges based on greeting cards is given.
The PDF download below also indicates the curriculum areas that are the focus for each of the outlined theme plans. Clearly, however, due to the cross-curricular nature of the greeting cards topic the areas of the curriculum promoted will depend on the way teachers use the plans and activities.