Carousel - All the Fun of the Fair

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This is a really good activity to get the students talkling and moving around the classroom. Very simple to set up and very effective.

This activity is ideal for revision or for a focused plenary.

The activity involves setting up (ideally) 4 ‘stations’ or areas. I always use the 4 corners of the room. In each corner I put a desk, several chairs and a piece of A3 paper (even better are the magic whiteboards as they can be re-used).

I then split the class into 4 groups and assign them each a station/ piece of A3 paper. On each piece of paper is a word or concept relating to the topic. From here it is best explained with an example…

In an English lesson, the teacher wants to revist the play Macbeth, and assess the students understanding of 4 of the main characters. The teacher has decided to use:

Macbeth
The Witches
Banquo
Lady Macbeth

The teacher has set up 4 ‘stations’ each with a piece of A3 paper in the 4 corners of the room. On each piece of A3 paper is a name of a character. The teacher splits the class into 4 groups and each group is assigned a character. The teacher then states that each group has 4 minutes to discuss each character and write down their thoughts on the character they have been assigned (key features, points etc).

Then, after 4 minutes, the students move to the next station/ character. They then have 3 minutes to read what the previous group has put and then add their thoughts to the piece of paper (nothing must be duplicated).

After 3 minutes they move to the next character. Here, they have 2 minutes to add to the previous two groups. Finally, they move again and have 1 minute to add to the previous 3 groups. Once the students have visited each character/ station, they then feedback their results for an open discussion.

What I love about this activity is that the students get to move around the room. They see what other students have thought and discussed and they have the challenge of trying to add new points to the previous groups points.

This activity works best when a topic can be split into different areas. For example:

Business Studies: Motivation: 4 areas could be Maslow, Talyor, Herzberg and Mayo

Geography: The different types of rainfall: Relief, Frontal, Convectional

I was at a school last week discussing this activity and a suggestion was that this could be used for exam questions. Where there are 4 different exam questions. The students spend time writing an answer then they rotate and see how they could imrpove the previous groups responses. An excellent variation.

Why not Give this a Go..........

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