Materials for the four week period

"Students come to formal education with a range of prior knowledge, skills, beliefs, and concepts that significantly influence what they notice about the environment and how they organize and interpret it. This, in turn, affects their abilities to remember, reason, solve problems, and acquire new knowledge."- Bransford, Brown, and Cocking, How People Learn (2000, p. 10). Students are not only intellectual but also social and emotional beings, and all these dimensions interact to impact learning and performance. The Standard-Based English Language Curriculum for Malaysian Primary Schools is designed to provide pupils with a strong foundation in the English language. Teachers should use Standard British English as a reference and model for teaching the language. I have read up the curriculum specification for Language Arts and create the activities which can help students in their linguistic, cognitive, aesthetic and moral development. The materials which I choose are storybooks from different genre which titled, Mother Hubbard by Gavin Bishop and The Very hungry bear by Bland, Nick, (1973). These books focusing on Year 3 students. For the first two periods, I will use the first storybook which titled, Mother Hubbard. This book is a fiction and also comes from family and friends genre. It is a story about how a mother treats her dog like her own son till the day it dies. She loved it so much till she can still see the shadow of it doing funny things like dancing, drinking and laughing even though her dog was already dead. These books are very interesting and students can understand it with simple language and a lot of pictures used to demonstrate the event . I can help students to develop their linguistic development by recasting or rephrasing the statement made by the children from the books into a question to them. These indicate an interest and then I shall elaborate on that interest. Other than that, I can also read the books together with them and let them repeated the words as they are learning new words and keep it in their vocabulary. These are part of the learning process that they will go through in learning new language. While they are getting better with language and thinking, they still tend to think about things in very concrete terms. In the aspect of cognitive development, Jean Piagets theory focuses not only on understanding how children acquire knowledge, but also on understanding the nature of intelligence. Thus, students need to be facilitating by the teachers, rather than direct learning. The classroom also needed to be setting up with full of exploration and discovery. The book I choose, Mother Hubbard is full of pictures and colours which really beautiful and enjoyable to be read. I can also used plays or dramatisation in

Language Arts class for this book. These could affect their aesthetic development as they could give their own ideas and imagination to complete the plays. They will be given masks to differentiate their characters and doing the assimilation of the story in front of the class. As a teacher, I could support them in moral development by values clarification. I need to help students to clarify what their lives are for and what is worth it. The best steps are by not pushing them in doing what is supposed to do and what are not. Some people learn better through mistakes. The most important thing is the moral values used in the story book need to be emphasized so that students know that that are what they supposed to do or to be. In Mother Hubbard, the longing of the mother towards the dog symbolise the relationship and love in a family. These kind of moral values and storyline that expressed by me could helps students to feel the importance of love in our life. Students will tend to cry, happy and enjoyed this story through their feeling and this is good in helping their moral development. For the last two periods, I will use The Very Hungry Bear also helps a lot in students linguistic development as the book is so beautifully illustrated. The bear meets the polar bear and learn sharing and kindness along all the way from the bear. The rhyming phrase makes it so enjoyable to read. In the other hand, The Very Hungry Bear teach the students to realise that even though we came from different family, and background, we can still be friends. The sound affects of this book also great. Kids loved waiting to see what was going to happen next. The rate at which a child progresses through the cognitive developmental succession may vary, especially from one culture to another. Thus, although formal operations are logically independent of the reality content to which they are applied, it is best to test and give them the opportunity to explore the books with their friends as they may learn and explore more. Aesthetic development also important in ensure the children gain something from the storybooks. These stages should be understood as guides to helping students think more deeply and reflectively about art, not as diagnostic tools or lock-step hierarchies or using a sophisticated understanding of culture and history to interpret The Very Hungry Bear and its significance in our life. These can also be modulated by different culture in Malaysia but still united because of the humanism and unity, just like the two bears that still help each other although they are different in colour. Moral development for Year 3 students will be focuses on the emergence, change, and understanding of morality. In the field of moral development, morality is defined as principles for how individuals ought to treat one another, with respect

to justice, others welfare, and rights. This kind of behaviour should be practiced in class. I shall also write rules which can be used by them to enhance their morality.

The approach adopted in the Standard-based curriculum is underpinned by the following pedagogical principles which one of it is back to basics. It is essential for teachers to begin with basic literacy skills in order to build a strong foundation of language skills. The reason I choose those two storybooks are because of the strategy of phonics is introduced in the book. Simple words and always repeated allow pupils begin to enjoyed read. Learning also supposed to be fun, meaningful and purposeful lessons, which emphasise meaningful contexts, allow pupils to learn by doing in fun-filled activities as I already plan. Other than that, to accomplish the principles of teaching is learner-centred; I tried various activities and approaches such as lessons and curriculum materials which suit the differing abilities of pupils.

Next, the principles which emphasised assessment for learning also important as these can be observed by the activities done by them after finish reading the story with me as their teacher. A range of activities can be utilised in order to assess pupils performance orally or in writing. The plays that they will perform later will assess themselves based on their understanding. Besides, character-building infused an important principle which needs to be inculcated through the curriculum is character building. The lessons based on the storybooks such as love, friendship and longing have to be incorporated in teaching and learning in order to impart the importance of good values for the wholesome development of individuals.

As a conclusion, education is not only about the subjects we get in our academics but also many essential things in life like -ethics, morals, responsibility, manners, behaviour, relationships ,respect, knowledge and many other important things in life. So importance of education should never be neglected as it plays a great role in shaping up over all personality of a person. Storybooks are one of the various genre in literacy which help students to love and happy in learning English through Language Arts for Year 3. Books have the power to benefit toddlers and preschoolers in a myriad of ways. As a teacher, reading storybooks to students is one of the most important things I can do to prepare them with a foundation for academic excellence.