Activity overview:

Deconstructing a text: Students are given a text (recipe) that

can be modified depending on the students and text types
being studied. Using this text, students are required to
highlight the circumstances by listing them in a table as
either an adverb or prepositional phrase.

Curriculum link:

LANGUAGE Year 4:
Understand how adverb groups/phrases and
prepositional phrases work in different ways to
provide circumstantial details about an
activity (ACELA1495)

Instructions for activity:

1. Students are given the text to read and understand.
2. Students can individually highlight the circumstances in
the text and then place the word or phrase in the correct
column (adverbs or prepositional phrases).
3. Students are then to underline the preposition in each
phrase to show their understanding.
4. Once students have completed the table they are to
think, pair, share with a partner to check their answers.
5. The teacher can use this as an opportunity to further
discuss how adverbs and prepositions are used to provide
different circumstantial detail. A possible question the
teacher can pose to the students is;
As you can see, circumstances are used in procedures to
achieve several important functions. What are the functions
of the circumstances (adverbs and prepositional phrases) in
the recipe text?

How activity supports curriculum link:

Students are actively using their prior knowledge to separate
adverbs and prepositional phrases from a text. In order to
complete this the student would have to think about the
sorts of detail each adverbial provides in order to decide
what words or phrases fit in what category. Therefore both
during and after completing the table there is a clear
representation for the student and the reader of the different
circumstantial detail an adverb provides compared to the
circumstantial detail a prepositional phrase provides. This
understanding can be extended through the think, pair,
share exercise as well as the group discussion focusing on
the functions of the adverbials and the different detail they
provide in a different context.