Any subject - Ages 11-14

This plenary and starter activity is designed to help lower ability pupils understand and remember the chronology of events. It is most effective when the main part of the lesson has pupils involved in activities that sort the sections of a story chronologically.

Pupils create their own role-play for each section of the story. They choose the moment that they think best tells that part of the story - then I photograph the “snapshot”.

You can follow it up in the next lesson. Pupils work in pairs with a set of prints and labels that tell the story. They have to match the correct label with its photo and put them in chronological order. This can also be done on an interactive whiteboard.

Pupils enjoy the drama, laugh at the photos and engage with the chronology, without making heavy weather of it. I have used it to get them to remember the events in the last week of Jesus’ life in RE, starting with a storyboard. It went down a storm, with the pupils improvising a Last Supper that included a chocolate muffin and Ribena.

Marion Pearson teaches humanities at Castledown School in Wiltshire.