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Dig Dig Digging

dig dig digging coverMargaret Mayo, Alex Ayliffe (illus)
Orchard Books
Age 3-5

Dig Dig Digging is ideal for children fascinated by vehicles and machines. Written in rhyme with a strong rhythm, it is a fun read aloud and great for joining in. The illustrations are bright and bold with lots to talk about.

 

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Share the story

Read aloud Read the book aloud making sure children can see the illustrations as you read. Stop to talk about the pictures when children want to.

Join in When you read the book again encourage children to join in, they will pick up on the rhythm and enjoy remembering the names of the vehicles. Encourage them to emphasise the sounds the vehicles make. They might like to invent actions for digging, tipping, pulling and swooshing!

Talk about the story What are the different vehicles used for? Talk about their functions. Look at the final page together; can children spot all the different vehicles in this night time scene?

Can children think of any other vehicles not included in the book? Children might suggest police car, ambulance or motor bike. What sorts of sounds might these make?

Watch a musical animation of the story

From Tabletop Tales 

Things to make and do

Story play
Children will enjoy re enacting pages from the book. Toy vehicles could be used if you have them; it would be fun for children to play with diggers, rollers and tractors in a garden earth in a garden or in a sand pit. Indoors they could ‘dig’ up small building blocks. Collections of toy cars could be loaded onto an improvised car transporter. Children will have their own ideas as well.

Children will enjoy pretending to be firemen on a makeshift engine made from furniture pushed together or storage boxes, with a vacuum cleaner tube as a hose. A fireman’s hat would add to the fun!

Out and about When you are out with children encourage them to traffic spotters looking for all the different vehicles they see, those in the book and others as well. Give children a small notebook so that they can draw the different  vehicles they have spotted when they return home.

Make a  model
Make a junk model vehicle using cardboard packets, boxes and tubes. If you have paints or felt pens children could decorate their model and make a label for it.

 

Find out more

Find out more about fire engines here.

Sing songs about transport here.