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Little Lunch episode ‘The Election’ is a great conversation starter for younger students ahead of this month’s federal election. In this 12-minute narrative, Rory announces that he wants to be the prime minister, so Mrs Gonsha suggests that they hold a class election. Debra-Jo runs against Rory, and Tamara – eager to run on a platform about sport – joins the campaign trail too. The three candidates must convince the entire class to vote for them. Just when Debra-Jo is looking like a shoo-in, she makes an unpopular election promise.

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Our free Little Lunch English resource suggests curriculum-mapped learning tasks for all 26 episodes in this much-loved series. Respond to ‘The Election’ with the following ideas for Year 3 to 6 classrooms.

Year 3

• Discuss the phone calls that your own school office may receive, analysing the purpose, audience and context of these hypothetical calls. (ACELA1478)
• Write your own campaign speech by innovating on the speeches delivered by Rory, Tamara and Debra-Jo. (ACELT1601)
• Plan and deliver your own campaign speech, focussing on tone, pace, pitch and volume. (ACELY1677)

Year 4

• Draw and write about what your work would entail if you were the assistant principal of your own school. (ACELY1692)
• Write and deliver your own campaign speech using a multimodal or digital format. (ACELT1794)
• Compare the informal language used in the classroom election to the formality of the language used in parliament and by the Prime Minister of Australia. (ACELA1488)

Year 5

• Discuss the audience and purpose of campaign speeches and evaluate the persuasiveness of the three speeches delivered in this episode. (ACELA1504)
• Use print and digital resources to research the Australian Prime Minister’s roles and responsibilities and their ability to do whatever they want. (ACELY1704)
• Evaluate the appeal of Debra-Jo’s various election promises, then discuss election promises that would appeal to their own classmates. (ACELT1795)

Year 6

• Discuss the value of leadership experiences for senior students and analyse why Mrs. Gonsha might have assigned these particular leadership roles to each student. (ACELY1713)
• Plan and write your own entertaining campaign speech and present it to the class. (ACELT1618)
• Use technology to create a humorous presentation on the topic ‘Everyone at school should have a leadership role’. (ACELY1710)

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