The Giant Layered Sandwich

Each sandwich ingredient has a movement, and children do them in the order the teacher builds the sandwich with picture cards. It works on remembering and performing a short sequence from start to finish.

How to play

1. Meet the ingredients: bread (stretch tall and flat), cheese (holey jumping: legs apart and together), tomato (roll the arms), lettuce (shake the whole body) (1 min).
2. Practice each ingredient on its own, all together, watching the card the teacher holds up (1 min).
3. First two-layer sandwich: bread and cheese. The teacher lays the cards on the floor and we do them in order (1 min).
4. Three-layer sandwich: bread, tomato, bread. Say it out loud before doing it (1 min).
5. Four-layer sandwich: bread, lettuce, cheese, bread; at the end, yum!, we eat it with a group hug (1 min).
6. A child picks the order for a new sandwich and everyone does it (1 min).

Rules

• I do the ingredients in the order of the cards.
• Every sandwich starts and ends with bread.
• I wait for the teacher to say “Let's cook!”

Variations

Adaptations

• Limited mobility: every ingredient has a seated version (arms up, hands opening and closing, wrist circles, shoulder shakes).
• Autism: keep the cards visible the whole time and point to the current layer.
• Visual impairment: big, high-contrast cards, and the teacher names each layer out loud.

Learning goals

• Perform a sequence of 2 to 4 movements in order.
• Link a picture to a movement.
• Warm up the whole body.

Equipment for a class of 25

• Food picture cards: 5

Teacher tip

Use big, letter-size cards and lay them out in a row from left to right. Kids often do their favorite ingredient and skip the rest, so touch each card as you do it.

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