Teaching resources for primary school
Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) has developed teaching and learning resources for primary school-age children.
This was made possible by a working group of teachers who kindly volunteered their time.
Click on the titles below to access the resources.
This resource is suitable for KS2 and focuses on reading and maths, and also includes some art and crafting work. It introduces some key vocabulary and general information about transport used by MSF and the work carried out.
The resource has been created by Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) using our authentic materials. Teachers are encouraged to review and select content and activities to best match their students’ needs.
This resource includes key information about keeping safe from Covid-19, and includes a variety of creative and vocabulary-based tasks. These resources were produced at the start of the pandemic, so it may be an interesting way to look back at how the situation was developing at the time.
The resource has been created by Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) using our authentic materials. Teachers are encouraged to review and select content and activities to best match their students’ needs.
This resource is suitable for upper KS1/lower KS2 and focuses on reading and listening, and also includes some art and drawing work. It introduces some key vocabulary and general information about MSF’s history, work, and purpose.
The resource has been created by Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) using our authentic materials. Teachers are encouraged to review and select content and activities to best match their students’ needs.
This resource is suitable for KS2. It focuses on the refugee crisis, and why people leave their homes. It introduces some key vocabulary and general information about MSF’s work in this area and celebrates World Refugee Day. It could easily be adapted to use for an assembly.
The resource has been created by Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) using our authentic materials. Teachers are encouraged to review and select content and activities to best match their students’ needs.
This resource is suitable for upper KS1/lower KS2 and focuses on reading and writing, and also includes some art and colouring work. It introduces some key vocabulary and general information about why people become refugees, and MSF’s work in this area.
The resource has been created by Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) using our authentic materials. Teachers are encouraged to review and select content and activities to best match their students’ needs.
This resource is suitable for KS2 and focuses on reading and writing. It introduces some key vocabulary and general information about why people become refugees and what their day-to-day lives might look like, and covers MSF’s work in this area.
The resource has been created by Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) using our authentic materials. Teachers are encouraged to review and select content and activities to best match their students’ needs.
This resource is suitable for KS2 and focuses on reading and listening within the context of the Spanish flu pandemic and the Ebola epidemics. It introduces some key vocabulary and general information about MSF’s work and the effect that conflict can have on national health.
The resource has been created by Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) using our authentic materials. Teachers are encouraged to review and select content and activities to best match their students’ needs.
This resource is suitable for KS2 maths, and focuses mainly on estimation. It covers the refugee crisis, introduces some key vocabulary and general information about MSF’s work in this area, and celebrates World Refugee Day.
The resource has been created by Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) using our authentic materials. Teachers are encouraged to review and select content and activities to best match their students’ needs.
This resource is based on four non-fiction texts linked to different aspects of MSF’s work. The questions are similar to that of the Year 6 reading papers. The challenging but engaging content in the resource means that it is not designed to exactly replicate the SATs papers, but rather to help students develop reading comprehension skills alongside general knowledge and vocabulary.
The resource has been created by Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) using our authentic materials. Teachers are encouraged to review and select content and activities to best match their students’ needs.
This resource is based on a non-fiction text – a first-person narrative by a clinical officer working for MSF in South Sudan. The tasks are structured so that students revise/learn key vocabulary before using this knowledge to complete the reading comprehension tasks. They work with synonyms, definitions, and idioms.
This resource is linked to science, geography and citizenship. It is based on a comic created by a Mozambican artist and highlights how climate change affects health and livelihoods. Students revise key vocabulary on the topic of the environment and explore the link between climate change and heath, and complete vocabulary, reading and writing tasks.
The resource has been created by Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF) using our authentic materials. Teachers are encouraged to review and select content and activities to best match their students’ needs.
Attention teachers!
Are you a teacher who uses these resources in the classroom? If so, we would love to hear your feedback, good or bad, to help us keep improving our resources. Please send us an e-mail with your thoughts.
Look out for more resources from MSF on the Times Educational Supplement website