All the letters of the alphabet written in one or two columns, with some space to write, next to each letter
Procedures
The teacher divides the students into pairs or teams and gives out the paper with the letters of the alphabet or asks the kids to write these down.
Step 1: The teacher announces the topic i.e. Clothes and asks the kids write one word (or phrase) for each letter of the alphabet or, more realistically, for as many letters as they can. The teacher gives an example. Ideally, the teacher creates her/his own list in order to have a set of words to model the other stages of the activity.
The teacher sets the time limit (i.e. 5 minutes for the younger kids and 3 minutes for the older kids). It might be a good idea to use a song instead and after the song finishes, the activity does, too.
The kids work in teams and make a list of the words within the vocabulary set. After the time is up, the teacher stops the game.
Step 2: The kids exchange the lists and count the words or phrases which their friends have managed to write within the set time limit. The teacher writes the results for each team on the board.
Step 3: The teams read the words on the lists and choose: the most interesting word, the most unusual word, the funniest word, three words you also have, three words you don’t have, any word you don’t understand or remember etc. The teams work in pairs and find out why their partners put these words on the list. If possible, the kids exchange the lists with another team and repeat the procedure once or twice.
Why we like it
For the students it is a great opportunity to revise and recycle vocabulary. All the beginner levels aside, even when the main lesson aim is to introduce and to practise new vocabulary, chances are the kids have already learnt, heard, used or seen some of the words. After all, the vocabulary sets are repeated and extended from level to level, not to mention that most kids have more than one source of English in their lives: the state school, the language school, a private teacher, brothers, sisters, parents, videos on youtube, cartoons, stories, computer games online…This game is one of the easy ways of revising all this vocabulary to prepare for ‘something new’
For all the reasons mentioned above, it is an absolute necessity for the teacher to find out how much the kids already know as regards a certain area in order to do a very focused (if a very contained) needs’ analysis and to adjust the volume, the level and the intensity of the new material presentation later in the lesson
It is very easy and requires no preparation whatsoever.
It helps to improve the students’ self-confidence because it gives them an opportunity to see how much they know already.
It can be used with any set of vocabulary, either thematic (i.e. clothes, food, animals) or content-related (i.e. the words necessary to describe a picture, the words used in a certain text or a listening task, a video)
The final task can be easily adapted i.e. choose 5 words to describe yourself, choose 5 words to use in a story or in a dialogue, choose 5 and describe them for your partners to guess, use a dictionary to find the words or structures for the missing letters, compare the lists with your friends to find the words or the structures for the missing letters, use the words to describe a photograph, use the words to talk about your day today etc.
Context: it is a new place, a new group of kids. In lieu of an induction, one line only and it goes: ‘You will be in room 5, miss Anka. Don’t forget to fill in the electronic register after the lesson.’
Lesson aims
It is all very simple: this particular lesson happens to give the kids a chance to meet the teacher and to give the teacher an opportunity to see the kids in their natural habitat. Since there will be quite a few new things for the children to deal with such as the class, the teacher, the first lesson in a foreign language, the coursebook, the classroom, the songs, games and the content, it might be best to keep the expectations on a reasonable level. It is a lot more important to focus on the child, on the student and on the routine, rather than on some ambitious linguistic aims. After all, there is going to be a whole year for the latter.
Before the lesson
In a perfect world, it would be possible for the teacher to see the classroom before the lesson, to take stock of the environment and all it can offer and to plan building the routine around the actual classroom. Is there any area without too many pieces of furniture which can be used for the movement games or for the start or the ending of the lesson? Is it possible to move the furniture to create a circle or are the desks to heavy for that and you will have to sit in rows as they do in their regular classes?
In a perfect world, it would also be possible to get the register of all the kids to figure out how many we are to expect and, last but not least, to talk to their class teacher to get to know them a bit before the lesson or, in a super-perfect-ideal-over-the-rainbow world to find out what they did in the previous academic year (if we are talking about year II and year III kids).
Alas. More often than not this is not going to be possible so I will base this lesson on the worst-case scenario: there is no chance to see the classroom, there is nobody who knows anything about the kids or the English they might or might not have had.
This is the worst-case scenario but it is not the end of the world, surely.
The overall structure of all these lessons will be the same but I will include some ideas for the year 1 and year 2/3 kids which might have had some English.
Entering the room
If the lesson takes place in a new classroom which you are entering together, line the kids up in front of the room. If they are entering with you or if they are already in the room, come in, say hello and do the roll call. It will help you remember their names and associate them with the place where they are sitting. It might be a good idea to write them all up on the board, in the order in which the kids are sitting. However, if there are more than eight or ten, this will take forever and will be counterproductive.
The official start of the lesson
It is great if this part of the lesson is marked in a special way.
You can:
ask the kids to close their eyes (please demo), count from 10 to 1 (or from 5 to 1) and say ‘Open your eyes’ and say and wave Hello to everyone.
ask the kids to stand up and do a bit of gymnastics (stand up, shake your arms, clap your hands, march (on the spot), dance, touch your hand, tummy, back, shake your friends’ hand, say hello), with the teacher demonstrating and participating, too.
clap once and ask the kids to clap once, clap twice and ask the kids to clap twice, clap three times and ask the kids to clap three time, say: Hello, kids say: Hello.
Whisper: Hello, have the kids repeat, then have them repeat: Hello Anka. Repeat a few times and then officially reply: hello everyone. Repeat with all the kids in the room:
Hello Piotrek (point at Piotrek) Hello everyone (says Piotrek)
Even if you don’t know or can’t remember the kids’ names, the students will help you. These types of activities are great because they mark the start of the real lesson and of communicating in English, they involve everyone in an easy way (clapping, touching, saying Hello) and there are a bit out of the ordinary hence fun.
Hello song
I would say it is a definite must, even in the very first lesson. First and foremost, it is something that the whole class can participate in, even if they don’t speak too much English because there will be gestures, rhythm and music involved. Second of all, it is great to start building the routine from the very first lesson and a routine or the lesson framework for primary school children must involve a song.
If possible, take your students to a safe corner (at the back or in the front of the room), go there yourself and call your students, one by one, to join you. Use their names. As soon as they get there, use one of the punctuation marks to signal the start of a new activity. It can be clapping, counting from 10 to 1 or just asking the kids (‘Are you ready?’ ‘Yes, we are’). This will help the kids navigate around the lesson and to get ready and to focus for whatever is to come next and it is especially useful in the beginng of the course. As the course progresses, it can be used less and less frequently because the kids develop the habit of tuning in.
Show the gestures for the song and go through a few dry runs, with you modelling and the kids repeating, in the correct order and in a random order. One of my greatest hits is Hello Song from Super Simple Songs. It is fast and cheerful and it includes 6 different, easy to mime emotions (if you need ideas for the gestures, have a look at the song video). There is an easier song, also by Super Simple Songs, Hello Hello, Can you clap your hands? This one includes some few verbs that will get the kids moving (clap, stomp, turn around).
After the presentation and the mini-rehersal, we listen to the song and try to take part as much as possible. It doesn’t matter if all your kids are not one amazingly coordinated choir. After all, it is the first time they hear the song. Things will get better in lesson 2, 3 and 15.
Both songs are accompanied by videos, of course, but I tend to skip those in the first few lessons, focusing instead on audio only, not to overload the kids as there are too many things in the first lesson anyway. Afterwards, we clap to thank each other and we sit down. Again, the teacher calls our students, one by one (or in twos in really big groups) to invite them to sit. This might take some time if the group is really big but it is the time well-invested (building the routine!) and it helps to avoid the chaos and the noise. As soon as the kids get back to their seats, use your punctuation mark again.
If there is no space that can be used as the dancefloor, these can be done while sitting or standing by the table, although then I would use the first song, the emotions can be easily demonstrated with everyone sitting at their tables.
New material: Class I
These kids will be brand new, straight out of the box, with no English whatsoever, although, of course, you might get a few that attended some classes in pre-school. For that reason, revision as the next stage of the lesson will not really work as there is nothing to revise.
In such a case there are a few options to go for
start introducing the colours because, more likely than not, this is going to be the first topic / unit in the coursebook. Another advantage is that even without any specific realia the kids will have plenty of colours on them and there will be plenty in the classroom and these can be used in a variety of games. There is no need to prepare any special flashcards either and a set of markers, coloured pencils, blocks or even pieces of coloured paper can be used instead.
rather than colours, go for pets of jungle animals for the first lesson. It will be necessary to prepare the cards here (or any kind of visuals) but the obvious advantage is the fact that animals are likeable, fun and at least some of the names will be familiar to kids and/or recognisable (cat, giraffe, zebra, lion) and the animals create lots of opportunities for a variety of resources: animals produce sounds (and can be used in a guessing game), animals move in a certain way (and can be mimed), animals have specific shapes and colours (and can be recognized in game ‘through the keyhole’).
Another good topic for the first lesson is school objects. The objects themselves are not as cute and fun as the jungle animals but these are definitely the things that we are going to be using in every lesson and that makes them worth investing in. Not to mention that they are already in the classroom and that each student will have a set and they can be used in a simple call out activity ‘show me your pencil’ etc. They can be also used for miming (with a bit of imagination) and for some guessing games, too. Most of them are small enough to be put in a Magic Bag and used for guessing. And through the keyhole can be used, too, with realia or with flashcards.
Regardless of which topic is chosen, one of more of the following activities can be used:
Introduction and drilling using a variety of voices (saying it with emotions, different volumes of pitch, pace etc)
Creating simple chants by organizing the cards on the floor / board and saying them in a rhythmical way ie
‘Yellow, yellow, blue. Yellow, yellow, blue. Red and green, red and green. Yellow, yellow, blue.’
‘Pencil, book and ruler. Pencil, book and ruler. School, pen, schoolbag, pen. Pencil, book and ruler.’
The cards can be put up around the room and with the teacher (or the kids) calling out single words, the group have to listen and to point at the tiger, zebra, lion and monkey.
Riddles: the simplest version of it is the teacher miming the words for the kids to guess or playing the audio for the kids to guess or drawing a part of the picture on the board for the kids to guess.
What’s my secret word? Kids, chorally in the first lesson, guess which word the teacher is holding. After a few rounds the kids can take over.
In the same way, a simple memory game can be played, too, either with the realia (ie markers or books of different colours) or with the flashcards displayed on the board or on the floor. Kids close their eyes, the teacher removes or covers one of the items, kids open their eyes and guess. It might happen that at least some of them will be answering in their L1 at this point and it is ok. Please praise them and provide the word in the target language.
Bearing in mind that this will be the kids’ first language lesson ever, five new words seems like a very good number for the first lesson.
New material: Class II and III
Essentially, all the activities mentioned above can be simply used with the older kids, too. Any of the topics will be a revision for kids and if the youngest of them can deal with that, so can the older ones. It might also be an interesting activity for the teacher to evaluate the abilities and skills of the kids against each other as, most likely, the year III kids will be able to participate more freely and in a bigger number of games mentioned above and with a bigger number of key words.
If the teacher is more adventurous it would be a good idea to involve the kids in an activity that will help them show off as regards the vocabulary (or structures) they have learnt so far and those that they remember. This can be done in the form of the alphabet game.
There are practically no resources necessary, apart from the alphabet, as a poster and small cards any picture scene, either a paper poster or one of the beautiful illustrations in the YLE Starters Picture Wordlist which can be displayed on the electronic whiteboard or printed and displayed on the noticeboard.
The teacher demonstrates by choosing one of the letters of the alphabet and calls out all the words in the picture begining with that letter. The kids join in, too.
The game can be played in teams, with the class divided into smaller groups, with each team working on one of the letters. It would be good to avoid scoring the kids as some of the letters are more friendly or generative and it would simply be unfair. It is also not necessary to introduce a lot of competition in the very first lesson. The teams can be awarded a point for completing the task, regardless of how many words they produce or remember. It might be also a good idea to remove all the unfriendly and rare letters from the set (ie x, v, w, y).
One more advantage of this game, especially for the first lesson, is that it can be played for as many rounds as there is time for. It can be stopped at any time.
Music and movement
Depending on the classroom, this stage of the lesson can be done in the back of the room or at the desks. Again, the kids are called out, and they join the teacher, one by one. Again, the punctuation mark is used to mark the start of a new stage.
It can take a form of a gym break (see above) or it can be another song. One of my favourites for the first lessons is ‘Head and shoulders’ or ‘Open Shut Them’, both for the same reason: they involve lots and lots of movement and are easy to mime and all the kids can be involved in taking part. As in the case of the first song, gestures go first, then the music and the song itself, also without any video.
Table time
Ideally, this element would be included in the lesson, too. In my primary groups I like to give them a chance to produce something, with class I or II to check whether they can write their names and in case of class I – how well they hold the pencil.
At the same time, it has to be something simple and perhaps the simple handprints aka autumnleaves might be a good choice here. This kind of an activity will only involve minimal resources (paper, pencils, crayons or coloured pencils), it does not take a long time and it can be made more or less complex ie only the handprint, the stem and the veins or the leaf, the veins and the colouring, the name written by the teacher, for class I students or the kids decorating their leaves in the way they choose and writing their own name. The leaves in class I can simply be displayed on the noticeboard at the end of the lesson, the older kids from class II and III can also be encouraged to describe their leaves and to compare (ie Sasha: My leaf is green) with the other kids raising hands if theirs are, too. The older kids’ leaves end up on the noticeboard (or the door or the wall), too.
There is one great activity perfect for this age and level that we used to on every first day of the summer camp: a folder, homemade and highly personalised. In class, the kids would get an A3 piece of paper and they would decorate it following teacher’s instructions (first write your name in big letters, draw your favourite fruit, draw your favourite drink, draw your favourite sport etc). After the lesson, the teacher would add another piece of A3 and staple each of these into an envelope. We used to keep those in class, on the shelf or on the window-sill and everything we produced during the sessions would be nicely collected in these folders at the end of each day. This activity takes a bit more time and might not be appropriate for all the context but it can also be used in its basic form: a personalised name poster.
At the end of the stage, the kids help up with cleaning up by putting away their pencils, crayons and handing the posters to the teacher. The teacher uses the punctuation mark again.
Goodbye
Since the kids will be still at their tables, it might be best to say goodbye just there. The teacher says ‘Thank you everyone’ and to all the kids individually. If the group is very big, it might be a good idea to do it super fast and in twos (Thank you, Masha and Sasha) but it is a nice touch and going over all the kids’ names, once more, really helps to remember them better)
I personally like to include a goodbye song also with primary, at least in the beginning of a new course to help create a framework for the lesson, for example Bye, bye, goodbye or See you later, alligator but later on, with the limited lesson time, we replace it the final game.
As regards homework, it might be a good idea to skip it during the first lesson. This element of the everyday routine can also be added later.
Instead of a coda
The list of the activities and the format of the lesson will depend on its length. If the lesson lasts 60 minutes, the teacher can use two, three or even four flashcards games and extend the leaf making. If the lesson is only 40 minutes’ long, it is better to focus on fewer activities, without rushing the kids. It might be a good idea to skip ‘the paper’ altogether, with no coursebook but also with no handouts or crafts, focusing on building the routine and interacting with kids in the target language. In that case, the leaf or the poster activity would be done in the lesson 2 of the course.
The same applies to stories, videos or online games. They are great resources and can be introduced later on in the course. The first lesson will be made of many new things anyway and it is better not to overload the children and to save some surprises for later.
As for the rules and the rewards’ charts, these are of course very important with a group of primary school kids but this also can wait until a bit later than the very first lesson. The lesson plan might be introduced from the lesson 2 as well.
There is one more element of the first class with primary that has not been included here but only because it is a very important one, it deserves its own post and this element are the parents. Regardless of whether we like it or not, the parents of our younger students will be in the classroom with us and it would be necessary to acknowledge their presence. A face-to-face meeting would be ideal but a note or a message in the electronic register or in the Whatsapp group will do to get you started. The parents might be coming from different background and have a different previous English learning experience, as students or as parents. That is why it is absolutely necessary to let them know how you are going to work with your students and their kids. More of that soon!
Here you can find some tried and tested activities for primary school kids (although perhaps not necessarily all of them for the very first lesson!)
If you are also about to start teaching your pre-primary, you will find some ideas here.
This is the second part of the Craft ABC series. You can find the first part here.
The main activity and the target language practice
This is a craft activity that features in the lesson to provide opportunities for the target langauge practice. As an example I have decided to choose our beloved jellyfish that is the first craft activity that I do with my first-year students, in one of the first weeks of the course. This is the time when we learn and practise colours with flashcards, colourful blocks and realia in general, with simple stories, videos, wordwall games and songs. A craft activity is yet another way of ‘recycling’ the target vocabulary and of giving the students an opportunity to be exposed to it and to use it.
The jellyfish is a super simple craft and even the youngest kids can draw the eyes and the smile on the head (which can be a semi-circle cut out by the teacher or a half of a paper plate) and then to attach the tentacles to the back of it. Kids are really motivated to make their own jellyfish and to drill and call out the colours and to ask for the following one, in a very simple way (‘Blue, please’). As a result, lots and lots of language is produced and everyone leaves the classroom with a creature they made herself. What’s most important, the jellyfish looks good even with the most crooked smile and the most inexpertly glued tentacles. And even if there are only three or four colours used, with the youngest kids.
The follow-up of a story or a song
Craft in this case is an opportunity to reinforce the ideas, concepts, vocabulary and structures introduced in a song or in a story. Or, to put it differently, a story or a song is not introduced only as a starter or a side dish but it becomes the topic for the entire lesson.
The three examples in the photos come from the lessons taught based on the Playway to English 1 by Cambridge University Press. The first one is a flower we made together while retelling the story from unit 7 (The Little Seed which you can also find here) and although we were not able to use all the original story lines, the kids could use the basic ones such as It’s sunny, It’s raining. The little seed is sleeping (at the beginning), The flower is growing (while making the stem) and so on.
The second example is everyone’s favourite Very Hungry Caterpillar which is a storybook we use in year, to accompany either unit 7 (Weather / Spring) or unit 9 (Food). You can find more information on this version of the caterpillar here.
Last, but definitely not least, is a simple craft that was a follow-up of the amazing Super Simple Song called ‘Are you hungry?‘ and it can be used either with the topic of fruit (Playway to English 1, unit 3) as it goes nicely with the theme of the song of monsters sharing fruit with their hungry friends or, in a wider context, with food in general (Playway to English, unit 9). The craft activity becomes the more palpable and 2-D version of a song and it can be used in a mini-role play, sung or spoken, depending on what the kids are ready for.
Props preparation
This type of a craft activity does not have a lot of potential as regards maximising production although the kids are quite likely to use some functional language, the staples of craft (Are you ready? Let’s sit down, Blue, please etc). This type of a craft activity is also quite short, compared with the ones mentioned so far but that is exactly the point. The craft activity is only a prelude. Everything important is to happen later with the finished product used as a tool.
The best example here will be our magic wand. It is simple and easy to make and can be used as a part of a shapes lesson (though, really, there is only one shape involved). The abracadabra TPR activity (Abracadabra, 123, you are…) is a game we play from the very beginning of the course. When the kids are ready to take over, we make a wand for each other and use it in a game and at this point, the kids get to lead the game for real, waving their own, freshly-produced wands and we all mime whatever there is to mime. The langauge is produced and lots of it (Abracadabra, 123, you are…swimming, dancing, flying…OR you are a cat, a happy cat, a hungry dinosaur…) but it is not directly related to the making of the wand.
A part of a Science, Maths or Art lesson
Craft can be also a part of a CLIL lesson or a Maths, Science or Art lesson, depending on whether we are dealing with the EFL or the ESL or bilingual programmes. In this case, the craft activity will create an opportunity for the students to put into practice or to reinforce the real knowledge or skills they have acquired in class, making it more practical, kinesthetic and hands-on.
Below, three examples of such craft activities.
The first one is a Maths lesson in which we were learning about and practising measuring. Apart from working with the rulers and measuring tapes and checking how long our cars, teddy bears, desks, noses and fingers were, the kids also got a simple handout with a section of a certain length and it was their task to measure the strips of paper with rulers, cut of the appropriate piece and glue it underneath.
The second one is one of the lessons devoted to animal habitats which we studied in our Science class. Apart from categorising animals and talking about the habitat, we also did a craft activity in which we created the habitat (here the polar region made of a sheet of blue paper, waves drawn, ice made of cotton pats and the animals glued on). After a series of lessons we had a set of habitats.
The third piece here is one of the activities we made as part of the Kids in the Avangard. In this lesson Paul Klee was our artist of the day and we created our own version of his Cat and Bird.
The non-linguistic aims
Sometimes craft activities have a non-linguistic main aims. Because of their obvious relevance to kids’ lives and the excitement that they generate, they can be used to help kids develop as humans and this can be the reason for their inclusion in a language lesson.
The first activity here is one of my favourite craft activities ever. It can be used in many different thematic lessons but its main advantage is that because, due to its design, it requires a detailed micro-staging and, on the one hand, it can help kids work on their ability to focus and to follow teacher’s instructions in order to be able to turn their circles into cats, dogs, frogs and bees. On the other hand (and it has worked absolutely every single time), it brings an immense sense of achievement and confidence in kids’ own skills since a random circle can become so many things.
The other activity presented here is an example of a festive craft that finds its place in the classroom as part of the seasonal celebrations. Despite the fact that sometimes this vocabulary will be used in class only in a year, when the holiday comes up again, it connects the lesson to the celebrations at home and in kindergarten and it is the easiest way of bringing these festivities into the EFL classroom.
The final activity, our solar system was a wonderful activity that we all enjoyed and one that helped us produce lots and lots of language. However, believe it or not, that was not the reason why we did it. This was our first real whole class project because the kids got an opportunity to work on something together, sharing resources and sharing the space and we produced one huge poster that nobody would be taking home in the end.
Just one of the shots taken in the middle of a working day, before a craft lesson…
Craft has been present in my classroom life for as long as I can remember. Looking back, I can see all the pieces I made with my superstars in Moscow over the last thirteen years, the robots we constructed at the summer camp in Tuscany in 2009, some 3-D houses we made with my Navarran babies in 2008, or the magazines I put together with my cousin, my first student ever, somewhere in 2000…What’s more, craft has been present in my life since my own primary school. I loved the Art lessons, I loved the Craft lessons. I even loved the Technology classes, although craft then involved: weaving a mini rug, building a birdfeeder and making a chair for a doll.
You could say that the foundations for my future career have been built pretty early and that I have had a lot of opportunities to perfect my fine motor skills and to fall in love with craft (truly, madly, deeply). No wonder that I would try to smuggle it into my lessons.
It was only a week ago, actually, while preparing yet another session for a teacher training course, that I saw craft with a fresh pair of eyes and I saw it for what it really is: the VYL world (or the pre-school world) in a nutshell, everything that is beautiful about it, everything that can be enjoyable about it and, inevitably, everything that can go wrong with it, too.
The simple truth is that: kids love craft
Craft lessons and craft activities are these parts of the lesson when kids can do something for real, not the coursebooks, not the handouts or worksheets, not the time when you need to stay focused but the creative, the beautiful, the fun part. And, one more important factor – something that is different every single time!
If you add to it the variety of materials that are included, the variety of techniques and that, more often than not, you end up with a real product, a book, a house, a puppet or a collage, which you have created yourself and which you are allowed to take home, it is not a surprise that kids love it.
‘Ah, we haven’t done anything for such a long time‘ was something that I heard one of my students mumble to herself when she saw me reach out for the coursebook as soon as we sat down at the tables. As a teacher, I was taken aback. Because we did DO things! We sang songs, we read stories, played with flashcards and we did have good lessons. In my student’s eyes, however, all that meant nothing at all, because, indeed, somehow a long time had passed since the previous craft lesson and that, at least for this one student, was the real thing, the something!
If you want to read more on why kids need craft activities, have a look here.
The simple truth is: many teachers don’t like craft
A craft lesson takes a long time to prepare.
It is messy, both during the preparation stage (see the photo above) and during the lesson.
The teachers might not have a full access to all the resources necessary, even the simple ones so they end up buying these themselves
Classroom management is a bit more tricky in the craft lessons, as there are more elements to manage and the kids might get too excited.
If not planned properly, craft lessons can turn into a mayhem, with kids not producing the target language or even not completing the task.
Craft activites are not very well taken care of in the mainstream coursebooks and in the teachers books and so there is no resource to learn from.
If the craft activity has not been chosen properly and if it is too complex for the students or if it is not planned properly, students might struggle with completing it or they might destroy in and in such a case there might be tears of a child in despair or tears of a disappointed child.
Craft is what the VYL world is about
Teaching pre-schoolers, compared with the other age groups, will require more of your time in the preparation stage and it will be more demanding as regards the class time. It might require you to include the things that teachers, as adults, have no interest in and which they will still include because that is what can be beneficial and effective with students of that age. In the same vein, some things will have to be excluded even if teachers love them, also because of the age of the students, they will simply not work.
There is only one thing to be done…
…and that is: careful planning and Carol Read’s MADFOX (Management, Appropriacy, Design, Flexibility, Outcomes, Excitement) which you can read about in the ‘500 Activities for the Primary Classroom‘. It is a wonderful tool that will help prepare for a craft activity in the EFL or ESL lesson, primary and pre-primary. Actually, this framework will work well with any type of an activity or a set of materials, stories, songs and games.
One of my earlier posts (and my first acronym W.O.R.L.D🙂 might also come in handy while choosing a craft activity for the pre-primary EFL /ESL lesson.
The most important thing to remember everything gets better with time. The lesson planning become easier and less time-consuming. The kids know the teacher, the lesson format and their peers better and that is an important factor contributing to the success of the activities and, last but not least, if you decide to reuse a particular type of a craft activity for the second or third time, the students will also be able to deal with it better as they will have done it before.
There is hope))
This post is only the first part of the Craft ABC series. You can find the second part here. Don’t forget to also have a look at all the posts in the craft section on this blog.
Let me tell you first what this post is NOT about:
It is not a post about any specific activity, resource or solution for the classroom.
It is not a report of a classroom research task or an experiment.
It is not a compendium of useful links. Or stories from a trainer’s life.
Not today. Today I want to write about the classroom magic and, in all honesty, I doubt anyone can find it of any use. Really. This is solely for my writer’s and teacher’s well-being.
The magic of Lousiana
When the magic happens OR When kids become communicators in L2
Maximising production is definitely a professional obsession.
Although a) it is probably better to call it ‘my professional interest’ and b) you have probably noticed, if you have been reading my posts (It not, you can find the chapter here). This is what I have on my mind while planning my lessons. This is what I think about while looking at the coursebooks, illustrations, stories and games. ‘How do I get my kids to speak?’
The magic of Louisiana
If you are a teacher of young children, you are a bit like a gardener.
There is a lot of digging, a lot of watering, some weeding, and, above all, lots and lots (and lots) of waiting before you get a chance to even hope about any real fruit or flowers. Or any real communication, in our case. Which does not mean that it is boring or uneventful! Quite the contrary!
It is a wonderful journey, filled with treasured moments, from the very first steps into the classroom and any signals that we have exchanged ideas and understood each other. Cautiously walking in, on day 1, a bit uncertain but also very curious what this new auntie (that’s what I have been referred to, in Russian, in Spanish and in Portugues) has to offer. Pointing at the right flashcards, nodding in lieu of a yes, lining up because the teacher asked for it, picking out for the red crayon in a colouring dication or replying ‘Hello’ to your ‘Hello’ Drilling and reciting all the colours and so is confidently shouting out ‘Cat!’ to correct the teacher when she shows you a picture of a cat but, somehow, she says ‘It’s a dog!’ (though with this special elfin smile and a spark in her eye)… All of this is priceless, amazing, magical. And necessary.
The magic of Louisiana
Then comes the plateu.
Yes, a language learning plateu. In case of the primary or the pre-primary language learners it has got nothing to do with reaching the intermediate level (quite often the level associated with the concept of plateau), quite the contrary, but, it does happen with the little kids, too (and yes, this is just the idea that I got right now and decided to use it in this post).
So, taking the level aside, what do I (very subjectively) see as the language learning plateu in early L2 learning?
kids feel confident in the classroom, with its routines and traditions, the teacher, the coursebook, the lesson and the course framework
kids feel comfortable with their peers and the bunch of kids starts resembling a group and a team
kids are curious and easily learn new words (aka single words) and they can reproduce them on teacher’s request, the action – reaction, teacher – student or teacher – students goes very smoothly
kids produce some simple sentences, depending on the curriculum and the programme
kids know and produce some phrases related to the repeated activities during the lesson
The first two points here are not directly related to the actual language production but due to the age of children, they are of the utmost importance and for that reason they have found their place here. This is the point in the course when the age-related characteristics stop being an issue and teacher and children can focus more on the language learning itself.
Finally, the learning happens, we move from unit to unit to unit. We go from unit 1 (colours), to unit 2 (school), to unit 3 (fruit), from level 1 to level 2, the kids are growing, the kids know more, they are under control. The kids are happy and the teacher is happy. The only thing missing is ‘They lived happily ever after’…
Don’t get me wrong. I am not UN-happy with the classes going beautifully well. I am not picking at the seams here. This is the state that we, as teachers, dream about. However, this is also the dangrous plateau because we may want to stay there forever. And we should not. Not moving forward equals staying in the same place equals regression. Things going well is a signal that the time has come to do something new, look for new challenges or think of ways of extending the Zone of Proximal Development.
In the very specific context of maximising language production in the VYL world it might mean helping the kids move from ‘the action – reaction’, ‘teacher – student’ and ‘teacher – students’, one word or one sentence production to the next level: a discourse (or a mini-discourse), student – student, student – teacher and spontaneous production aka I say things when I have things to say (and ‘Not because my teacher, the adult asked me’).
The magic of Louisiana
The most beautiful day is when the magic happens
There is no way of getting ready for this day, marking it in your calendar and making it your aim. It is when, all of a sudden, it happens – kids say things outside of the framework that you have prepared for the day, outside of the pattern they ‘should‘ be using according to the book. Or when they try to say things that are, clearly, out of their range (yet) but which they need to say. Sometimes it is fully expressed in L1, sometimes partially.
Examples? Yes, sure! Let’s go.
Case study #1
One of my 6 y.o. students, still in pre-school, about to go to school in a few week but have have been using the primary level books since January. She has always been a very active child and an eager students but recently, over the past few weeks, she has just skyrocketed. The magic happened!
We are studying online, she is in her natural habitat, at home where she communicates in Russian. However, during the lesson time, she started to use more English while talking to her brothers. Sometimes, it is fully in English, for example calling him from another room, to join us in a game (‘We are playing! Come!’), sometimes it is a mix of Russian and English (‘Sasha, go, do your thing!’). Sometimes, the baby brother wanders in, during our lesson and he also gets his portion of English, because I welcome him in English and his sisters babbles to him in English, too. Sometimes. We are in our little English bubble while in class and she is really making an effort to communicate in the target language then. Although, not only then, actually! I know it from her mum, that she sometimes plays with her teddies and that some English happens, then, too! Some of them must be English-speaking teddies.
I also noticed that when we play together with the older brother, she really listens to what he is saying and she picks out the useful words and then tries to use them, like, in the same lessons the phrase ‘everyday’ or ‘every day’ and, almost immediately, enjoying the variations such as ‘every minute’ and ‘every second’…
This ‘magic’ goes beyond the immersion in the context and the language creativity and experimentation. My student also started to attempt to maximise the amount of language produced.
Last week we started to practice Present Simple (Do you go swimming?) as a follow-up on the simple ‘Do you like?’ which we have known for quite some time and we were interviewing each other, not as ourselves but as the chosen characters. The main aim was to practise ‘Do you do something?’ and I did not even plan to insist on using ‘at the weekend’ or any other day of the week, leaving it for later. However, in class, my student just started to speak and it was a wonderful experience for me to see how far she would go. First, she’d say ‘do you’, then pause, choose the verb, pause again, choose the object, pause again, choose the preposition of place, pause again and, finally, add the day of the week…
Do you draw on your homework every day? Do you dance in your classes on Fridays? Do you sleep in the school?
I could not keep up with her in my note-taking, because there was so much language and, yes, because I was laughing out loud. Not only because her sentences were great but also because I realised that, this time round, I managed to notice, to seize the moment, in a way.
The magic of Louisiana
How to make sure that the magic does happen?
Let the kids lead the activities (‘Who’s the teacher?’)
Start introducing pair-work as soon as the kids might be ready
If possible, include free play slot in your lessons
Show curiosity, ask questions, even if they seem to be above the kids’ current langauge level
Model
Work with the emergent vocabulary but for that it is necessary to be able to speak or at least to understand the kids’ L1 and to provide the word they want to use, even though it is not a part of the wordlist for the level and to keep bringing it back
Be clever and welcoming when it comes to kids’ way of using L1 in class. Apart from the teacher showing respect for it (please, please, please avoid saying ‘DON’T speak L1’ or ‘NO L1’), there is a way of working it. Not all L1 appears because kids don’t want to speak English. Using L1 is one of the communication strategies and it can be a signal for the teacher as to what the kids want to talk about and what they need the vocabulary and structures for.
Be clever and welcoming when it comes to kids’ way of dealing with code-switching (aka ‘mixing’ L1 and L2). This is one of the communication strategies and it is the a step towards and an attempt at L2-only communication
Create the English language environment and provide the exposure with songs, books, games and stories.
Think of extending this exposure and taking English out of the classroom (aka get the parents, the grandparents, sisters and brothers on board!)
Continue reading this blog for more ideas:)
And wait. Stretch out and wait. Like in a song by The Smiths…The magic is bound to happen, eventually.
Since we are going through the quieter period of the year, there is more time for looking back and for reflection and this is how the idea for this mini-series of post came from. Just because we started to use those and each of these phrases or words was like a key that opened many, many doors in our communication and not only.
The one thing to teach your kids is ‘because‘…
…and the whole thing can* start in primary, and maybe even in pre-school. It is a powerful world that invites the kids to build a simple discourse and to go beyond one sentence or simple sentence production, even in the most everyday situations.
We start with extentending the answer to ‘How do you feel today?‘ which is a part of our class routine and the question which I ask and which the kids ask in every single lesson. As soon as they have a good number of adjectives to use in response (you can read about it here), I try to encourage them to elaborate on their answers, both modeling (I’m happy because it is sunny) and by inviting them to continue. ‘I’m happy.‘ ‘Because...’
Of course, the sentences the kids produce are quite simple, very simple, in fact, and sometimes partially in their L1 but with time, they are becoming more familiar with it and they are improving and, as a result, are able to say more and more and more. In English. Not to mention that as we go through the course, there are more and more situations in which we need because, for example to explain why we like Friday and not Monday, why we didn’t do the homework, why the kids in the pictures look happy or sad or why they did something in the story.
The same can be done with pre-schoolers, with certain adjustments to their age and the number of years that they have been studying. Thinking about my groups in the previous academic year, with the level 1 and the level 2 groups I was more focused on the full sentence production and it was too early to introduce any linkers. The level 3 children, however, were ready the unit ‘I’m scared’ (Playway to English, CUP) was a perfect opportunity to talk about the things we are scared of and to explain why. Or, more frequently, the things we are not scared of. ‘I am not scared of spiders. I like spiders because they are beautiful.’ and so on.
I often tell my students (especially those new ones, and yes, also the adult ones recently) that I will always want to know ‘Why?’ and that even if I forget to ask, they should always imagine this word written all across my forehead and answer it anyway. To help the kids in the everyday lesson and to make it easier on myself, I used the idea I got from Herbert Puchta, only mine was not any error correction technique and it stayed displayed proudly on the wall for a good few years. In the beginning, I really had to do a lot of pointing and waving at the word, later, the habit was developed and the kids (yes, as early as in year 1 of primary!) started to use the word without any reminders whatsoever. They were producing the language and lots of it!
My two favourite because-related moments from the classroom have been those:
when we talk about things, someone is telling us how they are and I, somehow, forget to ask ‘Why?‘ or I am just too slow with it, there is always a voice (or two or three) taking over and kindly suggesting ‘Because…‘, with this perfect rise in the intonation, the voice trailing off in an invitation to continue. I wonder where they got that from!
when we talk about pictures or we retell the story or we describe something that happened at school on the day and, by accident, I want to take over and move on and, in response, I get my own because back, in an interjection, and again, with the intonation perfectly matching the purpose (‘I have NOT finished yet‘) and I am thinking to myself: ‘Oh dear, I cannot shut them up!’ which is, by far, my favourite teacher’s complaint.
*) ‘Can’ or ‘must’?:-))
The one thing to teach your kids is…’I think’.
Initially, I wanted to have a pretty post, ‘one phrase per age group’ but I realised that I simply cannot NOT mention ‘I think’ and the impact it had on my primary school students.
Unlike the previous item, here I cannot even remember how it came about and how I first introduced it. It has always been in the air. I know that I use it a lot to slow the kids down and to signal to them not to rush through tasks (i.e. ‘Think and write’) or to encourage them when they are struggling (i.e. ‘Think about it’ when I know that they do know it and it is only necessary to rack through their brains). We had used it a lot in different stories (‘Elmer was thinking and thinking and then he had an idea!’) and a while ago we also introduced ‘Thinking time’ as an official preparation stage for projects and role-plays. Thinking has been with us, only it is not quite clear for how long.
For the reason, when we got to practise expressing the opinion in winter last year (around the middle of A1 / Movers), I did not even bother to check the meaning of it and the question ‘What do you think about it?’ and the answer ‘I think it is interesting / boring / exciting etc’, the adjectives were the main aim and the focus. For me, at least.
What my students took out of this lesson for the rest of the course (and life!) was the little ‘I think’, which is essentially only an introduction and which is slightly unnecessary even. An opinion can surely be expressed without it. ‘Maths is easy‘ expresses the same view as ‘I think Maths is easy.’ Or so one would think.
I noticed, in the lesson in which we used it consciously for the first time and in the lessons afterwards, last year and this year, that my students began to start adding ‘I think‘ everywhere. ‘I think it is beautiful’, ‘I think it is easy‘, ‘I think he is sad‘, ‘I think it is a cat’ ‘And I think it is a dog‘ and so on. ‘I think’ gave them an opportunity to personalise the message, to signal the autonomy of that message (since by making it subjective you kind of accept that other people will have or may have a different view) and, I suppose, by doing so, it made the message more adult and more serious. And they simply and visibly adored it. Maybe because they were only 7 or 8 or 9 at the time.
As I said, I don’t quite remember the start of that adventure and I am not quite sure when the good time to introduce really is. What I know, though, is that the next time I am starting the group, ‘I think’ will be on the list of things to think about.
The one thing to teach your teens is…’What do you think about it?’
There are many phrases that were shortlisted for this paragraph because of the difference they made to the way my teens interacted with the world in the English lesson, ‘I agree‘ and ‘I don’tagree‘ or ‘On the one hand…on the other hand‘ among them but the real deal-breaker was ‘What do you think about?‘
This phrase, especially with a special stress on ‘you’ (‘What do you think about it?’) has become the wonderful phrase that helped my teens really get engaged and communicate in a really interactive way, not only expressing their opinion, agreeing and disagreeing but also to boomerang the conversation properly by involving the other participant or participants. I mean, truth be told, I know that they did it mostly to avoid making too much effort and producing extensively and this line has become a fantastic and polite tool which they used to dodge the ball. Of course, they produced, too but I just had a lot of fun observing how by trying to be super clever they were involved in a conversation that would give them some high marks during the speaking part of the FCE exam.
The one thing to teach your adults is…’it depends‘.
Especially if your adults are shy, not naturally very talkative and a messy A2 level. Especially if they have already experienced some failures and disappoinment while learning Engllish and when they current progress is closely related to the promotion at work. Or the lack of. Especially if, due to all the factors mentioned above, they reply with single words (the teacher sighs) or when they just say, in their L1: ‘I don’t know what to say’ (the teacher sighs again).
‘It depends’ came to us by accident. It was not a part of any text, a listening task or a functional language phrases lesson. It was a part of the emergent lesson but because I take notes of that and send these back to the students, it stayed with us. And what joy!
I can say with all the confidence that my students, in this one (1) group have wholeheartedly adopted the phrase and made it theirs. First of all, it is this gold key that opens the discourse. You cannot just answer with ‘It depends’ and stop there. You have to continue and explain at least the two different ways at looking at the issue. Especially if your teacher is raising her eyebrows and nodding encouragingly. What’s more, I have noticed that they like using it consciously as a natural time-bying tool that gives them the benefit of a few precious seconds to come up with an idea and a way of formulating it in English. Oh, what a find, this phrase!
The one thing to teach your teachers to use and to remember about is…’but’
This one is here as a joke only. I don’t need to teach my teachers any English, of course, but, as a trainer, this is the one word that I would like them to remember to use whenever they consider the theory of child development and the methodology of working with young learners. Or even while going through the teacher’s book and adapting the activities. This little but powerful word is everything you need to be equipped with to ensure that they always keep thinking of all the exceptions to all the rules and that the most important point of reference are the people in the classroom, not some non-existent ideal students or typical five-year-olds and all the other YL cliches.
Seven. This is how many storybooks I own at this point in my life. To be honest, seven is a huge downgrade from these three shelves that I used to have a few months ago: one full shelf at the office, one full shelf at home and one, half-full shelf in the school…
I sigh and I try not to think about the absence of these shelves and, instead, I am thinking of my books circulating in the world, stuck all over the other, guest shelves, my storybooks out of reach but bringing joy to someone, somewhere. On a really good day, I can almost see myself as a fairy who sprinkles not golddust but beautiful pieces of literature.
The thing is, one cannot stay too far away from storybooks. Whether you want it or not, they start piling up, slowly, cautiously but still. Starting from scratch but I already have seven new books. Although ‘new’ should be taken with a pinch of salt here. I do recycle a lot, when possibly, and pick the gems to my collection in all the friendly charity shops. And some of them in my favourite book shop.
How do I choose the storybooks?
Oh, look, my unit 1 vocabulary! I buy the books to teach the lexis
In a perfect world there would be a library in which I would have a storybook for every unit (or for every set of vocabulary) that I am planning to teach. From colours, numbers, pets, transport, shapes to Christmas, Halloween and insects. This is probably never going to happen due to that inability to stick to a shelf for longer (see: Introduction) but it is good to daydream at least.
But I am trying!
When I choose storybooks, I like to look through the illustrations to see to what extent I will be able to use them with a specific topic. Sometimes I read the text, too, but I have also learnt to completely disregard it. The story can always be retold or adapted, graded to the needs of the people in the classroom and the lexis that they are working on at the moment.
That is why I bought Nick Sharratt and Sally Syme’s Something Beginning With Blue (yes, to teach colours!) and Debbie Harter’s Walking Through the Jungle, which has an amazing set of animals, habitats and verbs and which I will be also able to use alongside Walking in the Jungleby Super Simple Songs.
Grrrr! I buy the books to introduce and practise the structure
Because there is more than words, there is also the structure and sometimes I choose the books with the grammar that I will be able to introduce or to practise using a particular story. Oftentimes, the illustrations play the main role here (because, again, the story can be retold and adapted) although the story itself can help, too!
This is how Copy Cat by Mark Birchall landed in the bag and on the shelf. The adventures of the two friends, a cat and a dog, have a lot of verbs which means that I will be able to use it to practise Present Continuous or the Past Simple. I was also thinking of some functional language because the cat and the dog already talk a lot but they can talk even more in the future.
Say it again! I buy the books with repetitive language
Having read those two paragraphs, you might think that I buy the books not to read them but to look at the illustrations. It is not quite true. I use the text, too, but bearing in mind that my students are EFL kids, beginners, with somewhat limited exposure to the target language, I have to be selective as regards the text. At the same time, there are many amazing storybooks which can be used with a beginner child learner and that is because the language is repetitive and, even if it is above the child’s level and even if it has to be introduced, it is a good time investement because it appears throughout the entire story. Some good examples of that could be ‘I wrote to the zoo to send me a pet’ in Dear Zoo (another favourite) or ‘What do you see?’ in Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do you see?.
The story mentioned above, ‘Walking Through the Jungle’ took a similar approach. The entire story is told through the following exchange: ‘Walking through the jungle, what do you see?’ ‘I think I see a lion chasing after me‘.
I know this story! I buy the books with traditional stories
It is great to see that traditional stories are making a comeback into the EFL VYL world. They are not the easiest material to work with, especially with the younger students, because the language is usually complex albeit beautiful, but they have one great advantage – the chances are that kids will be already familiar with them, the characters and the plot, because they are quite likely to have heard them before. At the very least, these are the stories that we can start with while taking the first steps in the traditional stories for pre-schoolers or primary.
That is why I picked up Alexei Tolstoy’s and Niamh Sharkey’s The Gigantic Turnip at the bookshop. I am hoping we are going to have a lot of fun with it, especially that the illustrations are beautiful and there is some repetition in the way the story is told.
Hello again! I buy the books I used to have
The list of the storybooks that are important and close to my heart is long, very long, indeed. The list includes Elmer, Barry, the Caterpillar, Gruffalo and many others, all of the books that I love, that I have been using in class for ages and that I could just take out of my bag and have a lesson with, without any real preparation. The trialled and tested. The best friends forever. The personal top ten, twenty, thirty.
However, when I start recreating the shelf, I do not start from this list, although, perhaps that would be a good idea. Making a fresh start brings with it an opportunity to find new treasures and that is what I like to do, I am on the look-out, I keep my eyes open and when I bump into a title that I know and love, I just get it.
Only when I get to the point of ‘Oh, how I miss Elmer!’, do I go online and just order all of these staples.
This time, my oldie but good is an Oliver Jeffers’ book, Lost and Found which I love for his illustrations and stories.
Guilty pleasures. I buy the books beacause they are just beautiful.
To be perfectly honest, I have to be double reasonable when it comes to this particular category because it is very easy to lose control and to end up with piles and piles of beautiful artifacts that I cannot really use in class. Self-restraint, moderation and temperance are not my favourite words but I have to make an effort, from time to time.
Once in a blue moon, however, comes the day when I am allowed to forage the shelves and the boxes and pick out publications which are (mainly) appealing visually. They are those that are to be used in my art lessons to develop taste, visual intelligence and symbolic representation in children.
This time, the two books that I picked for that very reason were Lauren Child’s Beware of the Storybook Wolves (for the trademark produced-by-a-child-like illustrations) and Kazuno Kohara’s Jack Frost (for the monochrome in black and in blue which will be a starting point for a lesson on the importance of colour). Or Lost and Found…
Most importantly…
It does not really matter why you buy the books as long as you buy them!
The stories that I could tell you of the books that were no one’s favourite and on no one’s wishlist but they came with other treasures or there was a really good price on them or they simply got donated and thus they made it to the shelf…True, they had to wait for their turn, for the inspiration to come, for this special lesson. Every dog has its day. Every storybook has its audience and its lesson.
Go, get the books! Bring them to the classroom!
Happy teaching!
P.S. The only problem now is that it is the middle of July and I already have a head full of new ideas and still – a good few weeks of waiting before I can put them into practice…
Me and one of my best friends, Roman B. No old dogs in this photo. Only the amazing ones (The photo: courtesy of Yulia. The doggo: courtesy of Jill)
Back to the future
It just happened: a dedicated YL teacher (and a teacher who spent the last ten years doing her best to stay away from teaching adults (minus the trainees!) all of a sudden found herself in the classroom with some serious corportate clinets and their Business English, General English, English for Finance and Banking, A2 – C1. Full time.
It has to be said out loud: that was not a direction that this teacher dreamed of or the developement that the teacher planned or solicited but, at the same time, there is absolutely no need to wring hands or shed tears over such a giggle of the Fate. After all, the teacher is an experienced one, with an oh-dear number of years in the classroom (and different types of classrooms, everywhere) so the teacher will be just fine. After all, teaching is teachings, the students are great, the fun is being had. All the details are here just to set the context.
The old dog aka the adult classroom through a YL teacher
This particular started with a most random thing. I don’t even remember what we were doing and with whom, but, suddenly, I caught myself thinking ‘Blin, even my kids can do THAT‘. There was no anger in it or desperation, only curiosity and bemusement. I started to analyse the details and bits and pieces of this THAT and the reasons for that. It started with a sigh but it got interesting very quickly.
Here is a new post and an attempt at looking at the adult EFL learners through the eyes spoilt by her young students.
One. Inhibitions
This is something that is almost non-existant in the YL classroom. Minus all these cases in which the kid have had a negative first experience with English, at school, with the tutors or parents or when they are naturally introvert and shy and they simply need more time to settle in the group and to feel comfortable enough to talk. Most commonly, the kids enter the room, eyes wide-open, ready to discover and to enjoy the world of the English language.
Then, there are adults, a completely different picture. Naturally, there are quite a few factors that can contribute such as a lower level, a long break in learning or using the language, some negative previous learning experience or studying in one group with colleagues from the same company or being a low-level speaker of English when you are already a top manager.
The result? Silence in the classroom.
I guess that is the silence that is the time they need to think about their answer, to choose the words, to gather the courage to let them out and, naturally, they get it. They do have the right to the freedom of silence. For me, the teacher, it is also an interesting exercise in patience. I realised that I have been spoilt with hands shooting up into the air and the opinions voiced almost instantly. Here, I am getting used to breathing more and waiting for the students to be ready.
I am beginning to think that building up the students’ confidence suddenly gets the priority among the lesson and the course aims as regards the adult learners of English. Everything else, the vocabulary, the structures and the skills development will follow. Hopefully.
Two. Teacher-oriented communication
On the one hand, the YL classes are definitely more teacher-centred than the adult classes. That is, to some extent, fully justified. Students, especially the younger ones, are in need of the teacher and the adult as the lesson leader. But only to some extent. I strongly believe that this should be one of the main aims of the course to create the conditions in which the students will be learning to interact with the teacher BUT also giving them a chance to learn to interact with each other. After all, whatever happens in the classroom is only a warm-up, only the preparation, only the training before the real life interaction. In which, most likely, the teacher is not going to take part. For that reason, the students should be given the tools and opportunities to talk to each other, to lead the activities, to take part in pair-work. There is no need to wait with it until they turn ten or fifteen. Some elements of that can be introduced even much earlier and pair-work is feasible in pre-school.
Somehow, it is not a given with the older students. Adults, either because they are more inhibited or because they see it as a sign of respect towards the teacher, they hold back, they wait, for the teacher to call their name out or for the teacher to at least signal that it is their turn to speak. I have realised that sometimes I have to specifically highlight that I am stepping out of the conversation, that the students, in pairs or as a whole group, have to take responsiblity for the interaction and that I will not be encouraging, keeping it up and, of course, leading it. We have been studying together for about three months now and I can already see some improvement in that area. Hooray to that!
Three. Communication strategies
Communication strategies is one of my true professional passions and that is why it was chosen for my first research within the MA programme. Inspired by Haenni Hoti, Heinzman and Mueller (2003) (or, rather ‘taken aback by the comments of’) that claimed that young learners use a very limited range of communication strategies, basically limiting those to translation and code-switching (aka using a combination of L1 and L2), based on the gut feeling from the classroom, I decided to check it out. And, to prove them wrong. Hopefully.
Although my research was a very small scale and low-key and by a beginner researcher, I found out enough evidence to get me even more interested in the topic. My little students proved to be already effective communicators who work hard and who have a good range of different techniques to get the message across such as all-purpose words, approximation, direct appeal for help, indirect appeal for help, self-repair, other-repair and mime. The range was much wider. Translation and code-switching were used, too, and they were the most frequent ones, however, they were not the only ones.
Then, there are the adults and guess what, these adults, ‘Come as you are’, before I get to work on them, they know only one communication strategy and that is ‘translation’. falling back into their L1, straightaway, whenever something is unclear, unknown and uncertain. I am not even sure why it is assumed that the learners (let alone the young ones) will use these strategies of their accord. I haven’t researched that properly, yet, but perhaps it has got nothing to do with the age of the student or, rather, not only with the age of the student, and more with the learning experience and the opportunities to be acquainted with and to develop these strategies.
The adult students (my adult students) struggled in that area and if they didn’t know, they would immediately switch to L1 and they would expect an answer. Working around that by delaying the translation, encouraging them to try something else or, also, providing both, the L2 only and the translation was quite a challenge and I know that some of them were surprised that I don’t just provide the required service aka translation, that I am trying something else. They had it written all over the face. I can’t say my job is done here, far from it but we are working on it. And it is a bit better now.
Four. Sharing ideas
Teacher beliefs are a slippery topic and most of the time we don’t even think about them. It was only last year (and somewhere by the end of it) when I realised why I am a teacher and what I want from my lessons.
Everything happened thanks to one Sasha who joined our group and who, despite the eight months spent with the rest of the team, in a very welcoming and friendly environment, despite the fact that she got on with everyone, Sasha still would keep quiet in class unless I asked her a question and unless I called out her name. I had never even thought about it and only then did I understand that I want to create such an atmosphere in the lesson in which my students feel free to talk because they have something to share with the rest of the group, not because they have to, not because the teacher made them, not because the teacher asked the question or because the teacher is testing them. They talk because they have something to say. And I want them to feel that they can. This is something that we have been working on from the very beginning.
It was one more thing that was ‘not so obvious’ for my adult students. They stalled. They do, still, sometimes. Again, it might be due to a whole range of factors, the natural shyness, the lack of confidence, the level of English, the relations in the workplace, if they come from the same company, or even the natural politeness. It is not a given that everyone will be speaking during the lesson time because speaking and developing the communicative skills is the reason why we come to class.
Five. All ideas are good ideas.
That is a sad fact: adulthood and reality kills creativity and imagination. Long gone are the days of fairy tales and fantasy travels with Frodo or magical battles with Harry. Well, in most cases. For that reason, if the question is about playing football and the student does not play football, the rest, dramatically, is silence…With kids silence never ever happens, and that is especially amazing, because, more often than not, we do things that have nothing or very little to do with the real life. All these menus for the monster cafe, all these school trips around the world, or to the moon or, our life as pirates…Silence is a rare event. Thank heavens.
This post is not to be read as a huge, one thousand word, complaint about my adult students. It is certainly not. I am doing a good job, I like them and we are making progress. I am just positively amazed that with my young learners, we have done SO MUCH (and to be honest, so much we have done by accident, unwillingly, joyfully, just for laughs) to enable the kids and to ensure that they are effective communicators.
I would like to think that my kids are not in danger of being scared to scared, inhibited, with a strong affective factor. This ship has sailed.
This line, so frequently used in my kids classes, started to appear in my adult classes.
See this is basically what happens when you send a YL teacher into the adult classroom. There is a lot of dedication, professionalism and lots of good lessons are happening. But the teacher has a one track mind and everything is somehow YL-related:-)
Bibliography
A. Haenni Hoti, S. Heinzmann and S. Mueller (2003), I can help you? Assessing speaking skills and interaction strategies of young learners, In: M. Nikolov (ed), The Age Factor and and Early Language Learning, De Grutyer.
This is a lesson I taught with the older YL which started in unit 1 of the National Geographic coursebook, Life that we are using with the summer courses for teens. If you are interested in the original lesson, you can find it in the coursebook, in the second edition.
My brain tends to walk its own ways so pretty quickly it became aparent that much as it is inspiring, we have our own plans (btw, I am really looking forward to teaching the rest of the unit). Since I have already put together bits and pieces that were inspired and dedicated to Andy, this lesson was a step further, to take Andy into the classroom with the older students, too.
So, Andy.
Two pretty girls in puffs posing for the camera in the studio. Blonde and brunette in stockings look confident in front of the camera, hugging each other
Colour. Two pictures aka introduction
Two illustrations (see below). Students work in pairs or small teams and discuss the questions below. Afterwards, they compare the ideas as a class.
Talk about these pictures.
Are they similar or different? What is similar? What is different?
Do you like them? Why?
How do they make you feel? Would you hang them in your bedroom or in your house?
How do the artists use the colours in both pictures? Which one do you prefer?
Would these pictures still be interesting in black and white? Why?
Colours. New idioms aka new language
Students work in small teams. They match the the idiom in the sentence with the meaning.
Check the answers as a class, additional clarification.
Students go back to work in pairs. They come up with the examples to illustrate each idiom and tell mini-stories.
A mini-lecture on Andy Warhol and the way he used to work (Marylin Monroe and the Cambpell Soup)
The whole class works on eliciting the associations with one of the colours, in our case it was grey. The teacher shows some of her associations with the colour. The students try to guess the rationale behind each of the ideas.
The students prepare for the main speaking task: they write the numbers 1 – 10 and they notes about at least three associations for each of the colours
The students work in pairs or small groups. Each of the students presents their associations for the partner to guess the colours and afterwards they explain their choices.
During the feedback session, the students share the most interesting or the most unexpected associations.
Any photograph can be used to accompany Andy’s Marylin. I have used the one that we had in the coursebook, one of a scene from a traditional Indian wedding. Today, if I taught this lesson again (or when I teach this lesson again), I would like to use even a wider range of colour such as a painting by Kandinsky, a a painting by Rothko, a storybook illustration, a child’s drawing etc.
The lesson was taught online so the craft / creation component had to be limited to a speaking task. I was tempted to use a variation of the craft activity we used with my younger students but it was simply impossible.
We had our final lesson, we learned and we had a little online party, with snacks and dances. The final reports and the diplomas have all been sent out and it was only a few days later that, during a walk, I caught myself thinking that we have had a very good year in the classroom and I am really happy with what my kids have learned and how they have progressed.
I am here basically taking notes of where we got by the end of the year, not to forget how many structures and how much language can be squeezed in a lesson. Obviously, that is not everything and there is always room for improvement. Obviously, adaptations have to be considered for the younger, the older, the smaller or the bigger groups, the longer or the shorter classes…
Here is my group: 6 kids, (mostly) in their second year of learning English, 4, 4, 5, 5, 6 and 6 years old, for 60 minutes once a week (or 45 minutes when online), amazing parents included.
Here is my lesson, in structures…
Getting in
Hello, how are you? (I’m ok)
Where are you sitting? (A blue table and a pink stool (while putting the books down and while sitting down)
What have you got today? (I’ve got a spider (in the online classroom, showing us what they have brought or what is lying around)
Are you eating or drinking? (I’m eating. I’m drinking (online)
What are you eating / drinking? (I am eating cherries. I am drinking water (online, they bring snacks to the lesson)
Do you like bananas? (Yes, I do (an activity we played while walking into the classroom, they used to do it in pairs, the one entering and the one right behind them in line, with the flashcards they picked from the pile)
How many students have we got today? (Six. One boy and five girls. One teacher (before the hello song. Sometimes we also add: Who is not here?)
Where is Sasha? (Sasha is not here. She is ill) Here, it was the students who started to ask about the missing kids and for that reason we introduced the question. The kids were asking, the teacher was answering).
Who is it? (It is Sasha. It is Misha) This was something that we did only in the classroom and it was our reaction to kids coming late. Even in the classroom we could hear the main door bell (or answer phone) ring and we started to play the game trying to guess who might be coming through the door next. It was especially fun when a few kids were being late and, of course, we could play it only on some days:-)
Did you do your homework? (Yes. (online: we check the homework together, taking turns, classroom: there is more 1-1 interaction as we check the homework as the kids are walking in)
Hello circle
How do you feel today? (I am very happy, a little angry and very, very sleepy (online: we use the presentation, I am arranging the icons for each child, classroom: we use our faces flashcards, at this point we have about 12 in active use. Btw, at this point the kids are asking these questions to each other)
What’s the weather like today? (It is sunny (online: the presentation, classroom: we look outside of the window)
Who is wearing a t-shirt? (Not me / I am. I am wearing a blue t-shirt (online: presentation, classroom: flashcards)
Revision
What’s your favourite colour / pet / fruit? (I like green / cats / bananas (online: presentation, classroom: flashcards)
How is your mum? (My mum is happy (online: wordwall spinner, classroom: flashcards or dice, we usually do three family members)
What’s my secret? Look at me (It’s a car! It’s a train (used for the revision of pretty much any vocabulary, with the teacher and then the students miming their chosen word and the other kids guessing)
What’s my secret? It is big, it is loud, it is fast, it is red (It’s a rocket (used for description riddles, online: we use symbols on the chart to remember what to talk about or the discourse clock, offline: we use flascards. The aim here is to encourage the kids to make riddles, too, but with this particular group we haven’t got to the stage of the SS-led game)
Cat, how do you get to school? (I go to school by train (online: we use miro, the kids are producing the language, I am moving the images, the cat is actually getting on thet train, classroom: we use flascards, the kids put the animals on the transport)
I can see two cats. Yes or not? (No, I can see three cats (we use one picture, the teacher is producing, the kids are listening and correcting)
I can see a black cat. (I can see an orange cat (here we use two different pictures and we are looking for differences, the teacher describes picture A, the kids, in turns, describe picture B)
Songs and movement
Which song do you want to sing, Baby Shark or Old McDonald’s? (Let’s sing Baby Shark (while choosing the song, when we could choose)
Are you sitting or are you standing? (I am sitting. I am standing (while choosing what we want to do during the song)
Do you like the song? (I like it, I don’t like it (to ask after a new song is introduced. It is another activity in which the structure can be used but it is also good to find out if they like the song or not)
What’s your favourite shark / farm animal? (I like mummy shark (a short personalisation activity after a song)
Mummy shark is green. Yes or no? (No, mummy shark is pink (and more follow-up task, that can be used with pretty much any song)
Is it easy or difficult? (It’s easy. It’s difficult (another idea for a follow-up after a song, it works best with the more active songs such as Move, I am normally the one that struggles with some of the actions and the kids adore them)
Abracadabra, 123, you are a cat (Kids don’t really respond here, their only task is to mime a cat. However, the main aim here is to let the kids lead the game as soon as it is possible and once they do, they start producing a lot of language. The other variations include: You are a happy cat. You are a big happy cat. You are dancing. You are a cat and you are dancing)
Anka in the circle. Katya in the circle. Who’s next? (Sasha in the circle (classroom: we are getting up and making a circle before starting the first song. There is a follow-up: Let’s make a small circle. Let’s make a big circle.
Focused task
Are you ready? (Yes, I am) or I’m ready (I’m ready) (as we are sitting down in the classroom or as we are settling down in the online classroom)
I’ve got my book (I’ve got my book) (again, in the online or the offline classroom as we are getting ready for the task. We use it for the handouts in the online lessons, too. In the classroom, I would ask one of the kids to help hand these out. They would be saying: ‘One of Katya. One for Sasha’ and so on while giving them out. Only afterwards we would go ‘I’ve got my paper’)
You need one colour / three colours. What colour do you want? (Blue, please) while we were getting ready for the task, applicable in the offline classroom)
I’m taking blue (or, when appropriate: My car is blue) (I’m taking green. My car is green) We use these in the online lessons or in those lessons when the kids are given their whole set of markers or crayons to use. Sometimes we use ‘I’m taking’ when we only connect the dots, draw lines etc. When it is used for colouring, I prefer the describe the final product as it seems to be more natural in that case)
I’ve finished (I’ve finished) when the task or a part of the task is completed)
Close your books. Put the markers in the box.
There are also many specific task or specific craft-related verbs and instructions but it is impossible to add them all here.
Storytelling
Which story are we going to read, this one or this one? (This one) This is applicable only when we have two stories to choose from
Who is it? What is he doing? Is he big or small? Is he happy? Is he at home? (It’s a boy. He is sitting. He is big. He is sad. He is in the park) We talk about the character of the book, usually looking at the cover page. However, sometimes (like in case of Barry and the Scary Monster) it is much better to use one of the inside illustrations as the cover page reveals too much, you can see the monster and I like to keep him a surprise until a bit later in the game)
Do you like the story? (I like it / I don’t like it) This is the question we always ask at the end of the story)
Are you happy? How do you feel now? (I am happy) This one is also a follow-up question and it gives the kids a chance to express their emotions at the end of the story. Sometimes I use it during the story. It might be a good idea to pause and to gauge the audience to check and to ensure that the kids are not getting scared (re: Barry and the monster) or too sad (re: the little mouse in Playway 1. This is a topic that would perhaps deserve its own post, dealing with emotions in storytelling lessons, but when the character is getting too upset, I comfort him (It’s ok, mouse, don’t cry) or I suggest that the kids can close their eyes or look away)
What’s your favourite fish? (I like this one. I like the blue fish) one of the simpler follow-up activities)
Goodbye
Let’s sit down: we have homework, goodbye song and stickers (while we are getting ready for finishing the lesson. By the end of the year I am only counting on my fingers and the kids are enlisting what is left to do. I only need to correct the order, sometimes.)
I’ve got my homework (I’ve got my homework) only applicable in the offlince classroom when the homework is not in the book).
How many stickers are we getting today? Are you taking a sticker? We have got farm, sea animals and space. Which one do you want? (Three stickers. Yes, please. No, thank you. Farm, please) This is only applicable in the classroom. With my online pre-school groups we haven’t started giving out the online stickers and, although we shifted online half-way through the year when the kids were already used to stickers, they did not mind, they did not ask for stickers. I did not want to introduce the online stickers because we had too many new things at this point due to switching online. I did not want to add up to that.
Notes
Interaction: in most cases, kids answer in a messy choirmanner (I am giggling because I have just come up with that term) and that is: they respond to the question in their own time, to produce the language, more or less at the same time. I am keeping an eye and sometimes I have to call out those that missed the moment and did not produce. We have been studying together for two years so by now this type of interaction has become a routine. There are also situations, especially with the new structures or in case of a very important message (well, you know:-) when I call them out one by one. However, since there are six of them it cannot be every single time. There are also questions and structures that the kids lead and they choose one of the other kids to answer.
L2 and L1: most children, most of the time reply in the way that is the preschool teacher’s dream: in a full sentence and in English. However, kids are kids and they are beginner learners so of course that would not happen in 100% of cases. Sometimes they use single words (because kids do) and sometimes they thrown in three other sentences to tell me why their mum is happy today and that is just the way it is. I am doing my best to promote English only in the classroom but my kids are 4 or 5 and it does not happen overnight. But it does happen eventually.
Activities: I do not use every single activity in every lesson but I do like to repeat them in order to ensure that the basic structures feature more or less regularly
Outcomes, before and after: This is our regular lesson in level 2 which is the middle level. As regards my level 1 students – they have been exposed to some of these structures from the very beginning and, for example, in December, after only four months of studying, they already had about ten adjectives to describe emotions at their disposal whereas all the other structures were introduced gradually and, as can be expected, the main aim for some of them was only the exposure. As regards level 3, we managed to expand the range of these structures, make them natural and get to the point when the kids would be using them spontaneously.
