A paintbrush, that took us all by surprise with how beautifully it caught and preserved the paint. We all kept staring at it for a few minutes, in admiration.
Today, I would like to share with you a project that we have been a part of for the past two months and that I am hoping will continue until the end of the academic year: our own month song.
Ingredients
a song and a melody that will be used as a model, in my case it was January Song from Sing Play Create.
a group of kids and a teacher to manage
optionally: an audio of the melody, ours was Frere Jacques, it was easy to find.
Procedures
First, a story: Our lessons in December, with my year 1 kids, started with different Christmas songs as we had already abandoned the regular Hello songs somewhere in December. When January arrived, I wanted to devote a part of the lesson to a chat about things that we do in that month. And to introduce that slot, I was looking for a song. I found it and quite easily and it was perfect – short, call and response style and with a relatively simple melody. We sang this song throughout the entire month. Then, February came and I started to look for a song that we could sing. I did not find anything that would work for us, something easy and short, without too many cultural references that are not at this point relevant. I didn’t find anything that I could use. I decided we are going to create our own.
In the first lesson of February, I explained to my students the song situation and encouraged them to think about our own song. They made a real effort and we ended up with a song in 1 a and a slightly different song in 1b. I wrote the songs on the board and we photographed the board. Every day, at the beginning of the first lesson, I would take out my phone and start singing for the kids to repeat. Some of the phrases were familiar to kids, the others I helped to translate.
We repeated the procedure in March and ended up with two verses in both groups that we sang for a week.
The next step was of course the kids’ versions. I did not prepare them for that in any way and on one of the days, I simply asked: Does anyone have an idea for a new song? And they did. Right now we do it every lesson and there are always some kids who are willing to share their ideas.
Why we love it
The song is a perfect choice for creative singing (and speaking). It has got a simple melody which we already know very well. The song follows the pattern of call – response so whatever idea the leader comes up with, the group responds, by simply repeating the line.
The lines are short, easy to create and to repeat even for beginner children. It is an advantage, too that the verses of the song follow two patters: either a simple phrase or a short sentence so pretty much anything can be used. Some of the verses we created were like that: ‘March, March’ (only two words repeated), ‘Make snowmen’ (an imperative), ‘Birds and bees are flying’ (present continuous), ‘Flowers grow’ (present simple), ‘We are very tired’ (personalised sentences with the verb to be).
Some of my kids have an idea but they don’t have the language and that works, too. They sing the first line, in Russian, and I respond with the equivalent in English. It also helps with some verses that are not appropriate but are, at the same time, a result of my students experimenting with the language. We have had a few cases of a line like that appearing as a call and me replying with ‘La la la’ or with ‘Sasha is not singing’, to signal that some things are not be accepted.
Kids love this part of the lesson and, on a typical day, we have about 4 or 5 verses, sometimes more, sometimes fewer. Some of the kids sing the verses, some prefer to say them already and it all works.
I am just overjoyed because they are producing the langauge and in this previous week, we have seen an interesting new trend or even two. Some kids (following my example) started to create songs about how they feel on the day (‘March, March. Sunny day. I am very happy. But I want to sleep’) which is their extended and musical answer to ‘How do you feel today?’. Some children sang a song about their favourite month (usually related to their birthday). We had also a few crazy versions of snow in July and another Christmas in the summer. One way or another – lots and lots of language creativity.
Another thing that makes me really happy is that this creative activity appeals not only to my stronger students but also to some of my struggling students and, in general, is great for mixed ability groups. It is easy to create your song, for example by changing one or two words in the verses that your teacher or friend sang. That’s easy to do. Plus, all students are creative, even my beginner beginners. They have an idea and they want to share and since some of the ideas are shared every day, they stay. My student Sasha came up with the idea of a sick rainbow two weeks ago and now he remembers himself and encourages us to sing ‘The rainbow is sick’. We do.
Last but not least, this is our little tradition, our routine, something that we do as a community. And that makes it precious, too!
I am quite curious what is going to happen to this project in April and in May. It is already good and exciting and worthy of sharing but who knows what else is there for us…I will definitely be writing about it in the future!
The question appeared in one of the groups on the social media and I realised that a) I have something to share here and b) I haven’t got any posts on the movement games for the little people.
One: Abracadabra
Resources: only a magic wand. It can be made at home and producing magic wands is now a real hobby of mine. The easiest version (in the photo below) can be even made with kids, in class. Some shops sell magic wands, too but, really, kids will respond well to a simple pencil if it is accompanied by some ‘Abracadabra’
How to play: We have been using the same line for many years now, with many groups: ‘Abracadabra, 1,2,3. You are….’. The game might be introduced with the first topic that lends itself to miming, for example ‘pets’ or ‘toys’. We start with the simple phrase ‘Abracadabra, 1, 2, 3. You are a cat / a dog / a frog etc’ and I support the language with the visuals namely flashcards displayed on the board and my own examples. The gestures we use for each of the pets, toys, fruit, transport, jungle animals, fairy tale characters, jobs are not universal, they are only our creation for that particular group. Please remember that the ability to represent characters and words through gestures is not a skill that children are born with. They are developing their symbolic representation and they might need the teacher’s support in the beginning of this journey. That is why the teacher’s example is so important.
After the kids have learnt their first adjectives, these can be extended into ‘You are a happy cat’, ‘You are a sad princess’ and so on. Naturally, the game is led by the teacher in the first lessons but later on, the children are invited to lead the game and to cast some spells in the classroom. They start with the very simple and basic combinations but with time they start to be really creative, both with the langauge and with gestures. Think about all these gems from the classroom: ‘a sad pumpkin’, ‘a sleepy cat’, ‘an angry princess’…How would you mime these?
A classroom-made magic wand
Two: Musical flashcards
Resources: only one set of flashcards, I normally use the set from the coursebook, A5 size.
How to play: We stand in a circle and the cards are lying on the floor, in the centre. We move around, in a circle, just walking. The teacher sings a song and my choice is usually ‘Happy Birthday’. As soon as stop singing, everyone stops and picks up one card from the floor. Afterwards we show what we have by using the word in a sentence. The simplest version is ‘It’s a cat’ but the structures can vary and be more closely connected to the vocabulary for example: I like + food, I’ve got + toys, I am wearing + clothes and so on.
After each child produces the sentence, we put the cards back on the floor and continue the game. It works well with all the groups although with my bigger groups, I encourage the kids to speak together, in kind of a messy choir, in order to save time and not to risk any dead moment in the lesson.
This is not a competitive game, no one is sitting down or dropping out, we all play throughout the game. No points are awarded either.
A classroom-made magic wand
Three: Everybody is dancing
Resources: None:-)
How to play: We stand in the circle and the teacher is chanting or singing the phrase (the melody is made up), and everyone is performing the actions. I normally start with the easy verbs i.e. clap, march, walk, eat, drink, dance and swim but we keep adding through the entire year, more complex and more creative verbs so by the end of the first year we have lots of them at our disposal because kids learn all of them just from this simple game.
The teacher is the one to lead the game for quite a long time but the kids can be slowly involved, too by giving them a choice of two verbs, for example ‘Sasha, everyone is singing or dancing?’, Sasha: ‘Dancing’, after which the teacher is singing or chanting what Sasha has chosen. Eventually, the kids are ready to make their own decisions and to produce full sentences. And Present Continuous (because that’s what it is) will come in really handy with storytelling and picture description.
Oh, one important thing: don’t forget to add ‘sleep’, it will work wonders to calm the kids down.
A classroom-made magic wand
Four: Snake!
Resources: a long snake made of paper aka a necessary number of scrap A4 pieces of paper glued or stapled together with a head of a snake drawn on the first one and the tail of the snake drawn on the last one. I actually like to use the A4 sheet cut in half for a thinner snake and I cut out the head and the tail. Perhaps a set of flashcards in the first weeks of playing the game or with younger students.
How to play: The teacher puts the snake on the floor, the kids come to the snake one by one and stand in a line on one side of the snake. The game is intended to practise one particular group of words with some distractors included, distractors here being any other words, not in the category. For example, if the main aim is to practise colours, the basic distractor can be numbers or even kids’ names if that is the beginning of the year and the children do not really know anything else.
The teacher calls out the words, in a random order. If the students hear the target vocabulary, they have to jump over the snake (or to step over if the kids are young and not very good at controlling their gross motor skills) every time they hear the target word i.e. a colour. If they hear one of the distractors, they don’t move. In a way, actually, it is a movement variation of ‘Simon says’ only no one is dropping out.
When we start playing, we line up and I show the kids all the flashcards and we revise all the words. I also tell them that today we play with colours. Later on in the year, when the kids have more vocabulary at their disposal, the teacher can raise the level of challenge and play with two or even three categories.
The game mostly focuses on listening for the target vocabulary and discriminating it from the distractors but it can easily be turned into a productive game with one of the students standing at the head of the snake, facing the group and calling out the words. In the early stages of the unit, when the kids still might struggle with remembering all the new words, it makes sense to let them look at the cards displayed on the board or on the wall or to even hold all the flashcards and to call out the words they want to use.
I created this game for my group in Pamplona in which I had 12 little kids and no room in the classroom apart from the relatively narrow aisle in the middle of the classroom. This is how the snake game was born. We needed something thin to fit in the aisle and I chose a snake because I hate them personally and stepping over a snake is a good move, very conducive to survival. But the kids accepted it and we loved the game.
The snake itself needs to be made but it is easy to store it and to recycle it and if it gets destroyed during the game, it is also easy to fix. Or to be recreated. During one of my training sessions, one of my teachers suggested using a skipping rope and that, of course, is a solution. However, I still prefere the paper because in case of a mishap and a kid tripping over the snake, the paper seems a safe option. If it gets torn, we can fix it, no harm done. A child tripping over a skipping rope, however, might result in a child falling down. Typing that up here I realised that if the classroom has the appropriate floor, the snake can also be drawn on the floor, with chalk for example…
A classroom-made magic wand
Five:I like cats, I don’t like cats
Resources: one set of flashcards, the regular A5 set that normally come with the coursebook and two cards with symbols for I like / I don’t like, for example a heart for ‘I like’ and a crossed heart for ‘I don’t like’
How to play: Before the lesson the teacher puts up the I like / I don’t like symbols on two walls in the classroom, on the opposite ends. In the real life, these two simply stay there for the rest of the year as we use them all the time. The kids get up and stand in the middle of the room, half-way between these two signs. It is good to put there a small stool or a table with all the cards, for example all the toys, pets, colours etc.
The teacher picks out one card, for example ‘green’, calls it out and the students go either left or right, depending on whether they like it or not. The teacher points at one of the group and says: ‘Green!’ and the kids reply ‘I like green’ and ‘I don’t like green’ together with the rest of their group. Afterwards, they come back to the centre (aka the stool) and the game goes on with a different word.
This is another stirrer that gives the kids a chance to move around a bit and to produce the langauge, with the additional support since they have the flashcards to reinforce the meaning of the word and since they produce full sentences with approximately half of the group. The kids can also be invited to lead the game by choosing the words to use.
The game can be used throughout the year with almost any vocabulary and there are a few adaptations possible especially as regards the settting. If the group is big or if the kids are too energetic and too tricky to control, the same game can be played with the kids sitting on the carpet or even on their chairs. Instead of walking to the left and to the right, they can stand up and sit down or clap their hands and stomp their feet or raise one arm or two arms for ‘I like’ and ‘I don’t like’ respectively. This will make the classroom management a little bit less challenging for the teacher.
A classroom-made magic wand
Bonus activities: My favourite movement activies
Resources: the access to the internet and youtube
How to play: All of these songs here have been created specifically for the purpose of ensuring some movement in the classroom. The main aim here is not the langauge production although they do include some language but, of course, the movement is the star here.
Move by Super Simple Songs – a real hit, nothing more to say.
The Rolly Polly Roll by Super Simple Songs – another hit but only if you have a carpet because kids might actually try to roll or to crawl. You’ve been warned:-)
The Jellyfish Song by Super Simple Songs – I love it and it is quite a challenge to turn yourself into a jellyfish
Head, shoulders, knees and toes – this is the first song we sing in the classroom, mostly because kids can participate without any language production, just by doing what the teacher is doing. I like to sing this one myself, without the audio, in order to be able to control the speed and the activity. There is a version by Super Simple Songs, of course.
Shake your sillies out by Jose Paolo Liwag – I love to use this one with my older students, actually when they can appreciate the need to shake our sillies out and to clap our crazies out…
The Dance Freeze Song by Scratch Garden – the hit of this summer camp. There are some cool verbs and dance movements and we just LOVED to dance! You can also teach your kids the most important verb in the world: FREEZE.
Action Songs for kids by The Singing Walrus – one more fun song, with the basic verbs.
Make a Circle by Super Simple Song – it is a very popular song, I have seen it in many lessons that I observed but, somehow, I have never used it myself a lot.
A classroom-made magic wand
Some things to remember
Before you start any movement games, make sure that the kids are ready. Ideally, these games can be played in the part of the classroom where we have more room, only the carpet, no or fewer pieces of furniture. If that is not possible, please make sure that you create this space, with the kids’ help, possibly, to make sure that it is as safe as possible.
It is also a good idea to introduce some rules related specifically to this movement part of the lesson and these will depend on the classroom and on the group. In my classroom, we used to do all the movement games on the carpet by the window and for that reason our only rule was: We stay on the carpet, to ensure that the kids do not wander around, run around and leave the safe space.
Make sure that you move to this other place of the classroom in an organised manner. In the beginning it might be necessary to call the kids one by one, by the name to avoid a situation in which we have to control a stampede of five-year-olds there and back. With my groups (the maximum number of students in our pre-school groups is eight), we have our chant. I like to go to the carpet first and singing, call all the kids one by one (‘Sasha in the circle, Sasha in the circle’) and to wait, holding hands with all the kids, as they arrive. The child who is just joining is the one to choose the next child (‘Sasha, who’s next?’) and for the last one to join us we all call out loudly (‘Sasha, come here’) so that nobody feels unwelcome. Some kids actually love to be the last ones to join the circle because it is a lot of fun to be called by the whole group.
When the movement game is over, we go to our tables and desks, one by one or in pairs and the teacher is the one to make a decision about the order, at least in the beginning when the kids are still getting used to the new element of the routine.
Bigger groups can use the same pattern, but the kids move in groups of two or three so that the preparation for the activity does not last longer than the game itself.
One of the other things that I always do as the first activity on the carpet is to make a circle, holding hands and run a few rounds of ‘big circle’ (we stretch our circle), ‘small circle’ (we gather in the centre), a few times with these two adjectives and with the other ones, too for variation, for example a low circle (we bend), a high circle (hands up in the air, still holding hands), a wavy circle, a shaky circle and so on. It is an easy, risk-free activity, the kids love it (especially when everyone is present and we can really make a big circle) and, most importantly, after arriving one by one and being individuals, we can do something as a group, something super easy, before we get on to the more creative and productive things.
These games are not only about movement, although this is their reason for being in the classroom and in the lesson. However, as always, the main aim is language production and for that reason the students as the teacher, leading the activity have been included in all of the games presented above.
I still remember my first ever lesson with pre-schoolers in Moscow. I went in prepared, a whole pile of flashcards, crayons, books, mini-cards at the ready. I wasn’t scared or panicky and the thought that we had to occupy ourselves for only 45 minutes was rather soothing. After all, I did teach in Spain, the group was much bigger and the lessons much longer and yet I survived. In a rather victorious manner.
But then the kids came in, only five of them, they sat down nicely and we started the lesson. And by that I mean ‘I’ started the lesson. They did not give me the register before the lesson, the admin left quickly, the door was closed and the parents were somewhere else. I was on my own.
The kids were sitting nicely, very nicely, just looking at me and absolutely not reacting to my smiles, hellos and communication attempts. They did not respond at all to my ‘silly teacher guessing game’ that I normally (and successfully) use to get the kids to introduce themselves at the beginning of the first lesson. I say my name, pointing at myself and then start with one of the kids (the brave-looking one) and start bombarding them with all the boy’s or girl’s names typical of the country that I can think of until I bump into the right one or until the child reacts to the silliness and introduces themselves.
Only this time, I was getting nowhere. Five pairs of eyes were looking at me, just looking at me and waiting for something else. Something else which I did not have. It did last only a minute or even less, in real life, but it felt like a whole eternity. And I did start to panic.
Luckily, among the rubbish that I did bring to class that day, I had a puppet, Max from Playway to English. And guess what, the kids did not want to talk to me but they were more than happy to converse in Max. In English, straight away, even without any special introductions in L1 and explanations that Max is from England does not speak Russian and so we have to make an effort. That was not necessary, they just wanted to talk to him. We did talk. Yay!
I don’t really like puppets, to be honest.
I don’t and I cannot even explain why.
I am actually good at all the puppet-related skils. I don’t have a problem with putting on voices, making faces and role-playing things with myself for the benefit of the 5-year-old audience. And anything in the classroom can find its own soul and voice, flashcards, masks, pencils.
But, really, I use puppets only in the beginning of the course, with new groups, when we have new students joining an already established group or when we were forced to move our pre-primary classes online.
Dex is then ready to help and Teddy sorts out most of the issues. Children feel more comfortable with something that is soft and pretty and right out of the world that they are familiar with and someone who does silly things and who can make them happy. Teddy and Dex are always at the ready.
However, as soon as we done with the first weeks of the course and we feel comfortable in the classroom, they visit less and less frequently. I don’t miss them but perhaps this is something that I should actually reflect on why we are not using puppets more. But there are exceptions, of course.
Angelina, my superhero
It all started in 2017 because this was the Year of the Rooster and, traditionally, the world filled up with toys, figurines, puppets representing this very animal. One of my friends landed one as a present and decided that my classroom will be the best permanent home for it or, actually, her, because, regardless of the Chinese horoscope, it is a she, a hen, Angelina.
At the time, my youngest group were already very big, already five years old, well-accommodated in the school and in the classroom and definitely beyond the stage when they needed a puppet to ‘feel better’ or ‘to break the ice’.
But I had Angelina and I really wanted to use it and, of course, I did. It was not one of the projects that you start with research and reading that lead to implementing an idea in the classoom to meet some specific aims. Here, we went topsy-turvy. I had a resource, I jumped in at the deep end, without any specific aims, observing, taking notes and reflecting. And learning a lot about working with preschoolers. Here is how Angelina changed my teaching life.
Angelina 1: When puppets listen, kids talk.
Instructions
Get a puppet, think of the name, the background, the voice and the movements. Our Angelina, for example, is not quite a puppet, rather ‘a fancy sweets container‘ as she has a big zipped pocket, in her bum (sorry) which I decided not to use it. I do not to put it on my hand. She normally sits in my lap and I hold her by the back, letting her express herself mostly through the head movements. Sometimes, with the use of my other hand, I use Angelina’s wings or wings which are quite dangly. She is, overall, quite expressive for a puppet))
Make the puppet a part of the classroom routine. Our Angelina sleeps in her house (this being a rather unappealing plastic bag hanging on the bookshelf). Right after the hello song and hello routine, we wake her up and invite her to join us in the circle. Afterwards, she says goodbye and returns to her house, to continue sleeping.
The main aim of Angelina’s visits is to provide an opportunity for freer speaking practice and to encourage the kids to produce the language spontaneously.
In practice that means that we ask lots and lots of questions and Angelina is telling us about herself. We start with ‘What’s your name?’, ‘How are you today?’ and ‘What’s your favourite….?’, later moving on to ‘Do you like…?’, ‘Have you got…?’ and ‘Can you…?’, although these are always only ideas and I make sure that all the contributions are welcome. I have not tried telling and retelling stories yet but that might be another option.
Why we love it
Angelina (or ‘a puppet’) is a fascinating way of getting the language out of the kids. They start producing the questions because they are really curious about the class puppet’s life and these questions start from the ‘traditional’ questions, often used and heard in class but they quickly become very creative and unexpected.
Kids naturally react to what Angelina says and we can use this opportunity to teach them and them a chance to express surprise (‘Wow’), disbelief (‘Really?’) or shock (‘Oh no!’).
There is some opportunity for emerging langauge learning, for example ‘wolf’ (things that Angelina is scared of), ‘corn’ (things that Angelina eats) and ‘planet’ (things that Angelina likes) that we might not have learnt otherwise because they do not really feature in our coursebook.
It is a woderful opportunity for spontaneous production since with this kind of activities the students are in charge of the content. Naturally, they will not be able to chat freely in English about Angelina (what with being 5, pre-A learners of English, with a limited exposure to L2) but from my perspective (I still teach these same, first Angelina, children, now we are seven and eight and A1 level), this was an important first step that has definitely contributed to my students’ current level of fluency and communicative skills.
Angelina 2: Our class puppet and her diary
Instructions
First you need to have had a class puppet for some time for the kids to become familiar with the puppets, their habits and interests. I introduced Angeling in year two and the diary in year three, but it will depend on the group and the children.
The teacher starts the journal. I used a sketchbook and filled in the first few pages with Angelina’s adventures. Each of them was a drawing and a sentence.
The teacher brings the journal to class. The group look at it together and talk about what they can see in the pictures.
After a few weeks, the teacher first explains the whole idea and the logictics to the parents: the kids, in turns, will be taking Angelina and the album home for the weekend and then, when they are ready, they will bring them back, with one more drawing added. In class, we are all going to look at it and talk about it.
To lessen the stress of having to draw in the official diary, I have used a template for the main character, an drawing from clip art library that I printer, cut out and glued to a few empty pages. This way we would always create a collage, the drawing of Angelina would be consistent and of a good quality and the students would only work on the scene itself.
The kids were only suppsed to write but some of the parents helped and wrote the key sentences.
When I introduced the idea, one of my eductional mums said ‘Youa are brave!’ and, I guess, by that she meant that I was risking Angelina getting destoryed, lost, stained or loved so much that she would never want to go back to school…Yes, that is something to take into consideration. The younger students might get too emotionally attached and we would be in trouble. Plus, there are the accidents of the everyday that we cannot predict or prevent. I did think about it and I still wanted to risk. Plus, I had located another copy of Angelina in our accountants’ room and I was ready to ask, bribe or steal, should anything really bad happen to our original SuperHen.
‘Angelina is making cookies’
‘Angelina is having cookies and tea.’
Why we love it
The kids loved taking Angelina home to play. Once she came back to school with a boyfriend (who stayed only for a day) but she also encouraged other kids to bring her toys. A parrot called Pepsi attended our lessons regularly, participated eagerly and sometimes asked for her own handout in order to be able to do her own homework. Which, accidentally, was always different from her human’s homework.
The project gives the kids a chance to be creative as Angelina can do absolutely anything while visiting. She can go to the park and she can fly to the moon, too.
It provides the entire group with a picture to talk about, to discuss and to ask questions about and the best bit is – we never know what it is going to be. As a result, we get yet another chance to use the language tools we have to talk and to learn new vocabulary, too.
No Angelina was harmed during the entire project. The kids took this responsibility very seriously and I was really proud of them.
‘Angelina is making a cake’
‘Angelina is on the beach’
‘Angelina is jumping into the swimming pool’
Instead of a coda, another puppet story.
If you think that puppets and class puppets work only with the little kids, I would like you to reconsider.
In the classroom where we study with my older kids, we don’t have any balls and whenever we need to throw things (while playing games) we use soft toys. For that reason, we have a creature called ‘Flying Cow’, which lives on the top shelf, is a very sphere-like toy cow and, yes, it frequently flies.
Despite the fact that the students are well-past the primary age, Flying Cow always gets stroked, squeezed, hugged, patted, or, in other words ‘is shown affection’. Last year, while we were playing, the cow got thrown or caught rather too energetically and, as a result, suffered a tail injury (reads: it just got ripped off).
It was an interesting thing to see that all my seemingly teenage students gasped in horror at the damage done. As if Flying Cow would really be in pain. I did keep a straight face and acted like a good doctor ‘Don’t worry, everything is going to be alright. I’ll take her home and fix it.’ Which was met with relief.
Maybe not only the little kids?:-)
Now, dear teacher, take a careful look around. Is there anyone that could become your Angelina?
