23 March 2012

Teaching English to Young Learners

In one of my lessons, we have been learning how to teach English to young learners. I wanted to share the ideas we learned in the class because young learners are definitely different from adults in terms of learning a language. They like learning a language with games and songs. we cannot teach them grammar or give them a vocabulary list.
Pelmanism game: You show the flashcards with animals and you say the English names of them while showing it. After that, you show the flashcards with the written form of animals'name.  Then , in a circle, you can close all cards on the ground and you may want them to be 2 groups. They will try to find the card with  animal image with the card with its name in one time.
Kim's game:  There are some objects on the table like a pen, a pencil etc... You say the names of them then you ask the learners what they are. After these repetitions, you say to them "close your eyes". You take one of the object behind you. You ask "what is missing?". This goes on.
---> the other game: in a circle, you give an object next to you by saying its name and the other gives the object next to him/her by saying its name.
---> the other game: There is a balloon and you send the balloon with your hands by saying an animal name to one of your students in the circle. They do not catch the balloon. They will just send the balloon to a friend  by saying an animal name. This can be done for the colors ,also.
Overhead projector: If you want to teach some vocab. items, you can do it in a story by using the overhead projector. Take a piece of paper and cut the middle of it like the image of telescope's glass. Then, you can put the images of the words which you will teach into the middle of the circle paper which you cut. Or it can be like this: you can cut the paper like a queen image and you can put the images of the words into the queen's head, so you can create a story like " what is the queen thinking of?" The other option is to cut the paper like keyhole. Therefore, the students may wonder what is seen by looking through the key hole.
I spy:  It is a game that you choose an object from the class and you say " I spy a pink dog". Then the learners shows or finds the pink dog toy. If they are learning letters, we can say " I spy something with 'd'".  Then, the learners show the dog, as an example.
Listen and do activity:  This song can be used like Total psychical response. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QfPg_GzC-HA or

There is nice song which children like so much. Its name is Twinkle twinkle little star.

Circling: When you give learners a separate shit with  different people who have different features in appearance.  For example, first ask the learners "find the person who has eyeglasses." That is, ask  first two questions as affirmative questions, then ask the other questions as negative questions like "Find the person who do not have blue eyes".

Filling: There are two papers. Each of them has eight parts. There are different pictures in each part. In A's paper, there will be some empty areas and the students will sit back to back. A's will ask to B's  "what are there in section 1?". B's will answer like " 2 sheep" . Then , A's will draw 2sheep on the empty section. Also, B's will have some empty sections and they will ask to A's. This can be listen and draw activity.

Winnie the Witch: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u3QMAKX5xqg You should have the full DVD of this story. The DVD has stories, songs, games and the children like it.

Ginger Bread Man: In a circle, each student has a ginger bread man puppet and the teacher lay out the animal flashcards in the story on the ground.The teacher tells the story and when the teacher say an animal name, they make the puppets run to that animal's picture. Moreover, there are some repeated phrases in the story like "run away" or "I want to eat you".

Finger puppets: Children loves them and you can create a story with these finger puppets.


*** You should  paste posters near the board. The students see them while you are teaching and talking to them.
***You can teach the alphabet with songs. There are a lot of songs in youtube.
***You can label the objects in the classroom. Therefore, the students can learn what it is in English.

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