These changes and the feelings they bring about have implications for foreign language instruction. Great care should be exercised in activities that require students to generate physical descriptions or comparisons. Students may feel awkward about their appearance, may be reluctant to stand before the class for individual presentations, and should be allowed more sheltered opportunities such as small group or student-teacher interaction. The need for movement necessitates activities that physically engage students. Hands-on materials and manipulatives provide opportunities for movement while addressing the needs of kinesthetic and tactile learners.
Group work allows students to move about the room.
In middle school classrooms, it is not unusual to see small groups of students stretched out or seated on the floor. Piaget has suggested that the middle years are the time children move from the stage of concrete to formal operations. How new concepts are acquired will be influenced by maturational development. The difficulty many middle school students experience in mastering abstract grammar concepts may not be as much a reflection of aptitude as of cognitive maturity. These students will benefit more from concrete experiences, such as vocabulary presented through direct experiences, manipulation of real objects, and pictures, all set in a meaningful context.