TEACHING ENGLISH TO CHILDREN
Autor: Oficina Pedagógica de Campo Limpo Paulista | Publicado: 2008-06-10T07:29:00-03:00

Wendy A. Scott and Lisbeth H. YtrebergSummary: ( pages 5-26)What this means for our teachingWords are not enoughDon’t rely on the spoken word only. Most activities for the younger learners should include movement and involve the senses. You will need to have plenty of objects and pictures to work with, and to make full use of the school and your surroundings.Play with the languageLet the pupils talk to themselves. Make up rhymes, sing songs, tell stories. Play with the language – let them talk nonsense, experiment with words and sounds: ‘Let’s go – pets go.’ ‘Blue eyes – blue pies.’Language as languageThe spoken word is often accompanied by other clues to meaning – facial expression, movement, etc. We should make full use of these clues. When pupils start to read, the language becomes something permanent and there are fewer other clues to meaning.Reading and writing are extremely important for the child’s growing awareness of language and for their own growth in the language, although both are very demanding and take time and patience to learn.Variety in the classroomVariety is a must – variety of activity, variety of pace, variety of organisation, variety of voice.RoutinesHave systems, have routines, organise and plan your lessons. Use familiar situations, familiar activities. Repeat stories, rhymes, etc.Cooperation not competitionAvoid rewards and prizes.Creat an atmosphere of involvement and togetherness.GrammarChildren have an amazing ability to absorb language through play and other activities which they find enjoyable.As a teacher, you should note the structures, functions and grammar items which you want your pupils to learn as well as those they already know, but your actual teaching should only include the barest minimum of grammar taught as grammar, and then for the older children only.AssessmentIt is always useful for the teacher to make regular notes about each child’s progress.TEACHERSTeachers come in all shapes and sizes.We come to the job with our personalities already formed, but there are abilities and attitudes which can be learnt and worked on. As a teacher of young children it helps a lot if you have a sense of humour, you’re open-minded, adaptable, patient, etc., but even if you’re the silent, reserved type, you can work on your attitudes and abilities.AbilitiesMost of us can learn to sing or even play a musical instrument.We can all learn to mime, to act and to draw very simple drawings.AttitudesRespect your pupils and be realistic about what they can manage at an individual level, then your expectations will be realistic too.Correction has its place when you are working on guided language exercises, but not when you are using the language for communication.Everyone makes mistakes when they are learning a new language, and that it is all right.-Establish routines: ‘Good morning. It’s Wednesday today, so let’s hear your news.’ ‘Friday is the day you read the book of the month. Have a birthday calendar, so that you know when everybody’s birthday is, and have a routine for what to do on that day.Have a weather chart so that the weather can be written up every day. Have a calendar with day, date and month. Routines of this type build up familiarity and security for both are groups.Young children respond well to surroundings which are pleasant and familiar. If at all possible, put as much on the walls as you can- calendars, posters, postcards, pupils’s drawings, writing etc. Have plants, animals, any kind of interesting object.Encourage the children to bring in objects or pictures or postcards and tell the rest of the class a little bit about them in English.LISTENING IN THE CLASSROOMListening is the skill that children acquire first, especially if they have not yet learnt to read. When the pupils start to learn a foreign language, it is going in mainly through their ears and what the pupils hear is their main source of the language. Of course, we also give them as much visual back-up as possible through facial expression, through movement, through mime and through pictures.When you are telling a story, for example, you don’t have to tell it from beginning to end without breaks. You can re-tell it from beginning to end without breaks. You can re-tell it again and again as you go along:‘This story starts on a nice, sunny Monday morning. Who’s the story about? Who can we see in the picture? Yes, Fred and Sue. It’s a nice, sunny Monday morning and Sue and Fred are... Where are they? In the forest. Right. They’re in the forest. And what are they doing? They’re picking berries. So, it’s a nice, sunny Monday morning, and Fred and Sue are in the forest picking berries. What happens next? Well...’ and so the story continues.The listeners can’t re-listen in the same way that they can re-read, it means that if you are the listener, you can’t decide how fast you work.‘LISTEN AND DO’ ACTIVITIESMoving aboutChildren need exercise and movement, and you should make use of this wherever possible.Put up your handYou will amost certainly have to make use of the ‘put up your hand” type exercise at some stage. For example, you might want them to put up their hands when they hear a certain word.Mime storiesIn a mime story the teacher tells the story and the pupils and the teacher do the actions. It again provides physical movement and gives the teacher a chance to play along with the pupils.Here’s a very simple example of a mime story:‘We’re sitting in a boat, a small rowing boat. Let’s row. We row and row. Now what´s that? A bird. A big bird flying over the water. Now it’s gone. We keep rowing. Can we see the bird? No, no bird. This is hard work. Row, row. We’re tired. We row slowly. There’s the shore. Let’s go home now. We’re so tired we’re dragging our feet. We’re tired. We want to go to sleep. We lie down on our beds. We close our eyes, and...shhh....we’re asleep’.Drawing‘Listen and draw’ is a favourite type of listening activity in almost all classes, so keep the pictures simple. You can make up a picture or describe a picture you have in front of you. This activity is particularly useful for checking object vocabulary, prepositions, colours and numbers.Listen and colourChildren love colouring pictures and we can easily make this activity into a listening activity. We can use any picture. Instead of just letting them colour it by themselves, make it into a language activity. Here is an example: ATP de InglêsClaudeli Nunes Moreira Cesar de Camargo