Teaching Young Learners BBC

8/2/2019 Teaching Young Learners BBC

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Teaching Young Learners - Introduction

www.britishcouncil.org/worldwide_survey_of_primary_elt.pdf

The number of teachers of young learners is increasing as children start to learn English

at a younger age around the world. The term young learners can be used to describe:

Pre-school learners Primary school learners and Secondary school or teenage learners.

Carol Read (2003) proposes some of the optimal conditions for helping young learners to

learn:

learning is natural learning is contextualised and part of a real event

learning is interesting and enjoyable learning is relevant learning is social learning belongs to the child learning has a purpose for the child learning builds on things the child knows learning makes sense to the child the child is challenged appropriately learning is supported appropriately learning is part of a coherent whole learning is multi-sensory

the child wants to learn learning is active and experiential learning is memorable learning allows for personal, divergent responses learning takes account of multiple intelligences the learning atmosphere is relaxed and warm the child has a sense of achievement.

Read (2005) also suggests that the seven Rs provide an integrated framework formanaging children positively and creating a happy working environment:

Relationships -creating and maintaining a positive relationship with learners is at theheart of establishing a happy learning environment.

Rules - establish a limited number of rules and make sure they are clear, as well as the

reasons for having them.

Routines - classroom routines make it clear to everyone what is expected of them andwhat they should do.


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Rights and Responsibilities - although these may not be stated explicitly with very

young learners, teachers can model through their own actions which of these they value.

Respect - students who are treated respectfully by the teacher will respond in a similar

way to the teacher. If the children feel that the teacher treats them as individuals, they

will also respond to the teacher as an individual and not with a collective group mentality.

Rewards - reward systems can be an effective way of reinforcing appropriate behaviour

e.g. using stars, stickers, points, smiley faces, raffle tickets or marbles in a jar.

On her website Shelley Vernon presents some of the problems many preschool teachers

face. Preschool learners:

have very short attention spans forget things quickly

may not be fully confident in their first language may not be motivated to learn may be fearful develop at very different rates which leads to mixed ability groups can be easily overwhelmed need to be taught with effective language learning techniques and not just with

time fillers to keep them busy.(http://www.teachingenglishgames.com/3-5.htm )

The solutions she proposes include:

Change your games and activities every 5-10 minutes. Vary the pace during the lesson, mixing up energetic games with quiet ones. Repeat, review and revise. Use short games to review vocabulary and phrases you

have already taught.

Make lessons playful and full of physical movement. Children will find themmore enjoyable, be more motivated and remember the language better.

Teach in a relaxed and friendly atmosphere with plenty of encouragement. Avoid competition with preschool learners. It can be stressful and overwhelm

them. Play games where everyone wins, or where you do not single out a winner.

Encourage and support young learners. Use chants, rhymes and songs. These are great for movement and frequent

repetition of vocabulary and phrases.Do not focus on reading and writing - leave those for when children are older.

Focus on listening and understanding, building vocabulary and the acquisition ofshort phrases.

Concentrate also on speaking practice, starting with single words and shortphrases, and gradually moving onto longer sentences and questions.
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Avoid abstract concepts and focus on concrete items that children understand andrelate to. For example, start with familiar topics such as colours, numbers,greetings, animals, fruit, food and drink, families, body parts, shapes, clothing, the

weather, days of the week and everyday sentences and phrases.

Use please and thank you and be positive. Focus on positive behaviour rather thantelling children what not to do.

Be prepared - practise telling stories before you go into class and have yourpicture flashcards and materials ready.

Mix up active participation and listening. If the children become restless dosomething active.

Be flexible. If something is not working then change the game or activity. Involve shy children - help them to express themselves. Bring in real objects whenever possible, such as clothes to dress up in, or props

for acting out little plays or stories. When you cannot bring in realia use whatever

objects are available in your class, and use colourful pictures of real items.

Use stories. Stories are a great resource for preschool learners, who will want tohear the same tales told repeatedly.

Lynne Cameron (2003) argues that the continuing growth of teaching English to young

learners brings a number of challenges. Starting to learn English at an earlier age may not

bring automatic improvements to proficiency levels, unless teacher education andsecondary language teaching both adapt to meet the challenges of the new situation.

According to Cameron, amongst other knowledge and skills, teachers of young learners

need:

an awareness of how children think and learn

skills and knowledge in spoken English to conduct whole lessons orally an ability to identify children's interests and use them for language teaching to be equipped to teach initial literacy in English.

Other current issues in teaching young learners include:

the use of learners' first language in the language classroom teaching other subjects through the medium of English e.g. CLIL developing appropriate assessment of young learners young learner teacher education.

In the rest of this section you will find ways in which you can develop your knowledge

and skills to teach English to young learners through reading articles and books, attending

workshops and courses, visiting websites, and joining Special Interest Groups and

discussion forums.


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References

Cameron, L (2003) Challenges for ELT from the expansion in teaching children' inELT Journal, April, Issue 57, Oxford University Press

Read, C (2003) Is younger better?' in English Teaching Professional, Issue 28, Modern

English Publishing.

Read, C (2005) Managing Children Positively' in English Teaching Professional, Issue38, Modern English Publishing.

Website: (http://www.teachingenglishgames.com/3-5.htm )

http://teflbootcamp.com/teaching-skills/teaching-methods-for-tefl/
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Teaching Methods for TEFL

EFL Teaching Methods

TEFL Methodology:

Methods for Teaching Englishin the EFL Classroom

http://teflbootcamp.com/teaching-skills/teaching-

methods-for-tefl/

We have created a podcast to complement this page.

You can download it from ourpodcast page.

Basic Concepts:

TEFL Methodology taught in training programs is

generally either PPP or ESA

PPP means Presentation, Practice, and Production

Presentation is where the target language (the language

to be taught to the students) is presented to the studentsgenerally through eliciting and cueing of the students (to

see if they know itgenerally someone knows some or allof it) and then providing the language if no one does.

The target language is usually put on the marker boardeither in structure (grammar-type) charts or in dialogs.

Presentation features more teacher talk than the other

stages of the lessongenerally as much as 65-90% of thetime. This portion of the total lesson can take as much as

20-40% of the lesson time.

Next comes Practice where the students practice thetarget language in one to three activities that progress

from very structured (students are given activities that

provide little possibility for error) to less-structured (as

they master the material).

These activities should include as much student talk aspossible and not focus on written activitiesthough

written activities can provide a structure for the verbal

practices. Practice should have the student talk time range from 60-80 percent of thetimewith teacher talk time being the balance of that time. This portion of the total

lesson can take from 30-50% of the lesson time.

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Production is the stage of the lesson where the students take the target language and

use it in conversations that they structure (ideally) and use it to talk about themselves ortheir daily lives or situations. Practice should involve student talk at as much as 90% of

the timeand this component of the lesson can/should take as much as 20-30% of the

lesson time.

As you can see the general structure of a PPP lesson is flexible but an important feature

is the movement from controlled and structured speech to less-controlled and more freelyused and created speech. Another important feature of PPP (and other methods too) is

the rapid reduction of teacher talk time and the increase in student talk time.

One of the most common errors untrained teachers make is that they talk too much. EFL

students get very little chance to actually use the language they learn and the EFL

classroom must be structured to create that opportunity. See the paragraph on Pairwork

and Small Groups below.

ESA means Engage, Study, and Activate

Roughly equivalent to PPP, ESA is slightly different in that it is designed to and allows

movement back and forth between the stages. However, each stage is similar to thePPP stages in the same order. Proponents of this method stress its flexibility compared to

PPP and the method, as defined by Jeremy Harmer (its major advocate), uses moreelicitation and stresses the Engagement of students in the early stages of the lesson.

ESA is superior method to PPP when both are looked at from a rigid point of view. But,

EFL is not rigid and you should not adhere to any one viewpoint or method. PPP is oftenan easier method for teacher-trainees to get a handle on, but probably more programs

teach ESA than PPP these days, especially those that teach only one of the approaches.

Pairwork and Working in Small Groups

Most speaking practice in the classroom should be done in pairs and small groups withstudents talking to each other. It is a common mistake of the untrained teacher to think

that students must or need to talk to the teacher.

While talking to the teacher is certainly useful, each student in a small class of only 15

will get at most three minutes of talking time in a 45 minute class if conversation is

teacher centered. In pairs those same students could be directly involved in conversation

as much as twenty-two minutes.

See the difference? That is a seven-fold increase in the amount of time a student canpractice speaking, listening and interacting in English. And one of the biggest problems

EFL students have is the very limited amount of time they actually get to practice

speaking and listening in direct interaction.


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The teachers role during pairwork and small group time is to rotate around the classroom

encouraging students and helping them focus on the target language/concepts of thelesson. Including pairwork and small-group work in your PPP/ESA lesson is critical to

the success and improvement of your students.

Expanded Concepts:

Read the followingthey will download as Word documents:

PPP Basics

PPP Awareness Session

PPP AlternativeESA

Communicative Teaching

A good review of a variety of EFL teaching methods (so you dont get stuck in just one)is at the website of Dr. Jill Kerper Moran of San Diego State University: Second

Language Teaching Methods

Another overview of various methodologies is at English Club:HERE.

Additional Notes:

It is important to use English in the classroom as the target language and as the teachinglanguage.

There are times, however, when the limited use of the students first language can beuseful. Be careful though. Some native speakers lose their value when they begin

teaching in the L1. Most EFL students have already studied English for years in their L1,

but still cant speak fluently. The more you use a students L1 the more you lose yourvalue as a native speaker and in most cases, a major factor in your hire was that you were

a native speaker. If you dont use that skill and ability, they might as well hire a localteacher for half of what you cost.

Following is some information on the rare times when you might use L1 in the EFLClassroom:

Using L1 in the L2 Classroom

An older but equally valid review of L1 and L2 Usage

in the classroom ishere.

Read this British Council article onthe use of realia in the classroom

There is more information on realia in theStudent Motivationpage on this website.
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When you have finished the readings you will be ready for the unit onLesson Planning.
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Teaching Young Learners BBC