Without a doubt, teaching children is totally different to teaching adults. Many teachers are reticent to take the plunge and teach these height challenged students. However, have no fear – once you have a few tricks up your sleeve, you will be as illusive as a magician…with your students in the palm of your hands. What’s more…teaching children is rewarding and great fun! Having your students walking into your classroom in eager anticipation for your lesson is payment in itself. But how can you transform yourself into this magical teacher? Well….
1) Hide the carrots Remember how your mother used to trick you by blitzing the carrots in the food blender and putting it into your spaghetti sauce? Well this clever idea can also be applied to teaching kids. How interesting is it to kids if you say ‘today we are going to do the present perfect’??!! Instead, imagine the response to ‘We’re going to play a cool game...are you ready?” (which funnily enough will give your students tons of practice with the present perfect! Not that they know that!). Which would you prefer to do?!!
2) No learning without fun, no fun without learning Just because an activity is fun doesn’t mean that it’s useful! You should have learning aims just as you would for adults.
3) Keep it varied Children have short attention spans, therefore for an hour lesson you should be looking at around 10-12 activities (with each activity lasting about 5 minutes), not to mention different learning styles.
4) Make it achievable Think of ways to make activities easier so that students can build their confidence with speaking English (with no complicated instructions!). Challenge them when they are ready to be challenged.
5) Use flashcards and make drilling fun Children respond better to visuals. Instead of just presenting vocab, why not create a bit of intrigue and gradually reveal a picture. There are lots of games you can incorporate your flashcards into. Also make drilling fun by getting students to: say it faster, start in a ball and get bigger each time or start with a whisper and get louder.
6) Have a routine Children need consistency in the classroom or things will get unruly. Have a system for discipline, keep a check on behaviour and be consistent and fair.
7) Do a points system In the first lesson put students into groups of around four and get them to decide on a team name. Ask them to draw four horizontal boxes in which they must write their name in large letters to one side. Students get a point for good behaviour and get a point deducted for bad behaviour (doing/not doing homework, using/not using English). If you can, use stickers so students can put their points up themselves (gives a greater feeling of accomplishment).
What are the secret ingredients in your recipe for teaching success?
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Hi Liz,
I recently went to a conference and was inspired to try making my own songs up - have a look at this website for inspiration... www.funsongs.co.uk
Hi All. Great to read your posts. I am teaching English to two little sisters ages 5 and 6 in Istanbul in their home. As the class is for 2 hours I'm finding it difficult to keep their attention (dont have a classroom situation to use lots of students :o). I have run out of english songs i.e. "head, shoulders, knees and toes" which they enjoy. Can anyone give me other songs or ideas?
Thanks in advance
Liz
I love this post and all the comments. I have to choose whether i want to teach 6 and below or 6 and above in China on the August Intern programme. I don't know what to do!!!
I'm teaching in a kindergarten every Friday (3rd lesson this morning). I have three groups: 3-year-olds, 4-year-olds and 5-year-olds. The most difficult group is the 3-year-olds one!There are some who can't even speak properly, let alone do it in English...But today they surprised me because they remembered all the three colors we did last week (yellow, red and blue...pretty easy, but still...)!! The 5-year-olds are the 'easiest' ones because they are slightly more disciplined, or at least they are easier to handle, and then they already know something, so... 4-year-olds today were particularly 'lively'...They are probably the most difficult to keep concentrated and disciplined! I saw today that they already use a 'points' system, so I'm thinking of integrating that into our lessons as well! All in all, these kids are smart and pretty good, but at the moment the biggest challenge is probably discipline! Last time I used 'Simon says' with colors, and they really liked it, though... :)
Alix, maybe you will be a director of studies yourself one day! It's actually really easy to do in the world of TEFL apparently (once you get your D.E.L.T.A/masters and some experience behind you).
I was the same, I swore I would never teach! My grandmother, father, mother and two aunts are all teachers believe it or not! I get a lot of tips for teaching kids from them - my father suggested I use a points system for children and this is the best advice ever - it works a treat as long as u stick to it and make sure you really praise them and give them points for good behaviour! (that way when you take the points away for bad behaviour it has more impact and they really want to improve their behaviour).
I find the hardest thing is keeping a straight face when teaching kids when you have to be strict, when all you want to do is have a giggle! :-)
I'm glad the posts help, even if it's just a little. Romina where are you teaching? What challenges are you facing teaching kids?
Cool tips!! Really useful, now that I've started teaching kids myself!! :) I'm definitely using these tricks, starting tomorrow!! :D Thanks for your brilliant posts, Emma!!
Do you think it runs in the family? I must admit, for many years I swore I'd never become a teacher, and now I'm about to my mum admitted she used to say the same thing. Ironically, when we were at school, I usually got the best grades out of my sister and myself and she secretly hated it. Now she's just become head teacher - I'll never live up to that!!
This site is also great for advice from people such as yourself and I for one appreciate these posts Emma, full marks :)
Hey Alix,
My whole family are teachers, so I ask them for advice also :-) I really have learnt more from other teachers than all the training courses I've done put together!
Enthusiasm is definitely number 1 for teaching children (and adults!)...you only have to see how much of a difference it makes when you teach the same lesson twice - and in one you are tired, and in the other a ball of energy and enthusiasm! I have to say I get more carried away by the games than the kids when I'm teaching!
Hi Emma, more advice from my sister - (sorry, I know I've mentioned her before..). Two years ago she had to start teaching maths (she hates it, she's a language teacher) and by the end of the first term had made her whole year group in a large north London comp love maths! The answer - enthusiasm, something she got off Marcus de Something or other - professor who does maths programmes on the radio. He says - maths is beautiful, maths is the whole universe maths is everything, he just loves it. She gave them the same speech and they were, as you say, eating out of her hand - their parents came to parents evening and said thank you.
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