Teaching Young Learners - How exactly?
Teaching Young Learners - How exactly?? A not unfamiliar question often asked by my colleagues alike. Well, here are some relevant tips I have found to be most practical in a live classroom and an online one..
While some of the suggestions above work well in a live classroom, the prinicples can cetainly be applied to online learning Notwithstanding, as many of us are having to adapt to online teaching , here are a few specific tips for teaching Young Learners online:
A Have all your material readyily available at the click of a button. Long delays will disturb the flow of the lesson and the chidrens concentration.
B Invest in a cuddly toy, such as a teddy bear. Kids can name it; you can use it as part of relaia, as a puppet, in countable v uncountable nouns, etc.
C Exaggerate your gestures - funny faces, descriptive and emphatic gestures animate your presence online. Have the class raise their when they want to comment.
D You can use TPR with games such as 'Simon says', I spy with my little eye'; 'Who am I' kids try and find the word (not person) - they will love it and so will you! Or draw their answer and show it to others in the online classroom.
E We can ask them to make a face mask of their favourite super hero and bring it to class. They can pose with it on, creating a kind of power pose. Be sure to bring one yourself!
F Rememebr - just because we are teaching along doesn't mean we can't have the students up and moving around!
I hope this blog shows how not to lose that 'fizz' now we've transitioned from face to face to online teaching.
Finally, just as a good, tasty and delicious Victoria sponge cake needs the right ingredients to be just that, a successful YL's lesson can only be truly scrumptious, palatable to YL if it has the right ingredients!!
Oh, and never, ever forget the most palatable and scrumptious ingredient of all - FUN! You see 'there is no fun without learning and no learning without fun'.