Saturday 31 July 2010

Big Books, little readers

Show YOU are interested!
Action shots of Jim in action in the classroom are few & far between; Yuki is always pestering me for them though for promotion materials etc. So, seeing as she was helping out in pre-school today (Naomi off studying in Tokyo), she snapped away happily while I was reading one of our lovely BIG Scholastic readers ("I like").

Be active
Obviously (as I think it is obvious!) readers need to be interactive and engaging; milk the book for all it's worth and personalise it for maximum impact! In this case picking out the fruit we do like - and the fruit we don't like. Which fruit did we eat already today? Which fruit is soft/hard, what colours are they etc.

Most importantly of all, know your story!

As you can see, our pre-schoolers thoroughly enjoy a good book, and it is a lot of fun getting so much back from the children. I would say they are producing more spoken English now, before their 3rd birthdays, than most of our pre-teens who can only come to class once a week.

Engage
All the language they are acquiring at this age is going 'in', and being reproduced extremely naturally, frequently, and in context - with no pressure to perform.
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2 comments:

  1. Hey Jim. I'm sure all the teachers at Luna follow these golden rules!
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89-ZY4Tt7QM

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  2. Hi Patrick,
    Thanks for your link!
    The "Golden Rules" for teachers has such lovely music - it really made me smile... and then I discovered the Potato Pals videos on youtube which will be great to use with the students (we already have copies of the books)
    So all in all a good day!
    Thanks again,
    Tana

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