Young Learners - making things "harder"

colours & shapes

We love teaching children at Luna, and we particularly enjoy students who come to every class with big "Can Do' attitudes, like gannets hungry to learn & use English.

You'll notice in the photos our textbooks are not front & centre; we really like to encourage our learners to become independent of the printed word (massively useful to set out structures etc, for sure, and provide direction + continuity)...but to get language properly into heads we need to use it variously, flexibly & realistically.

Problem I have as a teacher with this class is to slow down ravenous appetites for progress! Instead, add on a lot of extras & let our students really go to town with their awesome willingness to jump into challenges bravely and intelligently, teaching/helping each other and being very positive.

"Outer Space" (Learning Resources)...was on the table five seconds when these two started playing (first time!) asking each and answering questions "What is it? .. "It's a blue circle." then game play asking each other Yes/No questions. Winner irrelevant as loads of great language work, prompting/correcting each other nicely. And the teacher lost!

Everybody Up on the board

Song "It's a book, it isn't a notebook" from Everybody Up 1 (Unit 1) > listening task & digging out the flashcards to pop on the board & then point along as we listened again...'narrate' it at their own speed, then join in & switch places half way through. "Re-write" the song by choosing other vocabulary items...and then try with the reverse sides (words) only...still too easy!

Can't wait to get into our new graded readers, but somehow I doubt they'll help as sheet anchors either...full speed ahead!
 

Creepy Crawly Coloured Caterpillar - platefuls of fun!

Cover of The Very Hungry Caterpillar

I have very fond memories of reading "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" (in Japanese!) from a young age, and I have been looking for a way to incorporate and share one of my childhood memories with my students in a functional and constructive way. Unfortunately I do not have a copy of the book so I had to come up with an alternative method. After having a little think and brainstorming some ideas I settled on something that I thought would capture the interest of my students as well as providing a bit of variety in the classroom. So I would like to present to you my most recent classroom project: the "Coloured Caterpillar"!

Our new classroom friend

The idea revolves around making a caterpillar using either coloured card or painted paper plates which are in turn used to make up the different segments of the caterpillar. You then cut out an assortment of shapes, numbers, letters or whatever else you think would suit the activity, from coloured card which the students have to sort into the corresponding coloured segments of your "Coloured Caterpillar". You can stick the caterpillar to a table or even on the wall or your whiteboard/blackboard! If you are planning to stick your caterpillar to the wall/board you're also going to need a way for sticking your shapes/numbers/letters too.

Fun with paints!

You may be thinking that making the caterpillar is going to be a major investment of time and effort, but this is where your students come to the rescue. Rather than make the caterpillar myself, I decided that for this activity to become a success the more hands on approach the students had the better. I also didn't fancy spending an evening painting paper plates on my own. So I roped them into caterpillar making duty. What better way to engage the students by using resources that they have helped make themselves!

In the "zone"

I have to admit thought that I was a little hesitant before launching into this project, especially as I had planned for my youngest students to shoulder the responsibility of painting the paper plates. I had a bad feeling the students would become more preoccupied in painting anything but the paper plates! However, when I broke out the paint and paintbrushes my fears were laid to rest. The students took to the activity like a charm, they were the most focused and well behaved I had ever seen them. It was like magic. Unfortunately due to paint needing to dry, we weren't able to put out caterpillar to use immediately so the students had to wait patiently for their next lesson before they had a chance to admire their work.

Showing off

A job well done

Shapes to sort

So one week came and went and it was time for the big reveal. The long wait was over and the students were finally able to see their painted paper plates come to life in the form of a colourful caterpillar. As you could imagine the students were terribly excited, and once we had stuck down our caterpillar they dived into the tray of cut out shapes and started sorting at break neck speeds! The first time we used our "Coloured Caterpillar" we used shapes cut out from coloured card, and we have since moved onto using numbers and letters as well. I have used the

Diving in

"Coloured Caterpillar in several of my other younger classes too, one of them even making the connection to "Harapeko Aomushi" ("The Very Hungry Caterpillar" in Japanese) which I was delighted by! By using the "Coloured Caterpillar" my students have become more adept at recognising shapes, numbers and letters and can sort by each category. I think it's safe to say this project was a success!

If you decide to create your own "Coloured Caterpillar" for your classroom please share your pictures and any feedback you have! 

Damian Gowland

Colourful alphabet soup

I think I have said this before, but I love my big blackboard (even though it's green), especially because it's magnetic and we can do cool stuff like this - fridge magnet letter soup!

To be sure, my very little learners are nowhere near letter recognition yet - we've only just started our learning journey together! No, I wanted us to get our hands on stuff, move around, share, negotiate and organise.

So that is exactly what we did. A grand time to work with mummy as well, whilst at the same time becoming a little bit independent - venturing out of arm's length. The to & fro of this discovery exercise building confidence and earning praise many times over. Some letter names were used, and some numbers too, but our prime target was colours...and I think you'll agree we ended up with a very colourful board :)

Maybe next time we will do some shape matching, or match up a few big & small letters...we'll see.

Pronunciation race: using Fotobabble to speed things up!

My savvy YLs know that if the recording app is on, they don't have much time to do whatever it is they're going to do next! How's that for a motivational tool?

We'd already had a go at this in another format, but I was not so happy with the way they were 'stretching' sounds out (that internal 'kana metronome' I think kids pick up in Japan...and one that is reinforced in schools with rote repititions & class chants.) 



Alright, so the pronunciation might have suffered a bit, but they got all the words out quickly, in the right order, and got their answers in as well! (And, by the way, solved a problem one learner was having in adding an "a" before the colour word).

Like it? I really recommend giving #Fotobabble a go!
Check out our gallery at http://www.fotobabble.com/l/LunaJim

Give a kid a device! Discovering colours in class.

 How can you make 'learning' colours a bit more fun? One set of words kids do not have a problem with, really, except maybe "false-friends" in some languages maybe...

Really wanted my charges to actually read the words from their class book (see the word, go back a page to the visual clue if necessary) and demonstrate they could worj their way through a list, in the correct order.

In pairs, swapping jobs as photographer & model, they were given iPhone/iPod . Camera app open, go find items of each colour in the classroom. Independence Day! Off they galloped!

Word of caution - these devices are expensive, so make sure you are doing this with a 'sensible' group. Suggest turning on 'airplane' mode so no in-app purchases get clicked, or your twitter feed/phone goes off! Maybe help with reducing camera shake?!

In pairs, swapping jobs as photographer & model, they were given iPhone/iPod . Camera app open, go find items of each colour in the classroom. Independence Day! Off they galloped!

Word of caution - these devices are expensive, so make sure you are doing this with a 'sensible' group. Suggest turning on 'airplane' mode so no in-app purchases get clicked, or your twitter feed/phone goes off! Maybe help with reducing camera shake?!

I wanted the children to then do the above post production, but they were not familiar enough with the iOS as well as the keyboard layout  AND the upper/lower case shift. It also took time - so this would work with mixed ages classes OR hooking one device up to a projector & doing it as a group.

The app I used = WordFoto, the link is here, which is really quick/slick & intuitive (for teachers anyway!). I only wanted one colour word per pic, but you can do this with a theme & add up to nine. You can change the hue/size & fonts to some extent. I think the end product of 10 minutes running around & 10 mins after class (me) = stunning & very personalised set of flashcards. We will print these & display around the room!

Have you used WordFoto?

Colours & numbers - kids in action

My students know the song quite well, but we haven't "done it this way" before. The Super Simple Song is just as it says on the tin, and very suitable for even very young learners. I wanted to make it a bit harder today, so we had a lot of flashcards on the floor, including numbers (more on that in a mo).

Make sure kids aren't going to dive headfirst at each other to get to the cards first (important!). As they hear the song mention colours, touch the card, then find other things that match around the room (having an interesting/colourful room helps a lot!).

After the song, a sit down - sort of! Leaving the flashcards on the floor we played colour bingo. Again, a bit too easy as most children quickly 'get' colours, so I wrote the word (blue, green etc) slowly on the board, asking the children to read the letters to me as I did so (taking a while to get fluent here). "That's it" = cue to go find the flashcard with the matching word - turn it over to reveal the colour. Get back to the table and do the bingo thing.

The actual bingo became a side show against the fun of reading out the words and finding the same spelling quickly.

We played the same game with numbers, and then placed the cards along the chalk board rail under the same (number) word (out of order). We played a "janken game" in teams - start either end of the row of cards, and read the card/say what is on it. When players meet in the middle, they do 'rock/scissors/paper' to decide a winner - who continues on while the other team replaces their player & start at their beginning again. This can get very noisy but is nice and simple, takes very little prep and is monitored by everyone! Weaker ones can go last & see how to do it/get prompting from team etc. I always answer if kids ask me nicely "What's this, please"!

Once we were done with the bingo game, I played another Super Simple Song "Seven Steps" and asked the children to point to the numbers in time to the music. Harder than you think! Remember, on a bingo card all the numbers are in different sequences...guaranteed giggles and re-starts & pleading to do it again (just what I wanted to do, but it was their idea!)

How do you teach colours & numbers after the first time?

I can do it!

My favourite phrase - it's so empowering!

A colour, cut, and stick-it-back-together again kind of activity that helps children review vocabulary, read (rather than guess!) and develop logical/predictive skills.

Basically this is a variation on dominoes, here making a circle. You can do this with any lexical set (or grammar structures too), but you need to make sure the last card will join back up to the first, or it won't work (and that you don't have duplicates).

What did we do? Coloured in big dots according to the words written under them. Big flashcards with the colours and words were on the board. Don't know?  - Go check! Then cut out your cards carefully (so that your pairs are separated). Give them a good shuffle, and then put it back together again! Use the flashcards again
to double check. If you want to keep sets separate, use different coloured base paper and avoid pink (girls will all want this one!).

Most enjoyable was the children showing mummies their puzzles, and mummies not being able to figure it out. Made the children feel very clever indeed - and they are, of course!

Heads I win, tails I win

If all you have to do for homework is colour in a few pictures and cut them out, can you really improve your English?


Somehow I doubt it too - actually, any homework that is not followed up on is homework virtually lost. It has to have a purpose and a value of itself to be meaningful & motivating for the learner, and it must also be seen, and have, a greater use ie in class. Whether that is having students read their work back out loud, or engage each other in Q & A, or pick on teacher's "mistakes" etc, some extension is essential so that 'just doing it' is not the task completed - for me it is next task prepared.



So, my simple dominoes game (combining colours with clothes) was a popular 'easy' bit of
homework & a very extendable activity. I encourage my young learners to find shortcuts - in this case reading the colours off their pencils even if books are 'closed'. They know I know...pretty soon they were all 'cheating', and then deciding themselves that they shouldn't - "You've read that twice already!" Peer regulation is unbeatable!

As for the game, our most reticent reader won easily. Our best reader was annoyed that she ended up with too many cards...until although she had lost, she could put down and read all her extra cards with a big flourish and lovely pronunciation at the end, upstaging early finishers!

High five Ha-chan

CALL - some interactive stuff

One of my lads has been struggling to keep up with his mates, and I was getting worried he was starting to feel the heat - they've started taking the Mickey...so I wanted to change tack a bit but still concentrate on our target vocab - colours.

In doing so, I didn't want to be 'just colouring', which this can often descend into. Instead, used a good resource (Scholastic's vocab series is excellent) which had a dozen or so line drawings of national flags (European). First task was to colour by numbers (ie read the names of the colours) and to predict which belonged to the list of countries in a list below.

To check, we went to a database of flags and then searched by choosing colours, patterns & designs, and selecting the number of stripes etc. Lots of good speculation and genuine 'need to know'. Some of them they knew, some were 'new', and some we right but wrong - Japanese names for some countries are from that country's language (eg 'Deutz') rather than our English word (Germany). On top of that, some are hard to read - Germany again, or Portugal.

As you can see, we had a good time, and learnt something a bit different into the bargain. And, my struggler was in his element :)

Singtation

My Wednesday boys can be a bit of a handful sometimes, but today we were all literally singing off the same hymn sheet; the Black Cat song from Let's Go 1.

Like most kids, they 'know' colours already; today we were making sure we could read and follow directions to colour objects. That was 'easy', as expected, so the challenge was to listen to a song and pick out the various bits and pieces,then draw/colour what they heard. Lots of shouting and speculation as they demanded to listen again and again, until they 'got it', bit by bit.

This will only work with a strong class that has already been exposed to the language you are trying to pick out; the beauty of a song like this is the relative speed, rhythm & ellision; single words no longer carry equal stress but get joined up. "Black" and "cat" are both familiar words; stick them together naturally and you get 'blackat'; similarly "yellow" and "eyes" gives you 'yelloweyes'. Picking words out from a real context like this really helps students 'want' to reproduce the same sound themselves - and not just singing along. So a drawing/colouring task becomes a challenging listening job, which in turn works on pronunciation and thus speaking.

Another bonus for them with this kind of exercise is that it replicates the part four task in the Cambridge YLE Starters listening test. Now, isn't that nice!?