Job Discussion Forums

dragonpiwo · Joined: 04 Mar 2013 Posts: 1650 Location: Berlin

Dear All,

I'm not a YL educator but I'm trying to help my sister-in-law make a decision.

I need recommendations for a British English coursebook series for a 9-year-old. The kid's a false beginner.

Something from Oxford/Cambridge perhaps. I've done the Google search but don't know which ones are good.

The more fun the better.

TIA

HLJHLJ · Joined: 06 Oct 2009 Posts: 1218 Location: Ecuador

This isn't really my field, but as no-one else seems to be offering much, I'll give my twopenn'orth. I've never seen a fantastic young learner course book, but NatGeo Our World and Cambridge Super Minds were OK. They both have British English options.

At that age, kids seem to enjoy courses that have connections to the regular school curriculum, rather than being just about English.

yurii · Joined: 12 Jan 2017 Posts: 106

Do you mean for private study?

Some of the Starters, Movers and Flyers exams can fun for kids. Maybe a preparation book for one of these tests? or maybe even Think Starter by Cambridge.

juriusz · Joined: 05 Sep 2011 Posts: 26

I like Superminds (Cambridge), especially the first two books - the first one should be easy, maybe even too easy. These days many schools use "Family and Friends" (Oxford) - it's not super exciting, but not too bad either. If she wants to teach her own child and goes for this one, make sure she's got Grammar Friends - the series wants to look children friendly and it doesn't have enough grammar exercises (unless you have a super talented kid that can deduct grammar rules after doing four sentences) . Grammar Friends can be boring as hell, but if she chooses wisely, she can still use many of the things that are there.

If she follows Fun for Starters/Movers/Flyers - it is pretty awesome, but I generally supplemented other courses with those. A combination of Superminds and Fun For is the winner for me. The new edition looks much better than the old one. She could supplement it even further with Storytime for Starters/Movers/Flyers.

Readings - generally I like things from Scholastic.

Other books that I like - Primary Box, Timesavers (and JET - Junior English Timesaver). Some of the things are pretty outdated, but some are pretty good. Most of them are designed for groups rather than solo students, but still worth checking out in my opinion.