Job Discussion Forums

[almuze]

I am going to make a guess, and say most of the teachers on this site are teaching folks who have learned how to write thier own name and count to 10. However, maybe there are some preschool teachers out there?

I am teaching parttime, only 2 days a week, to kids under 6. My thinking, and previous practice, has been to try and keep the language controlled (not a lot of extra chit chat...) but also that the kids understand a lot very quickly. and will repeat and often remember almost anything you say.

The local (head) english teacher thinks that if the kids haven't learned the concept in L1 then I shouldn't be teaching it yet in english. This is very limiting, since they really don't know very much - colours numbers letters, etc....

I say teach it, either way, it's not like they won't learn the word for "blue" at home...any thoughts on the offical child devolpment language learning process?

[Celeste]

I think that you can assume that children who are over 4 will know their basic colours, many will know numbers up to 10, they will all know common foods that they eat daily, and they will know basic animals. I teach elementary school, but I also tutor preschool aged kids, and these are concepts that are very easy to teach. They can learn about "I like/I don't like" with foods, " I can/I can't" with some basic verbs, and also "please give me" with basic objects. Parts of the face/body are very interesting to children of this age. Opposites are easy to do as well (big/small near/far hot/cold, etc). Use lots of songs in your teaching, and perhaps some very easy crafts as well. Some websites that might help are www.genkienglish.com (for games and songs) www.enchantedlearning.com (for craft ideas) and maybe even www.crayola.com (for some colouring pages)

[almuze]

thanks for the web sites! songs songs songs.... who ever knew I was such a great singer?

[Larry Parnell]

What do you mean by

[Sekhmet]

I used to teach Kindergarten, at a summer school. The kids I taught were aged from 4 to about 6, and although none of them knew how to write (or draw!!), I still managed to teach them. Songs, games, repetition and stuff like that worked well with them, and even though we struggled a bit (and I did need the occasional help of the local teacher to explain instructions) they left the summer school with what seemed to be a fair knowledge of the basics.
Good luck - teaching the really little ones is hard (and frustrating!), but they can learn more than people sometimes give them credit for!!

[Roger]

"The weakest link" - obviously has the weakest mind of all the respondents! To the OP: please, ignore this ignoramus!

I taught kindergarten, which I sometimes call "preschool"; the range in age of my learners was from 3 to 6. I taught the same class for two consecutive years, and thus, I can safely say I learnt my ropes thoroughly.

Your superior has a limited understanding of the needs of your learners: limiting their L2 learning to what they are ablethink about in their L 1 is puerile!
Of course, you can teach them anything, even, and quite especially, things they haven't had to learn in their mother tongue yet!
They are after all learning how to conceptualise the world. They are coming to terms with all manifestations of nature and reality. There simply is no end to what they can be taught.
The only limitation is their thinking.

You must kindle it.

Refrain from using their first language! Teach them from day one to rely on their own mental resources for resolving communication problems GAPS MUCH BETTER THAN OLDER KIDS DO!

But, you must also start at an appropriately low level.

Don'tteach them ABSTRACT things that have no bearing in their young lives: love - what's that? ET? Walrus? Forgetmenot? Forget all of them, and concentrate on the basics:

At their level, they must first learn to differentiate between "I" and "you", "he" and "she". You will see you can teach them such things without taking recourse to their native language, and you can have a lasting effect!
You also must think of verbs that they may need right in your class:
Stand up, sit down, walk, raise your arm/leg, touch your arm/head/ear/knee etc.; left/right, fast, faster, fastest, great, big, small, large, full, half-full, empty etc.
And: take good care to internalise good grammar from the beginning, stress SVA" I raise my left arm, he raiseS his right arm", etc.

What else? I don't know how many periods you are teaching every week; I had a very good teaching plan for the whole semester, and I covered only a few hundred vocables; the key is internalising, repeating them, reviewing former lessons time and again, under different circumstances.

Don't have your poor kids sit at desks! Have them move around. Can you incorporate TPR? Without physical education you cannot teach them effectively!

Apart from the Total Physical Response method, you can also use drawing as a means to teach them objects and their colours. This can lead to teaching them letters - at first outlines that they can colour, then name: Mammi-A, baby-a, etc., 'A' as in 'apple', and then they learn the noun 'apple',and that it is a FRUIT, which TASTES SWET, and is RED, ELLOW or GREEN...

That's how I did it, and that's what they loved doing!

As for numbers - no need to draw or show them any numbers! Have them play with objects that they learn to count, say, building blocks; my kids could actually multiply numbers that included two-digit ones: ten by ten = 100! They didn't memorise that! They had seen that if you place ten units of ten pieces side by side, the total result is 100!

[almuze]

Thanks again! This was exactly my thinking, and, to be honest, I kind of like teaching this age group. Sadly, the HOD, and all the local teachers, think that kindergarden/preschool should not be allowed to learn to much (letter and number recognition, etc) because then when they get to first grade when "real" school starts they will be bored. So much for "school readiness" programs!

As it is, I am only teaching part time, with little support from the home room teacher (I am handing out a lot of stickers for good behaviour!) and so I am just trying to make my 2 hours enjoyable for the kids, so they will learn a little english (not to much, don't want them to be bored in 1st grade!) and think it is an enjoyable subject, ready to leanr more when "real" school starts for them...
thanks!