Job Discussion Forums

[Omeo]

I've been looking over some of the sample lessons I've found (Thanx, moot point) and I'm wondering something about the beginners. Exactly how little do they know? I'm trying to plan a demo lesson, here, and I can't help wondering how I'm suppose to get these kids to talk 80% of the time if they can't form a sentence. Can they? Do I need to teach them the alphabet? How'my 'spose to know how much these kids know?

[Like a Rolling Stone]

[ndorfn]

get some idea from the office staff of what they're capable of. depends a lot on how old they are. if they're only 3-5 years old say, don't do more than a few letters at a time, and break it up with games (eg. hide one card of 5 consecutive letters and they guess what it is).

colours are good, fruit combined with colours ("it's red, what is it?" they cry out "apple!" and wet their pants when you slowly turn the card around to reveal apple.

almost makes me miss those kindergarten days.

But not quite.

[Omeo]

My main concern when I asked this question is the demo lesson for the interview. Again, if they ask me to teach a lesson to kids who don't know any English or don't even know the alphabet, how am I suppose to get them to talk 80% of the time? It hardly seems realistic. How do I know how much my "students" know?

[jr1965]

Omeo,

When my daughter started pre-school in the U.S. at age 3, she was in a class with kids whose first languages were English, Russian, Spanish, and Cantonese. The speakers of those last 3 languages were all experiencing English for the first time for the most part b/c most of them spent the other time with family members or in communities where their first langs were spoken.

Anyway, I don't know anything really about working with young children, but I'll tell you what I observed when my 3 year old started pre-school. In class, there was a lot of practice with the alphabet (it was new for the English-speaking kids too, obviously). They took a letter a week and did different activities with it�just getting kids to draw the a letter (in a fun color, of course) and say it (and then eventually sing the alphabet song in the correct order) can be a challenge for a 3 year old. There was also an animal a week; there was also lots of work with shapes and sizes and adjectives to describe things (big, little, hot, cold--great for talking about food and drink too). They did lots of work with numbers and counting �again, many of these concepts were new even for the native English-speaking kids. They did lots of drawing, coloring, cutting and pasting. They learned holiday songs. The teachers read to them (the kids loved "Go Dog Go") and the kids did lots of rhyming activities. All activities were usually short and there was lots of variety. And lots and lots of repetition (this drives adults crazy, but kids love doing certain things over and over and over...).

Even with older kids (i.e., in kindergarten), doing stuff with letters/alphabet, numbers/counting, shapes and sizes, colors, music & song, and reading to them is a good thing. Since they're a little older, you may also be able to do more sophisticated games with them (e.g., Bingo) that would fly right over the head of a 3 year old.

I hope this helps. Take care and good luck.

JR

[jr1965]

Omeo,

I just did a quick search and tons of stuff came up (I'm sure you've seen a lot of this). Anyway, I looked quickly at one page (this one: http://members.tripod.com/~ESL4Kids/games.html ) and sure enough, there are a number of activities here that my daughter used to do in many of her pre-school classes. A number of the activities are still for older kids (i.e., 5 year olds), but a number are good for younger children (3 or 4) once they've learned some vocab. I still remember my daughter at age 3 doing alphabet searches and scavenger hunts in the classroom or the school yard. The kids learn a lot of language and they love the activities.