We all know that young learners
who do not speak English as their mother tongue have some difficulties at the
point of acquiring some words. They also find some book texts very boring, so
the teachers must be responsible for creating so fantastic lessons in order to
attract students’ attention during the teaching process. In other words, we
must make students to learn certain words and expressions, especially those
ones which are used in everyday English communication.
On the other side, students also
have difficulties about writing certain words. As we all know that English is not
like Serbian
language, read as it is written or write as you speak. But I have to say that
there are some exceptions in English (such as dog, pink, red, pen, and many
other words) but not all.
In this post, I want to share all
new knowledge I gained during the seminar of Cambridge English Days that was held
in Sarajevo. In
the very beginning, I have to admit that it was really, really great time
during the lectures. My colleagues and I picked up a lot of rewarding things
which can be used during teaching both native speakers of English and students
whose English is the second language. As I mentioned above that some students
have difficulties of remembering the process of writing the words, I will say
that my students also have that problem. As a professor Bob Obee had so great
examples, the one caught my eye. It was a word ‘because’. Some students, even
the native speakers of English, could not remember how to write the word. So,
some experts developed the following system. Here it is:
Big Elephants
Can’t Always Understand
Small Elephants.
In order to know how to spell the
word correctly, one must extract the initial letter of every word and at the
end you will get the correct spelling of word ‘because’. This is so great, isn’t
it? I have to say that this is very appealing for students because I showed
this kind of spelling the words. They were amazed.
On the other side, I think that
all teachers have to be always in touch with the latest tech which can be used
during teaching and learning. One of so constructive tech tools is Youtube. At
this web tool, there are many rewarding videos which can be found in order to
organize the lessons better and to make them more appealing for students. For
example, we can use the following:
wrap a present … learn a dance step … sing
along …how to sign … do magic … make
projected puppet shapes …. draw cartoon
characters … learn card tricks … make a
Chinese lantern that will fly
All these things are so helpful both
for students and teachers. For students, it is good because you can tell them
to prepare or to find an interesting video for a certain topic. This is too
motivating for students. They will be so willing and eager to go back their
homes and find and prepare a video for the next lesson. Try it, it works out!
On the other side, it will alleviate
the teachers’ work. So for mutual pleasure, all participants in creating
fantastic learning and teaching atmosphere will be very satisfied. I tried it
and I have no words to say.
In early students’ writing and
reading skills, we can also use many things. For example, we can use a quick
quiz:
How many sounds are there in
English?
How many characters are there in
the English alphabet?
How many consonant clusters are
there in English?
How many consonant clusters can
occur both at beginning and at end
of English words ?
What is a digraph?
Cognitive abilities, participation, sharing .. Reading
and Listening quiz
1 Can
camels swim?
2 How many legs has a spider got?
3 Do
snakes lay eggs?
4 Can
ducks fly?
5 Does
a chicken foot have three or four toes?
6 Can
frogs walk?
7 Can
chickens say quack quack?
8 Do
penguins lay eggs?
9 Name
two animals we get milk from?
10 Can
cows jump ?
11 How
many legs has a frog got ?
12 Can you spell : bee
I hope that some of these things will be
rewarding and helpful for you. As soon as I find out other things, I am going
to put them on my blog.
Best regards
