Episode Transcript
[00:00:06] Speaker A: We know how to teach the language but don't necessarily know how to teach the language to very young learners.
It's an age of showing or doing, not telling.
[00:00:15] Speaker B: They're always imitating everything.
[00:00:17] Speaker A: The skills that we need in order to teach English to adults are wildly different from the skills we need to teach to pre primary. It's a different way of thinking or behaving.
[00:00:29] Speaker B: They will learn much more from what you do than what we set.
[00:00:33] Speaker A: Plays effectively a live rehearsal and even
[00:00:36] Speaker B: the experience itself will be owned by the children when they take it into this child initiated play.
[00:00:50] Speaker C: Welcome back. I think we had a really great session before about play and this time I really wanted to look at some of the doubts that people might have if they're new to pre primary language teaching and they're thinking this, you know, what are the things that might catch me out or the things that I'm struggling with, you know, and how you manage with those things. So really, can I start this off with a kind of general open question? What are the kind of things that people might find challenging teaching very young learners?
[00:01:22] Speaker B: I tutor a course about teaching English in pre primary and many of these teachers are primary teachers and they.
One of the first questions we ask on the course is what do you think the challenges will be for you being in the pre primary classroom for the first time? And most of them come up with classroom management because they can imagine these are really young children and they'll come in crying and missing mummy or fighting over a toy or they can't focus or they're going to be wondering about instead of sitting nicely and listening.
So that's one of the things, the biggest challenges I think to, to, to master this classroom management which is so different to other age groups and yeah, so it's a. Children with their own characteristics and features is already a challenge when you've got not one or two like you know, as a parent you've got one or two children to deal with but in a classroom you might have 10, 15, 20, 30, even 3 year olds who
[00:02:26] Speaker C: may not have learned social skills, you know, still developing those social SK skills. It's difficult. Yes.
[00:02:32] Speaker B: It's not an easy task.
[00:02:33] Speaker C: How to share things.
Yes. Those might be your anxieties.
[00:02:37] Speaker A: Absolutely. This was definitely my worry. I think classroom management and dealing with 33 year olds and having to teach them a new language as well. And I think that relates to a point made earlier about, you know, the, the variety of teacher profiles. So another worry that I hear a lot is from English language teachers who were not trained in pre primary. This was me as well, who know how to teach the language, but don't necessarily know how to teach the language to very young learners. And the skills that we need in order to teach English to adults are wildly different from skills we need to teach to pre primary or very young learners. And they're not taught that. And I think the lack of training or available training resources in your particular context might be an issue as well. So obviously, I think you were saying
[00:03:40] Speaker C: something in the first episode around you're not really teaching the language, you're developing their whole selves through English rather than explicitly teaching English. And yet if you've come from an English language teaching background, that is exactly what you've been doing. Explicitly teaching the language, that's your skill set.
[00:04:01] Speaker A: Yes, exactly. And again, each context does this differently. But for example, in Greece, English has been recently introduced to pre primary level and the way they do it is English language teachers come in to schools for one or two hours per week to teach the language. So they do collaborate in a sense with a classroom teacher and they do get a sense of what the wider curriculum is, but they don't really have as much time to take that in and formulate integrated lesson plans. So it's a real challenge and really will vary depending on where you are
[00:04:42] Speaker B: and who you are. Yeah.
[00:04:44] Speaker C: So I think we're going to.
I think in the next episode we're going to come to a bit more about that collaboration between teachers.
So I want to pick up on the point you made about classroom management and how, how do you help your trainee teachers to improve on this?
[00:05:05] Speaker B: We do a lot of brainstorming and thinking. If you were a kid, child of that age, how would you like things to happen in your world?
And of course the answer comes back to playfulness.
So we would. Yeah, you would want to be not just told, be told what to do.
You get that at home already.
So turn it into something playful and use this call and response kind of strategy with them or use Simon says to give instructions and yes, and all we're always.
Also respect each child and their pace because if there is a child who's crying, not just because you're being playful, are they going to stop crying?
So there's this emotional aspect of pre primary that is really important as well to respect the children.
[00:06:00] Speaker C: Is routine an important part of this?
[00:06:02] Speaker B: Absolutely. Routine is really important for classroom management because when children know what's going to happen and it's familiar to them, they know how they're supposed to be behaving as well. So they know that when we start our day, we'll start with circle time. And when we start circle time, that means we're sitting on the carpets with our legs crossed. They know what that means. They know that they're going to be first listening to the teacher welcoming us into the classroom and then we're going to be singing a song and then we're going to. So when they know what's going to happen. Yeah, that gives them boundaries and it regulates how they're going to behave in the classroom.
So routines are excellent for that.
[00:06:41] Speaker A: Just jumping in routine is also really important for language development because if you know what to expect and you are able to kind of take out of the equation all the noisy aspects of coming into the classroom and sitting down and knowing who to pay attention to and so on, you can focus on what it is that they're saying or doing. And this allows you then to focus your attention a lot better and become able to kind of learn the language that the teacher is using a lot better.
[00:07:12] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely.
[00:07:13] Speaker C: I mean, I remember hearing a Montessori teacher talking about this and in her case they have multi age classes, so they've got children, different ages in the same class and she was able to use that to establish expectations. So the older children would kind of almost guide the younger children in what's expected.
But most of us don't teach in that situation. We have children coming in. So that beginning stages, the early stages of, of a new class and especially three year olds, that must be a little bit difficult to establish those routines.
[00:07:51] Speaker B: It is, it is, it's really difficult.
But they need to be established from the very start.
That's really important.
And so that you've got time as well for them to settle into those routines and those rules or norms of the classroom and be able to use them every session.
And always, again, it's the teacher who needs to make them visible and physical and needs to show them. Not just by saying, okay, we're going to sit in a circle every day when we come to our class, you can't just say that. So that's going to happen through practice, through repetition of it, and the teacher's going to also sit on the floor with the children to show what they're supposed to be doing. And that's important as well.
It's not just the teacher at the front of the class and delivering a lesson, but you've actually got to do what you expect the children to do. They need to be able to See it from you.
So it's important that the teacher is a member of that group.
[00:08:56] Speaker A: It's an age of showing or doing, not telling.
[00:08:59] Speaker B: Exactly. They will learn much more from what you do than from what you say.
[00:09:04] Speaker A: They look at you all the time.
[00:09:06] Speaker B: They're always imitating everything.
They're imitating language, but they're also imitating your ways of being in the classroom. And you're transmitting, emitting lots of messages from the way that you behave in the classroom.
[00:09:19] Speaker C: Because your example with the waterfall, it was powerful, partly because you were doing. You were getting quieter as you were, as if waterfall. And so you kind of. You get caught up in that action.
[00:09:32] Speaker B: Yeah. And that is actually a message to say, let's bring our voices down without saying, let's bring our voices down.
So it's through action and through sounds and through movement that you are expressing things.
[00:09:47] Speaker C: And again, that must be difficult for, say, your regular primary school teacher, who is more used to telling students what to do rather than actually doing it themselves.
[00:09:58] Speaker A: Yeah. It's a different way of thinking or behaving. But I think much like children do pick up on these routines and then after a while they'll go and immediately sit in a circle by themselves without the teacher telling them.
[00:10:13] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:10:13] Speaker A: It's a learned behavior for the teacher as well. So maybe in the beginning it will be a challenge to get out of that mindset of telling and into the mindset of doing.
But I think it will become second nature soon enough.
[00:10:29] Speaker B: Yes.
It doesn't mean it's going to be easy at the beginning, it's going to be very difficult.
But when you're doing it and you're saying, okay, everybody, come and sit on the floor. On the floor with me. Oh, very good, Maria, you're sitting on the floor. Look, Maria is sitting on the floor. So everybody, can you sit on the floor? To repeat that language so many times by showing yourself, by using a good example from a child, and then everybody, oh, that's what I'm supposed to be doing. Okay. They maybe didn't understand the words they're understanding from the context that, oh, I'm supposed to be sitting on the floor like Maria is and like my teacher is.
So they start understanding things and there's layers of understanding.
[00:11:08] Speaker A: Yeah. And actually that's a really important point. They're not just observing us as teachers, they're also observing everyone else. So it's the vibe of the classroom, which is also part of classroom management.
Because if Maria does it and she gets praised for it, then I want to do it too and also get praise. And then I'll try to imitate Maria in order to be as good as her.
[00:11:33] Speaker B: There's a community feeling in a pre primary classroom, mainly where you're doing your circle time, where everybody's together and everybody can see everyone else. You're not seeing people, people's backs, like when you're sitting in rows, you can actually see everybody and look at them when they're speaking. And that is a rule of respect. You look at people when they're talking to you. So that's what's happening without really saying it in circle time. So those are social rules that we're not actually saying explicitly, but they're there.
[00:12:04] Speaker C: Yes. A lot of things which we almost don't realize that children have to learn, you know, because if you're getting children from five or six, they perhaps learn more of that, but three or four, they're still learning that.
[00:12:19] Speaker B: Yeah, we take it for granted, you know, it's just something you do.
But no, you can't take it for granted when they're that young.
If you want to discover more about how to help your very young language learners thrive with holistic and child centred learning, you can download Oxford University Press's latest position paper that I helped to co author called Pre Primary how to do it well via the link in the description.
In the paper, we explore the rationale behind introducing English in pre primary education and how it can be done effectively. We highlight the importance of teaching young learners in developmentally appropriate ways that are aligned with how they learn. Enjoy the read.
[00:13:04] Speaker C: One of the other things that you talk about is trying to make things child centered. But are they, to what extent can they be child centered and to what extent does the teacher lead in the learning? How do you work out that balance? How do you approach that?
[00:13:23] Speaker B: So usually we would go from teacher led activities to more child initiated experiences.
So we might sit in a circle and play a game or sing a song, or read a story, but at some point we want this to be owned, this language that is going to come out from these experiences. We want it to be owned by the children and even the experience itself will be owned by the children when they take it into this child initiated play.
So as an example, if you're going to be learning about fruit, you might decide, okay, let's make a fruit salad. So that's the teacher led moment where you say, get the banana, put three slices of banana in the bowl. Get the apple, put three slices of apple in the bowl.
So you're giving them the input. They're listening to the words banana, apple and they're making the fruit salad. That's the experience.
It's going to be playful for them to feel like they're chefs. Maybe they're wearing.
Maybe they did a craft. Yeah. Yesterday with. With to make their chef hats.
And so it all makes sense. It all needs to connect anyway.
And after that you might come together and talk about what was put into the fruit salad. And then maybe later on you will see them in your learning areas or learning corners. That is quite characteristic of pre primary classrooms or their free play.
And they'll be in the play kitchen and they'll have a bowl and they'll say banana, apple and making that fruit salad again.
And they can use the language that was introduced in the teacher led moment in their own play because of that sense of ownership. Now that I'm using it to play and playing in a different language.
[00:15:22] Speaker C: Yes. Wow. Yes.
[00:15:23] Speaker B: That's really good.
[00:15:25] Speaker C: Is that world of it imagination? I mean, this is one of the things I'm taking from a lot of what you're saying is that play is. Is about imagination and it's about physical things as well.
[00:15:36] Speaker B: Those combinations, sensory activities.
It comes through the body, through the senses, through movement. Yes.
[00:15:43] Speaker C: But also the play in some ways has to be modeled, which can be through a story or it can be through the teacher doing it themselves.
[00:15:50] Speaker B: Exactly. So most of the time what children take into their own play is what you have already done with your teacher before that. So if you play a board game with them, you leave that material or the props you use to dramatize the story with, you leave that in the learning areas or their free play. And those are the materials that they can use to play with. And when they see that material that prompts the language that they used.
[00:16:21] Speaker A: And I think that might resonate with parents as well because I. I think at home as well, a lot of the activities, the play activities that were introduced in school are replicated at home because play is effectively a life rehearsal of sorts. So they're practicing the language but also the behavior of the teacher or the peers that they have experienced in class. So Yeah, I think that happens all the time.
[00:16:50] Speaker B: Yeah. Many times we suggest that teachers give the children the challenge or mission to teach their families what they have learned in class. So they take home the craft or the prop or the. And they use it at home as well. So it's taking it out of the classroom. It's beyond the four walls of a classroom and it's not dependent on the teacher being there, which is really important as well. So it's much more of an independent use of the language as well.
[00:17:19] Speaker C: See again, if I was teaching slightly older children, I would be thinking of that fruit salad as this is me demonstrating how you do it and teaching the language. Now you in your groups do that, but that's not the vibe I'm getting from you now. It's not now you play this game. No, it's more. You're leaving those in the corners.
[00:17:43] Speaker B: Yes, there is a choice usually when it comes to child led because it's child initiated. So it has to be chosen by them.
You can't say now you do that over there.
So you leave different materials, you leave the Pete the cat book and you leave the board game and you leave the play kitchen with the plastic fruit and bananas. And they choose what they want to play with and that will prompt that language. Sometimes you need to remind them of it before you go into. So we're going to go into learning areas now so you can choose what you want to play with. Remember when we did the fruit salad? What did we put in the fruit salad? We put apples and bananas. Excellent. And what did Pete say in his story? If you choose this learning area? Pete said, goodness, no. And what did you.
You remind them of it before they go into those. And you monitor and you walk around and you try to elicit the language if they're not using it. Because sometimes they do switch naturally into
[00:18:43] Speaker A: their mother tongue and sometimes that's fine.
But I wanted to come into this distinction or differentiation between primary and pre primary because in primary we tend to think of these activities as maybe that could be your whole lesson, like teaching the fruit teaching imperative.
[00:19:02] Speaker B: Like how?
[00:19:03] Speaker A: Like put this, do that, then chop, you know, and so on, and then get them to do it. And that would be a full lesson, probably. And that's great because it's still playful and interactive. But in pre primary you have to think of smaller activities just by virtue. Smaller in terms of duration or shorter, I should say, because of the fact that children don't have the scope to devote a whole hour to just fruit and verbs related to making the fruit sound.
So we have to keep that in mind. And then the idea of child led in that they can choose which activities spark their interest or they want to practice with.
[00:19:45] Speaker B: Yeah.
As a consultant, I was once observing a group of three year olds and this was a really good routine that the teacher was establishing with them. It was a weather routine. You know, everybody does A weather routine in pre primary. But the special thing about it was that the teacher got out her magic box and took out her wand and she went, eenie meenie miny moe Catch a tiger bites there a bit screamy meeny miny mo to choose another child to come to the front. And in Argentina, in private bilingual schools, teachers wear a pinafore apron, something over their clothes so that you can tell who is a teacher. And so they wear this so that children can identify them. Well there are sometimes parents in the school so just so that they can identify who teachers are.
So the teacher took that off and put it on this child that she had chosen. The child dragging the apron on the floor, sat in the teacher's seat, got out the magic box, got out the wand again and went eeny meeny night she's three. Eenie meeny miny moe. Packaging bites. So if it's green says go let eeny meeny miny mo.
Another child came to the front, stood next to her. Out of the magic box she took the weather flash cups.
Is today a sunny day?
The other one checked, no it isn't. Is today a rainy day? No, it isn't. Is today a cloud? Yes, it is.
And then they conducted the whole weather song then just the two girls at the front and the teacher had gone to sit in one of the kids places in the circle. So the teacher became one of the children in that circle and so they were conducting the whole thing and they stood up and sang the weather song with everybody else. And the confidence they had at the front of that class to do that. And the little child was the mini teacher. And that's pretend play.
They were pretending they were the teachers and they were teaching even to the teacher who is sitting in their spot what's the weather, what the weather is like and doing the song. And that was amazing to see how they could do that when there are only three. Because this routine was so well established and the teacher was able to change those roles around, the teacher was no longer the teacher, the child was a mini teacher.
[00:22:12] Speaker C: So that kind of links to a question I was going to ask, which is that I think sometimes it looks a bit daunting because you have, as you say, they've got short attention spans so you have short activities, so you then move on to another one. And they're creative and they're different. So it feels very demanding of the teacher to have lots of different activities in games.
[00:22:36] Speaker A: It is.
[00:22:36] Speaker C: But then I'm thinking, does that connect with your point about repetition. So that although in each lesson it feels like you've got lots of different activities, you reuse those in different classes so you don't have to be endlessly creative.
[00:22:50] Speaker B: No, yes, yes, absolutely. So you would have routines that you repeat. And of course, this teacher in this example, she had been using that same routine in the same way for a period of time so that the children could actually do it themselves. So obviously this has happened many times, many times before the children can actually take on that leading role.
So yes, there is a lot of repetition of certain things, even songs that children enjoy. And you repeat the songs again many times. What we also try to do is repeat in different ways. So sometimes we read a story using the storybook, sometimes we tell the story using puppets and masks, and sometimes we tell the story using movement and everybody's standing up and acting out the story. So we do tend to try to also use varied repetition. So repetition that is varied in a way.
But there are, yes, a lot of variations on and variations.
[00:23:47] Speaker A: And again, from more kind of research related perspective, repetition is ever so important for developing language because essentially the more frequent words and expressions are learned faster. And so if we manage to integrate them to as many activities or routines as possible, then we kind of will support our pupils to. To learn these words.
[00:24:16] Speaker C: Spaced repetition kind of built into it.
[00:24:18] Speaker A: Absolutely, yes. And of course the teacher has the ability to see what spacing works for them and for the pupils, because some classes will get bored maybe a bit faster of having the same routine kind of repeated on a daily basis. But clearly other classes, like the one with the weather routine, they loved it.
[00:24:43] Speaker B: The good thing about pre primary is that children like repetition. If they enjoyed a song, they want it again and again. And sometimes they even say again, again. And you're like, you can't do. We haven't do that. I'm bored, don't want to stick it again.
But they want things again. If they enjoyed a story, they will want it again. So it's great that they even ask for it. That's good for learning, for language learning,
[00:25:06] Speaker A: and also for teacher preparation, because you can limit that, take every win.
[00:25:13] Speaker B: And Ben, you mentioned Montessori before and this example about the children doing the weather routine.
I always connected with what something that Maria Montessori once said, which was the greatest sign of a teacher, is to be able to say, my children are now working as if though I did not exist.
So I see that example like that the teacher was another child. The teacher did not exist. She was not there. And the children were just working as though she didn't exist. And working is playing for a child. So play is work.
This idea of child initiated play comes from that as well. They go to play, choose what they want to play with, and they can do it by themselves at some point.
[00:25:59] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:26:00] Speaker A: And what I like about that example, if I understood it correctly, was that if you didn't feel confident to be the teacher, you could, you know, do the wand routine again and choose someone else to come and be the teacher.
So actually this is completely child led because you go with the child's level of comfort in speaking in this case, or leading the class through the routine. So that's a fantastic example of an activity that starts as teacher led and then ends up being child led completely, which I think is in relation to your first question or one of the first questions.
It's basically that we can't go to child led immediately because that will be complete chaos and no learning outcomes will ever be achieved. So everything needs to start from something that teacher led and can then be owned. I love this term that you used by the children themselves.
[00:27:01] Speaker B: As a teacher. You have to have that ability to perceive whether they're ready for it or not, because if it's too much of a challenge, they won't be enjoying it.
So you need to make sure that they're ready for that. And you don't want to be repeating things over and over again if they're ready to take on the lead role. So you really need to have that perception to really eyes when they're ready
[00:27:20] Speaker C: and when they're not, you have to read the room. You have to be very sensitive to reactions.
[00:27:25] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:27:27] Speaker C: So this has been fantastic. I feel there are a number of areas where I was thinking, I'm not sure what to do. And you've given me great suggestions and ideas how to address those challenges to teaching.
So thank you very much.
[00:27:41] Speaker A: Thank you.
