WRITING TIP Nº1: The Fantastic Binomial

I've decided to present, starting from this post, a series of writing tips that you can easily use in class.

Inspired by Gianni Rodari's Grammar of Fantasy I want to spread his brilliant ideas all around the world to improve story telling and creating.

In this first post I'll be talking about the 'fantastic binomial', a simple technique I'm sure will spark many funny moments in addition to great compositions!

According to several theories the human brain elaborates concepts from opposite pairs. This means that the idea of 'soft' can't exist in our mind without thesimultaneous experience of 'hard'.

To make up a story, as well, two non related-words are necessary.

I mean, daisy and daffodils are an example of related words that will inspire a few ideas but not enough for a story.

Let's think about some examples of non-related words:

Pepper and Football

Penguin and Hot-air Balloon

Egg and Diary

Do you think they are distant enough to wake up your imagination?

Several ways exist to choose these words: pointing to them in a dictionary, letting each student  write one on a piece of paper etc.

Once you've got your two distant items you must connect them, through preposition, for instance:

The penguin on the bus

The penguin under the bus

The penguin with the bus

….

Are you getting inspired?

We've already got many points of departure to develop a whole story.

I'll use the Egg and the Diary

The Egg's Diary could be a good one with the Egg as main protagonist and narrator at the same time. Can you imagine?

Gemma the Egg is happily living her life on the farm when suddenly she's told by her neighbor in the egg compartment that she will be probably e part of a Spanish tortilla (omelette) the next day. Horrified by the idea Gemma decides to run away and, since she went to school at the farm, she's capable of writing about her adventures in the diary received  as a present from her mum.

A diary that, due to some lucky coincidences, is now in our possession…

Of course this is only a story idea  but it can be developed by the students: each one, in sequence, can write a chapter that will continue the previous one to create a collective classwork.

That's all for now. See you soon for the second Writing Tip.

WRITING TIP NUMBER 5
WRITING TIP NUMBER 4

WRITING TIP NUMBER 3

WRITING TIP NUMBER 2

LEARN THE COLOURS! by Stephane Husar and Loïc Méhée

A new school year has just begun and I've been assigned to a pre-school mixed group of old students of mine, aged 5, and new students, aged 3.

The main challenge, in this situation, is how to present topics that my old pupils already know to the new ones without being boring and using material and books they haven't seen yet.

It's a really difficult problem to work out!

Fortunately, I came across this bilingual book collection, 'Aprende Inglés con Cat and Mouse', edited by Anaya, which in some way partially solves my problem, at least until Christmas! 

The first book I've been using over the past two weeks talks about colors, as you can read on the title. 

Cat and Mouse are the main characters who will show many balloons and teach your kids what colors they are.

The book scheme is really basic and repetitive, the pictures are colorful and bright: elements, as already mentioned in my previous post about teaching from books, that make it easier to convince young minds that a new language can be simple and fun to learn.

To complete the color experience I added complementary fun activities to involve all my students' faculties in the learning process.

First day:

I read the book aloud and then I played the game 'Touch something… Red!' 

As you can imagine it's a game where they have to run around the classroom to touch something colored as I require.

Finally we sat down to paint a clown holding several balloons, each one had an assigned color written in it. This way the oldest children could start reading and recognizing the colors' spelling while the youngest ones just had to listen to me pronouncing the color's name and choose the right crayon to paint the balloon.

Second day:

We listened to the Cd that comes with the book, repeating the lines.

Then I drew some balloons on several sheets and let the children paint them using their favorite color.

Afterwards, using the same drawings, we played a game they really love.

There is a child who's the captain of the ship and stands alone at one side of the classroom. At the opposite side, there is the rest of the class (lees one) holding usually flashcards but in this case the sheets previously painted.

Finally there is one kid who's going to be the shark, placed more or less at the same distance from the captain and the rest of the classmates.

When the captain calls out a card, pronouncing these words "I can see, I can see a blue balloon across the see!!!", the student holding the blue card has to run towards him avoiding the dangerous shark's clutches!

This game is also helpful to start to get used to saying adjectives before nouns.

Third day:

I proposed that we perform a little play using the book's lines as a script.

So, two by two, each one holding a flashcard respectively showing a cat and a mouse, recited the lines while the rest of us were holding the sheets with the different colored balloons.

I can say it was great and un unexpected success!

The oldest ones, after just a minute, were acting by themselves and the youngest were, little by little, recognizing and pronouncing the correct balloon's color. 

Beside, it's an activity you can repeat several times over the month. It seems they don't get tired of it! 

After the 'theatre' we sat down to play the "I spy" game. 

Display some animals flashcards on the table (but you can use anything colored), and then say: "I spy something with my little eye…" They must ask "What color is ti?" Tell them the color you're thinking about and they have to point to the card showing the color you said.

In this case the oldest were reviewing animal vocabulary at the same time that the youngest enjoyed the pointing experience. They loved it!

I hope I've been helpful. I'll soon review more books and present more related games and activities.

You can take a look at the whole collection on Anaya's page: Aprendo inglés con Cat and Mouse

ROUND OF QUESTIONS

One of the main speaking exercise I constantly perform with my students, right at the beginning of the class, is the 'Round of Questions'.

Once they are sitting in a semicircle you can start to ask the student sitting beside you the first question.

- How are you?

- What's your name?

- How old are you?

- Where do you live?

- What's your favorite color/ animal / food?

These inquiries and their respective answers are the goals you can achieve with pre-school children.

You can add more complex questions for higher-level students.

The child, sitting beside you, must answer and then ask the same question to to the one sitting next to him and so on until the question will reach you again.

It should be a fast-pace game to avoid general boredom.

At the beginning it will be naturally slow because the kids will have to learn the right words to use and you'll notice their certain tendency to divert their attention toward anything but the performance. Don't give up and be firm.

To make it more engaging I also use a little soft ball. I throw it to the chosen 'victim', who after answering will redirect it to anyone he chooses asking, of course, the same question and so on.

The problem with this solution is that you will have, and I am almost 100% sure of it, someone of them trying to throw the ball as high or far as possible instead of his/ her classmate… 

When that happens, definitely write his/her name under the sad face on the board!!! ;o)

Recently, i successfully introduced a box into which they have to throw the ball or a puppet or something soft you keep on hand, exactly like basketball.

It helps to avoid balls flying everywhere inside the classroom with the consequent mess. 

All of your pupils, with no exception of age, attitude and ability will participate with sincere thrill and joy!!!

Do you know any best way to start an English class?!?

I design series of activities based on a communicative method that will help children to practice the grammar they're learning at school.

Many ESL activities, I see, are nothing more than 'fill in the blank' exercises that only teach kids how to fill in blanks and miss the whole point of learning to speak and understand a new language.

It's much easier and more fun to learn by doing, and you'll be surprised at how quickly you'll see valuable results. 

You can get my activities on my online store:

http://childreneslworksheets.bigcartel.com

TEACHING ENGLISH THROUGH CHILDREN'S PICTURE BOOKS: ERIC CARLE

Eric Carle's illustrated books are my favorite for teaching very young learners.

I own several of them and they've always been successfully welcomed by all of my students.

I'll try to briefly explain why they are so useful and engaging.

First of all, for the choice of the topics presented in his books. In fact, they perfectly suit very young learners' needs: numbers, animals, colors, food, body parts, days of the week etc. Just to start.

The repetition of the same structure is the second aspect I would certainly highlight. 

During those ages, from 3 to 5, constantly repeating terms and expressions is really important for students to assimilate new words, but, please, be careful!

When I mention the word repetition I'm not suggesting you always do 'the same activity'.

Keep in mind that children of those ages have a very attention span: a period of 10 minutes is the most time they can dedicate to someone or something.

This is the reason why you could actually present the same vocabulary during the whole hour but through 4/5 different activities!!! 

(Also consider a certain amount of time between one block and the other to re-arrange and organize the kids and the space, in order to not hurry and stress them).

That's what I mean with the term 'repetition' and that's what Eric Carle does in his books. He shows the same vocabulary set, for example, animals, but using different situations and landscapes. This way he fully achieves the difficult goal of involving our young learners.

Another aspect is, indeed, the quality of his collages/illustrations: I haven't seen one single child showing indifference once he is facing Carle's colorful and expressive characters.

Some of the titles I usually use:

The Very Hungry Caterpillar Cover

THE VERY HUNGRY CATERPILLAR 

- adjectives

- numbers from 1 to 5

- food items

- colors

Do You Want to Be y Friend? Cover

DO YOU WANT TO BE MY FRIEND? (lovely guessing book)

- animals 

- sentence structure

- colors

1,2,3 To The Zoo Cover

1,2,3 TO THE ZOO

- numbers from 1 to 10

- animals

- colors

The Mixed-Up Chameleon

THE MIXED-UP CHAMELEON

- animals

- colors

- body parts

- sentence structure ' I wish I could…'

Brown Bear, What Do You See? Cover

BROWN BEAR, BROWN BEAR WHAT DO YOU SEE?

- animals

- sentence structure

- colors

Today is Monday Cover

TODAY IS MONDAY

- food

- animals

- days of the week

- colors

- song at the end of the book http://vimeo.com/23553723

From Head to Toe Cover

FROM HEAD TO TOE

- body parts

- verbs 

- sentence structure 'Can you…?
- an activity idea

Related activities and little handicraft are available on his official web:

ERIC CARLE'S OFFICIAL WEBSITE

   

I design series of activities based on a communicative method that will help children to practice the grammar they're learning at school.

Many ESL activities, I see, are nothing more than 'fill in the blank' exercises that only teach kids how to fill in blanks and miss the whole point of learning to speak and understand a new language.

It's much easier and more fun to learn by doing, and you'll be surprised at how quickly you'll see valuable results. 

You can get my activities on my online store:

http://childreneslworksheets.bigcartel.com

 

Lucy dedicates a lot of time and love to thinking about and writing the posts she shares with all of you. Because she believes that a better teaching is the key for a better future. If you find any help, value or joy in this blog, please consider becoming a supporting reader. A donation, in any amount, will be gratefully accepted. 

                                                   

 

THE WORD-EATING SNAKE

I know a fun way to introduce your young learners to the magic world of spelling: 

it's the word-eating snake!

Simple and fast to display, you only have to draw a long snake on the board and fill it with the words you want your pupils to learn.

Insert random letters between them to make it more challenging , or not, if your class is at the very initial stage.

Some examples:

More Spelling Games:

GUESS WHAT?!?

I design series of activities based on a communicative method that will help children to practice the grammar they're learning at school.

Many ESL activities, I see, are nothing more than 'fill in the blank' exercises that only teach kids how to fill in blanks and miss the whole point of learning to speak and understand a new language.

It's much easier and more fun to learn by doing, and you'll be surprised at how quickly you'll see valuable results. 

You can get my activities on my online store:

http://childreneslworksheets.bigcartel.com

GUESS WHAT?!? The Spelling Game

This is  the 3rd and last activity for Cambridge Movers and Flyers exams.

It's conceived to improve students' writing skills.

Print the page, fold it on the line, so none will see the answer and then cut the single word sections. Afterwards invent your game.

It could be a team game where each group has the same words to guess; you might assign points to the fastest on giving the answer. 

To check that nobody is cheating send a member of the first group to the second group and so on. They will be incorruptible referees!!!

Another possibility is doing exactly the opposite: opposite: tell them the word in order to guess which definition suits it.

In any case, I would  start with one topic and keep adding topics one by one to refresh the previous ones and learn the new ones.

DON'T MISS IT!!!

Resuming: 

1st Warm up  ---> GUESS WHAT?!? The Vocabulary Matching Game

2nd Speaking ---> GUESS WHAT?!? The Card Game 

3rd Writing ---> GUESS WHAT?!? The Spelling Game

I'll soon publish a second set of cards and games about different topics. 
Stay tuned! 

I design series of activities based on a communicative method that will help children to practice the grammar they're learning at school.

Many ESL activities, I see, are nothing more than 'fill in the blank' exercises that only teach kids how to fill in blanks and miss the whole point of learning to speak and understand a new language.

It's much easier and more fun to learn by doing, and you'll be surprised at how quickly you'll see valuable results. 

You can get my activities on my online store:

http://childreneslworksheets.bigcartel.com

The BFG by Roald Dahl

What does a human bean from Turkey taste like?

If you don't know the answer, go and ask the Bonecruncher Giant.

He will certainly know. Every night Bonecruncher is galloping off to Turkey to gobble Turks.

The BFG Cover

What about human beans from Panama, Wales or Jersey? Each region has a peculiar taste, and for the giants, galloping off to one or another place is,  to us, like opening the fridge and deciding what to have for dinner.

It doesn't sound extremely encouraging if you're a little orphan who's just been snatched by a big-eared giant. Does it?

Sophie, our little heroine, has been taken from the orphanage, but actually, she has been saved from the horrible Mrs Clonkers, who punished children locking them in the dark cellar for 24 hours with nothing to eat or drink (Does that ring a bell?). 

She is inspired by the author's niece, Sophie, and is the first girl to appear as a protagonist in one of Dahl's books; a busybody little kid who will find the solution and the courage to stop giants' night incursions to gobble human beans.

She has good luck because the giant who kidnapped her is the Big Friendly Giant, whose hobby is to hunt dreams, to blow them into the bedroom of those sleeping children he visits during the witching hour.

Dreams, he says, is very mysterious thing.They is floating around in the air… And they are like bubbles making just a little buzzing-humming noise, imperceptible by human beans. 

They live in the Dream Country together with nightmares. 

Only the BFG, thanks to his special big ears, can hear them and is able to catch and lock them into a glass jar. 

Thousand of jars that he accurately collects and classifies; each one has its label with an accurate description of the dream inside. There are dreams  suitable for all tastes ready to be blown through the long trumpet every night.

The BFG spreads nice lovely dreams exactly like Dahl tells his stories, collected over his life, to enrich children's imagination.

With his super ears he can also hear all the secret whispering of the world.

From ladybirds to plants he demonstrates Sophie that every living thing on the Earth has a soul and gives us a great lesson of ecology.

Sophie is afraid to be eaten but the BFG shows her what kind of food he lives on to avoid eating people: Snozzcumbers! A sort of enormous black and white striped cucumbers, that are the only vegetables capable of growing in the desolate land of Giants, but they taste of frogskin and rotten fish! 

But not all the children are as lucky as her, because many of them  will soon disappear during the night, swallowed by a nasty giant.

So she decides that something has to be done immediately to save children's lives and convinces the BFG to prepare a terrible nightmare that will be blown into the very Queen of England's room to make her aware of the terrible facts, but most importantly,  will reveal to her the existence of the BFG.

Will the Queen believe to a dream? Will the little orphan manage to be heard? And will the BFG be treated with respect and not as a circus attraction?

I warmly recommend you to read this book. It's adventurous, it's fun, it's full of strange words, but especially it teaches us to see things from a different perspective.

http://www.roalddahlfans.com/games/quiz.php?quizID=4

http://www.derbylive.co.uk/documents/TheBFGEducationPack.pdf


Lucy dedicates a lot of time and love to thinking about and writing the posts she shares with all of you. Because she believes that a better teaching is the key for a better future. If you find any help, value or joy in this blog, please consider becoming a supporting reader. A donation, in any amount, will be gratefully accepted.