Summer Camp 2015: My House

At Summer Camp this year we learned about 'the house', among other things.
Since the location of the camp is a garden I introduced the topic by asking the children to fetch sticks and dry pine needles to build a simple flat model house in the grass. 
 
Then I let them choose which room was the kitchen, the living room, the bedroom, the bathroom, the garage and the garden and I placed the corresponding flashcards in each 'room'.

After everyone had agreed on the layout of the rooms, we played this simple game: 'Where is the cat (or any other animal or object you know your students may be interested in)?' In this game everybody closes their eyes and you hide the picture of a cat under one of the flashcards representing the rooms.  The children have to guess which room the cat is hiding in. Once they've picked the right room, you can let them hide the cat for the other kids, one by one.

Once the topic was introduced, we read a Cat and Mouse book 'Come to My House' which repeats the same pattern as the game. The protagonists go from room to room asking 'Where is Coco?' the cat family's pet parrot.  
The next step was learning the song 'Cows in the Kitchen', a pretty catchy song.
We studied animal sounds: moo, quack, meow, baa, oink and meh, with a game in which one kid reproduced  one of the sounds and the others had to guess which animal it belonged to. Apparently the most challenging sound to remember was the goat's Meh, as they kept confusing it with the sheep's Baa.


 

Then we built a cardboard house and stuck pieces of furniture in each room. While working, I left the song on in the background, so the children could continue to learn the words without realising. Other games you can play to teach songs in a more playful way are Musical Statues or Musical Chairs. Kids love them!The last step was painting the farm animals mentioned in the song with finger paint. The most fun part was trying to wash our hands in the garden sprinkles without getting completely soaked. Fortunately the heat wave that covered Madrid for the first 3 weeks of July allowed us to dry off quickly anyway.



 
Summer Camp 2014
Summer Camp 2013

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On Reading Comprehension and How It is Connected to Young People's Ability to Visualize Their Own Meaningful Future

www.quirkyworks.co.uk

A few weeks ago, I practiced some listening with one of my teen students by listening to an audiobook: an abridged version of "The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde", by Robert Louis Stevenson.

After listening to the first chapter, which was quite long to be honest, we approached the reading comprehension questions at the end of the book. Surprisingly my student didn't get a single one right. He had almost fallen asleep while the CD was going, while I ,on the other hand, had been imagining my personal version of the movie of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

The difference in our approaches to reading and listening made me realize that maybe one of the reasons why teenagers don't read is because they can't create that film in their own heads. But now the question is: how is that possible? I mean, children spend their lives analyzing texts of any nature and genre, so how come most of them end up disliking books?

I'm a visual person, I can draw a map of a town in my head just after a few walks around it. I can see vivid images of what I'm reading, and the other four senses are quite active too.  Obviously, that wouldn't be the case if I hadn't spent primary school drawing pictures for our classroom posters. They were about history, geography or even letters: big posters hanging on my classroom wall all year round. We also read stories and answered questions about them, and guess what? I don't remember those stories, but I do have clear images of those posters in my mind and I still remember the stories they told.

Thanks to the Multiple Intelligences Theory , we now know that each one of us learns in a different way and this means that probably some of my classmates probably remember school plays best, while others will remember the games played or the school trips we took. Any and every kind of experience can be called to mind while reading a book to enhance the experience and make it personal.

Anyway, all these memories have led me to this question: Why can't  teens use their imagination? Do they even have one?  Or  are they just future grey adults, who can only follow instructions, and are incapable of creating their own meaningful future because they can't even imagine it?

The next question is: how can we improve our children's ability to be creative and imaginative?

There are probably many theories which could answer this last question. I'd like to tell you about one in particular, mainly because I had ignored it until January and even though it surprised me quite a lot when I first heard about it, later, I definitely understood the essence of its principles later on.

So here you go! It's called Creative Education and basically it allows any kind of person to express his/her creativity through free-of-all-impediments drawing. During these graphic art sessions nobody judges, compares or comments on any of the drawings in order to allow a real and profound personal expression.

So, I was asked to teach English to preschoolers following this method and what's more, I was told that no illustrations or illustrated albums were allowed in order to avoid any influence on the way the kids expressed themselves. 

Imagine my reaction to the no-illustrations-or-illustrated-books-or-cards rule,
since one of the reasons I love my job is precisely  because I  have the best excuse to collect illustrated albums and cards!

However, thinking about it, I realized that it made total sense. I thought about Beatrix Potter, and how she became the first children's author and illustrator ever, as well as my forever favorite. She spent her whole life drawing animals using real models. No illustrated children's  book had ever existed before her. This shows that, as the Creative Education principles affirm, she could fully express herself in her drawings and stories. And she did a wonderful job of it!

So, to cut a long story short, the week after the first chapter od Dr Jeckyll and Mr hyde I dedicated part of  the class to a  visualization session during which my student had to describe how he was imagining the characters and their surroundings after listening to the description of each scene.

Of course it worked wonderfully. This time, he could easily answer all the reading comprehension questions properly, because he had finally been able to watch his own film too!


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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. 

                                                   

Phonics - Teaching Reading and Writing (ESL)

http://dollarstoremom.com/2011/04/make-a-phonics-flip-chart/

In one of my previous posts I wrote that my challenge for 2014 was going to be teaching reading and writing in English to some of my students who could already understand and speak English quite well.

Looking for some ideas and advice I came across such an abundance of strategies and material that I almost felt overwhelmed.

However, I've been able to design an effective plan that is already showing some results.

Everything started to become clearer when I was able to take a look at a collection of booklets specifically designed with the purpose of teaching phonics.

It's published by Collins and it's called Collins Easy Learning Age 5-7

It's interesting because the books cover many letter sounds with examples and colorful drawings. Also, there are a couple of workbooks to keep practicing a little more.

I decided to use them as a sort of guide through the maze of phonics, but also as a 'test' to use at the end of each module.

Then, following my 'guide', I searched the internet looking for entertaining activities linked to phonics, first of all because I wanted to dive deep into the topic and second because engaged kids are the secret to successful teaching.

Well… I would say I found a treasure. 

Look at this page and take your time to explore it, because it's an amazing source of almost anything you need to teach this topic.

The worksheets you'll find here are great! Crosswords, puzzles, cut and paste activities, cards. So far my students have enjoyed them a lot.

Furthermore, it's so nice to see how the children are getting more and more confident with every class.

I can see how they are reasoning about what letters they need to write every single word, making a big effort not to peep at the word bank that follows the exercises.

However, the best of all is seeing their eyes light up with satisfaction when they realize that they can spell correctly.

Below, I give you a list of other things I'm using these days to expand the phonics experience:

- Cards to teach Rhyming words and Phonics

- Spelling Games from Instant File-Folder Games for Reading grade 1-3 published by Scholastic
  (sample pages available)

- Success with Reading Comprehension Grade 1, also published by Scholastic
  (sample pages available)

- Dr Seuss rhyming books (Children love them!)

- Alphablocks cartoons. (Very engaging and fun. Available on YouTube)

As you can see, tons of material is available, so I personally selected those phonics that Spanish children would find the trickiest to recognize. I imagine that kids from other countries will need to focus on different sounds and patterns.

Good luck with your work and, as always, have fun!

More about reading

More about writing

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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.