Flash cards… These Cards with a word and/or a picture on them that teachers use during their lessons, and which are particularly useful, for teaching a foreign language without using the children's first language. (Check out chapter six of my guide for more details.)
So, you're a teacher or parent who's fresh off the boat and someone has suggested that buying flashcards might help you grab your young learners' attention during English classes. You went out and bought a set and... now what?
Sometimes, especially at the beginning of the school year when I show my students the first set of flashcards, during the first classes, they become very excited and there's always someone who literally begs to hold them. I usually let them because I 'm always curious to see how they'll use the cards. As children usually tend to repeat what they've learnt with their school teacher, sometimes they come out with cool ideas I can reuse, but, unfortunately, when it comes to flashcards, they just sit quietly and start to slowly show one card at a time, asking 'What's this?'. If you are in a classroom with the desks organised in rows without much space for moving around, I imagine that's the most obvious way to use flash cards. Even so, I think it's worth exploring some more drilling games you could use to make the most of your flashcard sets in order to grab your students' attention and speed up their learning process.
So here's list of flash cards games for children who can't read yet:
Flash!
Choose the flashcards you're going to use and hold them so that the children can't see what's on them. Pick one card and turn it around very fast, so that students only have enough time to take a peek at it before you turn it back round. Ask what it was on the card and if nobody answers, show them the flashcard again, but a little more slowly than the first time. Repeat until somebody gives the right answer. Once shown how to proceed, you could also call on some of your students and let them be the ones to turn the cards round quickly.
Slowly!
Obviously this game is the opposite concept to the one above. Choose the flashcards you're going to use and hold them so that children can't see what's on them. Pick one card and turn it round very slowly so that the kids will have to pay a lot of attention to be the first to guess what's represented on the card. Again, once shown how to proceed, you could also call on some of your students and let them do the trick.
Point to…! or Walk to…!
Walk around the classroom sticking a set of flashcards to the walls round the classroom. Get the children say the names as you stick them up, then say 'point to the rabbit!' or any other item shown on the cards. The children listen and point to the correct flashcard as fast as they can.
"The Walk to…!" - version allows the children to stand up and go over to the card. However, in order to avoid a crowd of 24 kids pushing and pulling (and screaming and crying :o) ) to touch (and possibly destroying it) the only one card in the room which shows what you've just called out, I'd definitely suggest using at least 3 copies of the same set of cards, spread out all over the classroom.
What's missing?
Stick a set of flashcards on the board. Have the children say the names as you do it. Then say 'Close your eyes!' and once their eyes are closed, take one card off the board. At that point say 'Open your eyes! What's missing?' and let the children guess the name of the missing card. The funniest part of this game is that the second time you say 'Close your eyes', the children will start to cheat. Pretending to be a little upset and surprised (yes, just like a clown), call out the name of each cheating little monkey and tell them to reeeeaaaally close their eyes this time. You'll see how easy it is sometimes to make a child really happy.
Kim's game
Stick 8-10 flashcards on the board, eliciting the names. Give your students 1 minute, or less, to look in silence and try to memorize the flashcards. Then remove all the cards from the board and finally ask them to say the names they can remember. While they're telling you the right answers, repeat the names of the items and stick the cards back up on the board, in the same order they're being called out by the kids.
Flashcard chain
Sit in a circle with the children and with your set of cards. Pass the first card, e.g. cheese, and ask a question 'Do you like cheese?' encourage them to answer 'Yes I do/ No, I don't'. After answering, the child asks the same question while passing the flashcard to the next child and so on round the circle.
This game is quite flexible because you can choose different questions depending on what you're currently studying, or you can change the questions for statements, e.g. 'I like cheese' or I don't like cheese' , I would like…, I can…, I have got…, etc.
Another option is to have every single child holds a different card, while the first child says ' I like cheese', holding the card which shows the cheese so that everybody can see it. The second child, who is holding the card with, let's say, the lettuce then says: 'I like cheese and lettuce'. The third child, who's holding the card showing ham, says: 'I like cheese, lettuce and ham'. Keep playing until the last child in the circle has mentioned all the cards.
WARNING! Always expect some mess the first time you introduce a new game to young learners, because, as they say, practice makes perfect and children need a lot of it. This way, the second time will be a little tidier and quieter and the more you practice and adjust the game to your students needs and characteristics, the smoother the game will go.
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Over the last 2 years I've been teaching some children who were finding learning to read difficult and they also made lots of mistakes when writing. As a result, and despite their best efforts, their academic results weren't satisfying at all. When I started to help them, their self-esteem was non-existent; they showed no interest in learning English, and, since they had experienced failure so often, they didn't even try to write correctly anymore and, of course, they didn't like reading at all.
To try to solve the whole situation it occurred to me to use phonics: If my students had begun by learning to decode a word by identifying the sounds it's composed of, they would at least have had a tool to help them write that word correctly. Having said that, if they had learnt how to read a word correctly, they would have been able to recognize it even when someone else said it, which would have improved their learning ability overall.
It worked. After a few sessions of studying phonics they've started to do better in English tests, their self-esteem has 'risen from the ashes' and they have even started to enjoy reading.
But, what are phonics?
Each letter of the alphabet makes a sound. Also, different combinations of letters produce other sounds such as 'th', 'sh', 'oo' or 'ee' for example. Words are made by blending all these sounds together from left to right.
More details about phonics are available here
What I like about the theory behind phonics is the fact that children acquire a decoding tool they will be able to use at any time with any word. Phonics improve their reasoning skills which is exactly what we, as teachers, should look for: children who can think.
In order to delve a little bit deeper into this topic I took a course in June where I learnt about the Jolly Phonics method of teaching phonics.
I definitely recommend it to anyone, both teachers and parents, because the amount of English words that children have to learn has increased dramatically over the last 7 years. In addition to English as a subject, kids are now studying science, social studies, art and music in English, which means there are many, many words to read, remember and write correctly if they want to get high marks. Learning every single word by heart, as children are doing now, is exhausting and certainly doesn't improve their love for learning or reading.
This year I'm going to follow the Jolly Phonics method to teach my youngest students, who are 4, 5 and 6 years old. If you too wold like to know more about it I suggest you take a look at the Jolly Learning website first and then attend one of their courses. To do so, you can get in touch with Beki, who, by the way, is a great trainer, her classes are dynamic and really entertaining, exactly as we like them at Miss Lucy's ;)
More about this topic here, here and here.
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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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Last May was a particularly touching month. I had been told that it was going to be my last month at the public school in Madrid, the place where I have learnt almost everything I know about children, and about the right way to teach them.
I asked my students to draw me a picture of our time together, telling them to think about 'Lucy and our English classes' and these drawings are the result.
I was particularly impressed by Pedro's art. As you can see, he drew a tall house on a vast horizon and a sky filled with seagulls and a big bright sun.
When I saw the drawing, I travelled back to a turning point in my life, the moment when I made the decision to work with children.
Back in those days, almost 8 years ago, I was quite confused about my life. I didn't really like my job as a graphic designer, or Barcelona, the city where I was living. Everything was meaningless and I really needed a 'time out' to to escape the totally apathetic state I was in.
I felt the need for completely different surroundings, both culturally and environmentally. Fortunately I literally have friends all over the world, so I got in touch with the closest one, who, at the time, was living in Trondheim, Norway, and we arranged a three-month-stay to take care of his baby daughter, Sandra, who was around 5 months old at the time.
Reflecting on one's life is a process that requires time and broad horizons, and here is where Pedro's drawing starts to make sense.
During the last month of my stay, I had the chance to live in a flat on the 14th floor of a new block of flats at the top of a hill, where I could enjoy views of the 'fjord' in all its magnificence!!! The storms coming in over the bay, the sun shining, the rainbows, and, of course, the seagulls. Have you ever seen seagulls fly, looking down on them from above? From the 14th floor of a hilltop flat, It was like I was flying with them.
When I saw Pedro's picture, a series of questions crossed my mind: 'How ddi you know, little boy?' How could you represent something I've never even told anyone?' Is it just a coincidence or some sort of connection?
Unfortunately I'll never know, but I really hope that during my English classes I will forever be able to transmit the feeling of freedom that little Pedro captured so well in his picture.
--> Quiero leer esta entrada en castellano (he descubierto que eso de usar 'castellano' en vez de 'español' es típico de los de Barcelona :D)
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.
I suppose every child around the world goes places with their parents. Schools, hospitals, parks, train stations, bus stations, and shops are all around and children learn to recognize them and to interact with the people who work there quite early on.
At the age of five, some of them have certainly already experienced grocery shopping with their parents: asking for food (in our cute Spanish neighbourood shops), asking about the price of it and handing money over to the shopkeeper to pay for the family shopping.
Taking this into account, since my classes are inspired by children's real life and interests, I planned some lessons around this topic. And looking back on the whole experience, I must say we enjoyed it a lot. Thanks to activities involving coloring in, cutting out and pasting, as well as role playing games, the kids learned a lot and in a reasonably short time.
Step one: I showed them some flash cards and we played flash cards games to remember the different locations. In the first group, the places were either very familiar or had a very recognizable name: school, park, hospital, train station, bus station, gas station… and airport, which at the beginning was logically called… the plane station (my cuties!)
Then we made a paper city: I let them choose which place they wanted to color in, cut out and paste onto the wall of the classroom, where I had previously stuck a long paper street. If you're working with a very small group you could suggest doing a 3D version of the same project, using whatever recycling material you can think of (see pictures).
We also played this game: ' Look!' - pointing in any direction to get the kids attention, of course - 'I can see a train/plane/bus/car/ teacher… Where am I?'
The second step was to introduce the names of shops, such as the butcher's, the fishmonger's (one of the most loved by the kids, probably because it sounded funny) the baker's, the green grocer's, the flower shop, and the supermarket.
We use flashcards games to memorize the words and then we played charades: the players took turns acting it out, without speaking or making sound effects, while the other players tried to guess which shop they were in.
Then we added these shops to our paper city. Everyone got the same paper model of a generic shop. Each child decorated their own shop windows with the typical products of the shop they had chosen to illustrate.
Next we played Shopping List, another Orchard Toys memory game where each player has to be the first to fill their trolley with all of the items on their shopping list. There are also booster packs about fruit and vegetables, or clothes available which are the perfect way to review a ton of vocabulary.
Finally we practiced real life situations. The last game was a role play about buying and selling. I printed several items for each shop and fake toy money (which some of the children couldn't resist pocketing, even though they were only pieces of paper, eh eh eh!). Some of the kids acted as shopkeepers, displaying all their products on tables, while the others were the customers.
Here's the dialogue they used:
Customer: Good afternoon! (we usually have class after lunch)
Shopkeeper: Good afternoon! May I help you?
Customer: Yes, please. Can I have...
Shopkeeper: Here you are. Anything else?
Customer: No, thanks. How much is it?
Shopkeeper: It's € ..., please.
Customer: Here you are.
Shopkeeper: Thank you! See you soon!
Customer: See you!
As you can see I recycled expressions I was sure they already knew (greetings, asking for something, etc.), and added new ones like 'How much is it?', 'May I help you?' and 'Anything else?'. This allowed the kids to think in a logical way about what they were saying instead of just learning it by heart.
First they practiced the dialogue by buying paper bread, paper flowers, paper fish, paper fruit and paper vegetables. Then to make it clear that this dialogue could be used for any kind of shopping, I let them buy real stickers and real candies… to their great astonishment! One even exclaimed ' "What?!?!? You are giving us real sweets for fake toy money?!?! "
They may be young but they're certainly not slow!
--> Quiero ler esta entrada en castellano
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.
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| 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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Quiero leer esta entrada en Castellano
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.
Flash cards… These Cards with a word and/or a picture on them that teachers use during their lessons, and which are particularly useful, for teaching a foreign language without using the children's first language. (Check out chapter six of my guide for more details.)
