Нова українська школа: методика навчання англійської мови в 1-2 класах закладів заглобальної середньої освіти на засадах компетентнісного підходу - Карпюк О. Д. 2020
3. Arts, Crafts and Games
Part II. Helping Tips
Arts, crafts and games are a fantastic way of developing children’s fine motor skills, and for teaching children grammar and vocabulary without their realising it.
This section will start by giving you 10 good reasons to take activities like these into your classroom. Following that, you will find plenty of concrete ideas for arts and crafts activities and games. All of these can be used to teach the most common topics on a young learner course and to develop the children’s language skills in a communicative and engaging context.
10 reasons to use arts and crafts activities
Arts and crafts activities can be a real asset in any young learner classroom. However, to be truly successful, these activities require careful planning and effective classroom management strategies. Remember that an arts and crafts activity has three fundamental stages: before, during and after the activity. All of these stages depend on specific instructions that you’ll need to prepare beforehand. You’ll also need to include a tidying-up stage to help the children develop responsibility skills and get the classroom back in order without too much fuss.
1 Memorable
Exposure to art, music and drama promotes increased brain activity. The more active the brain is, the more memorable a learning experience tends to be. You may find that children remember and speak about an arts and crafts activity that they did long ago as if it were yesterday.
2 Variety
Arts and crafts is another tool in your teacher toolkit that you can use to add variety to your teaching. Most children will love the opportunity to create an object while learning language and applying it to a concrete and meaningful context.
3 Effective for language learning
Remember that doing an arts and crafts activity is a process. This means that when they are doing the activity, the children will naturally be exposed to language, inevitably picking up the words and expressions needed to make the object. This means that you can expose children to a lot of language in context throughout the whole process, and not just during the final presentation stage of the activity.
4 A welcome break
Arts and crafts are a great way to give children a change of pace from working with the course book and a more formal approach to learning. This type of activity allows children to learn without realising that they are working hard. It also allows them to work according to their own rhythm and pace, which naturally ’opens their learning gates’ and raises motivation levels.
5 A behaviour management technique
An arts and crafts activity is a great classroom management and behaviour tool that you can use for calming children down after a more boisterous activity. Children will need to focus on what they are making. The class will tend to be calmer and easier to manage for a good 10 minutes!
6 A wide range of skills
Arts and crafts activities help children to develop and acquire a wide range of skills, as they learn to focus and work hard to create a final product. They learn to overcome various unexpected obstacles by applying problem-solving skills and being creative and adaptable — all essential skills in the information age. Not all children are artistic by nature: a child can excel at languages and maths, but have difficulties when it comes to drawing, cutting and creating things, depending on their natural talents and fine motor skills. Thus, children will need to communicate and work with others. As a teacher, your job is to ensure that they have enough language to do so in English.
7 Fine motor skills
While colouring in within the lines or cutting along the lines may be simple for some children, others, who may not have been to preschool or developed their fine motor skills, will need lots of practice in the young learner classroom. An engaging way of giving them this practice is by challenging them with arts and crafts activities.
8 A way to experiment
Arts and crafts activities allow children to experiment and make mistakes, which can end up producing surprising and pleasing results. Thus, in the arts and crafts classroom, mistakes are not necessarily seen as a negative but rather as an opportunity to explore something else or even start from scratch and try again. These are skills that will benefit the child’s language-learning process later on.
9 Fun
It is undeniable that arts and crafts make life, and lessons in general, more exciting and interesting. Children prefer to do a fun arts and crafts activity rather than do a language drilling activity any day.
10 A sense of achievement
Arts and crafts challenge children to make something which they can then take back home to their loved ones. This is a perfect way for teachers to build children’s self-esteem, self-discipline, cooperation and self-motivation.
Some popular arts and crafts activities
Arts and crafts activities are a great way to bring diversity into the primary classroom. However, not every arts and crafts activity is adequate for the young learner classroom. Before you choose an activity, make sure that it meets the following criteria: is it suited to your learners’ age, gender, interests and skills? Does it respect time constraints, or is it too time-consuming? And finally, does the activity allow the children to pick up language in context and practise it, or is it limited to developing the children’s artistic skills? Here is a list of 14 arts and crafts activities that respect these criteria.
1 Decorated name card
Start the year by doing an arts and crafts activity and getting to know your students better. Have them decorate a name card, making it unique to them. Information given on the back, or illustrated through the design, will help you find out more about each child and their skills and talents.
2 Bookmark
Good readers make good students. It’s important to introduce a reading culture in the young learner classroom, so why not start by getting the children excited about the actual reading process? Children can make a personal reading bookmark or page marker that they can put in every book they read.
3 Storybooks
A fun and personalised arts and crafts project that you can do in class for any topic or storybook that you have read is to challenge the children to make their personal wordbook or storybook. Children can make a topic book or dictionary by writing and illustrating a word on that topic on each page.
4 Paper plate masks
Encourage children to participate in drama activities by getting them to make their own props. Paper plate masks are easy and fun to make, and help shyer children to feel less exposed in front of the class. You can make whole-face or half-face masks, and even Venetian-style masks — by gluing the mask onto a lolly stick.
5 Puppets (finger puppets, paper bag puppets, lolly stick puppets)
Puppets are a great tool for encouraging children to try and speak English in class. Like masks, they give children a crutch to lean on, but they also allow children to speak without being worried about the mistakes they are making. They are also very teacher-friendly as they allow you to correct the mistakes without criticising the child: ’Oh dear, Mr Penguin must be very tired today. Mr Penguin, did you forget that we say I am hungry and not I are hungry? You need some rest and a big bear hug!’ By giving children this type of feedback, you are correcting the character represented by the puppet and not the child behind it. See Appendix, p. 138 for instructions on how to make some simple finger puppets.
6 Story dice
A fun way of getting children to retell a story you have told them is to ask them to make a story dice of that story with an image of a particular part of the story or the name of a character in the story on each face (see Appendix, pp.139-140, for a dice template). The children roll their dice and see which scene or character from the story is uppermost. They then retell that particular part of the story or explain what happened to the character. Children have fun retelling the story and get to train their speaking skills without realising that they are repeating the same language over and over again. They also get great satisfaction from the fact that they are able to tell a story they heard in English.
7 Weather wheel
A good routine to start your lesson every day is to talk about the weather. To scaffold this language for children, make a weather wheel with them (see Appendix). For more advanced learners, you can add two outer circles: one for the days of the week (see Appendix) and the other for the months of the year.
8 Clock
To encourage children to practise asking and telling the time, get them to make a clock (see Appendix). Use the clock to do a pairwork activity in which the children take turns setting the clock and asking each other the time.
9 Topic spinners
Spinners are a very popular resource to have in any young learner classroom. They can be used to practise vocabulary, or as an alternative to dice when playing games. Like mobiles, they can be made for any topic (see Appendix). As the children get older, divide the spinner into more sections so that the children can practise more vocabulary. Get the children to draw a picture of a different word for the topic you have chosen in each section. Once the children have made the spinner, ask them to play a game by spinning the spinner and naming the image the spinner has landed on.
10 Topic-related mini-flashcards
Get the children to make mini vocabulary flashcards (see Appendix), which they can use to play a fun bingo game. The children place mini word cards face up on a bingo card. Slowly, say the words out loud. When a child hears a word that they have on their bingo card, they turn that word card face down. As soon as a child manages to form a vertical or horizontal line of turned-over cards, he or she shouts, ’Bingo!’ and takes over from the teacher as the ’bingo caller’. Younger learners who cannot write yet can make mini picture flashcards; older learners can make word cards or even illustrated word cards.
11 Topic wheel
Topic wheels are a good way of getting children to practise vocabulary you have worked on for any topic. Divide the wheel in half and ask the children to draw pictures of the words you want them to practise on one side and the corresponding words on the other (see Appendix). The objective is for the children to spin the wheel and match each picture to the corresponding word.
12 Word banners
Help the children revise vocabulary they have been working on by making a topic word banner. Hand out a template to each child. Ask them to choose a word for any particular topic and write the word and decorate the banner with a picture relating to that word. Then put all the children’s banners together and make a class banner. You can get the children to repeat the words on the banner by making a banner chant for the children to repeat to a set rhythm.
13 Crazy sentence-maker
To help the children learn to make sentences in English, get them to make a crazy sentence-maker. Give the children three different coloured strips of cardboard on which they write parts of a sentence: on the first strip they write 8-10 subjects, on the second strip, 8-10 verbs, and on the last strip, 8-10 adverbs. Then let them play with their sentence-maker to create crazy sentences which they can repeat or write in their notebooks.
14 Word-wall poster
Get the children to make visual word walls about the topics they have been working on in class. Give each child a blank piece of paper or cardboard. Begin by brainstorming the words that children can remember about the topic they have been learning. Allocate one word to each child so that words are not repeated. Get each child to write and illustrate their allocated word on the blank paper and put it up on the wall chart to help children remember how to spell words correctly.
10 more good reasons to play games in class
If you’ve ever played a game with children, you’ll know that they are a fantastic way to engage children in the learning process.
1 Play
Young learners are naturally drawn to play. As toddlers and very young learners, children learn through play, both at home and at nursery school. Games allow children to experience play-learning again in the classroom. So, it is not surprising that children become more engaged when you announce that they are going to play a game in class.
2 Competition
Another good reason to introduce games in the classroom is that they appeal to children’s characteristics. Children tend to be competitive by nature, and games have the power of encouraging children to speak English and work hard just so that they can win the game.
3 A natural context
Games are usually built around a context. As children are curious and imaginative by nature, they are easily drawn into this context. This means that games provide you with a natural context for children to practise and apply language that they have learned in class.
4 Drilling practice
Many games require the children to repeat a language structure or vocabulary again and again in order to play the game. This provides the children with lots of drilling practice. The children often don’t even notice that they are doing this as they are so focused on the game itself. Another reason why games are useful for drilling language is that children really enjoy playing them, so they tend to ask you if they can play the same game several times or in another lesson.
5 Memory skills
Games are a great tool for developing children’s memory skills, as children often have to play a game several times before they actually manage to win it. This means that games help children learn and remember new language. Pair-matching games are an ideal tool for training children’s memories, as they force the child to remember where the card pairs are. Memory skills will later prove to be fundamental when the child reaches more advanced levels of the language.
6 A revision exercise
A great way to begin a lesson is to play a game that you played last lesson. Alternatively, play a game that gets children using the content that you looked at in the previous lesson in order to help them quickly revise what they learned.
7 Play at home
Another reason to invest valuable learning time in making and playing games in class is that children can then take them home to play with their families. This means that games allow children to take home the language they are learning in the classroom. They will often bring it back again as they give us feedback on what happened, who won, and what their families thought of the game.
8 Cooperation
Many games are built on the concept of cooperation. This means that no matter how good an individual student may be, they need to learn how to work with other team members in order to define a group strategy and win the game. Cooperation and teamwork skills will be an essential skill when children enter the workforce, and games allow us to train this skill from an early age.
9 Social skills
One of our main tasks as teachers is to teach the whole learner and not just the language learner. Games are an excellent tool for us to do this as they help us develop the children’s social skills such as turn-taking. In addition, games help children realise that we all have different talents, which are essential to being the best and winning the game: a child may not be very good at English, but if they have a talent for drawing, they will be a valuable asset to the team when it comes to playing a game like Pictionary.
10 Fun and engaging
Perhaps the most important reason to play games in class is that they are fun and engaging by nature. As teachers, we should always remind children of how much fun learning is. Games are the perfect tool to do this as they allow us to prove to them just how enjoyable the learning process can be.
Vocabulary and grammar games
Games appeal to children’s competitive nature and give them a good reason to try hard at using language. Activities 1-5 are targeted at vocabulary and activities 6-10 are targeted at grammar. These games can be applied to almost any topic.
1 Alphabet game
Make a set of alphabet letter flashcards so that you have one for each child. Hand out the letter cards randomly. Play some music and encourage the children to dance and move around the room to the music. When the music stops, ask them to line up in alphabetical order as quickly as they can. Remember to alternate cards so that the children practise the whole alphabet.
2 Back to the board game
This activity is suitable for more advanced classes. Divide the class into two teams and choose one child from each team to stand in front of the class with their back to the board. Put a (different) flashcard on the board for each team. A member of each team rolls a dice. The team with the highest number starts. That team gives their player one clue to help them guess the word on their flashcard on the board. If the child guesses correctly, the team gets a point and the next child takes their place with a new flashcard until all the team members have had a go. If the child doesn’t guess correctly, the other team takes a turn to give their own team member a clue. The group to guess the most words wins.
3 Basketball game
Divide the children into teams. Choose one child from each team to come to the front of the class. Place the waste paper bin against a wall and get the children to line up in front of it. Show the first group a flashcard. They consult and give their answer (i.e. identify the word from the picture on the flashcard). If they are right, their representative at the front of the class is allowed to have a shot at the basket with a paper/soft ball and win a point. Then it is the turn of the second group, and so on. The group with the highest score at the end wins.
4 Catch
The children sit in a circle. Introduce or review a set of vocabulary flashcards by placing them in a pile in the centre of the circle. Ask a child to go to the centre, take the first card from the pile and show it to everyone. The child goes back outside the circle and walks round it touching each child’s head while randomly saying words from the vocabulary set. When the child says the ’magic’ word, i.e. the word on the flashcard, the child whose head was touched must stand up and chase the first child round the circle, trying to catch him or her. If the first child gets back to the vacant space and sits down without being caught, the ’chaser’ chooses the next flashcard and continues the game.
5 Adverb action miming game
This game is great for revising vocabulary that the children have already learned. Begin by choosing a topic that you want to work on, such as daily routines, and write an action on the board, such as ’brush your hair’. Then invite a child to choose an adverb flashcard from an opaque bag. The child then mimes the action according to the adverb word card and the other children try to guess the adverb.
6 Simon says
’Simon says’ is the perfect game for practising the imperative and reviewing vocabulary relating to the body. Ask the children to stand up, and then give them an instruction, for example, ’Simon says touch your head.’ The children who do not carry out each instruction correctly sit down. After a while, speed up your instructions and add a twist to catch children out, simply saying, ’Touch your foot/’(instead of preceding the instruction with ’Simon says’). Any child who carries out the instruction without ’Simon says’ is out. When the children are ready, swap places with one of them who then becomes the caller. The last child left standing is the winner.
7 Musical chairs
Place 8-10 chairs in a circle in the centre of the room, each with a flashcard related to the language topic you have been working on, e.g. ’food’. Choose some children to sit on them. Invite the remaining children to sit in a circle on the floor around that circle. Play some music and ask the children to walk around the chairs and to sit down on one when the music stops. Remove a chair and stop the music. One child will be left standing. The children who are sitting must say a sentence about their flashcard, for example, if it’s a picture of an orange, they might say, ’I like oranges’ or ’Oranges are delicious’. If the child is unable to produce a correct sentence about their flashcard, they are out, and the child who was left standing has a go. If the sentence is correct, he or she is allowed to sit again. Choose a new player from those sitting on the floor to join the game, and replace the players every now and again.
8 Matching game
Choose ten sentences and divide them into two. Make a sentence card for each part. Jumble all the parts together. Get the children to order the parts to make 10 sentences. This game can be played individually or in groups. Use flashcards to play it as a whole class.
9 Jumbled sentence cards
Choose a sentence and make a single-word flashcard for each word. Put all the flashcards in an opaque bag and jumble them up. Hand out the cards randomly to the children and invite the children with flashcards to come up to the front of the class and show everyone their flashcard. Challenge the children to form a sentence in 10 seconds. To involve the rest of the class, allow the students sitting down to give the players tips.
10 Jump to the left and jump to the right!
Get the children to stand up. Say a sentence. The children jump to the left if the sentence is correct and jump to the right if the sentence is incorrect. Children who jump the wrong way have to sit down. The last child left standing is the winner.
Flashcard games
As a teacher of young learners, you may already know the value of flashcards. Flashcards help you teach new vocabulary by providing the children with a picture of the new vocabulary item so that children can quickly understand their meaning. They also allow you to do a multitude of activities while catering to young learners’ needs. Here are 10 flashcard activities to get you using this versatile resource.
1 Voice-drilling activity
Children need to practise a word many times before they can remember it properly. However, this drilling process can become tedious. So why not add some interest by using the children’s imaginations and voices? Challenge the children to repeat the target vocabulary using a different voice each time. All-time favourites are: a witch’s voice, a princess’s voice, a dragon’s voice, a ghost’s voice and a parrot’s voice. (In the latter case, the children repeat each word at least twice in a squawky parrot tone.)
2 Guessing game
Remember that children need to be exposed to vocabulary before they can produce it themselves. A fun way of giving them this exposure is to play a guessing game. Present and drill the target vocabulary that you want the children to learn. Then practise it by playing a guessing game with them. Start by choosing a flashcard without looking at it. Show it to the children by holding it in front of you. Ask the children simple questions like ’Is it [adjective]?’ and ’Is it a [noun]?’ until you can guess which flashcard you have chosen. When the children are ready, encourage them to take your place.
3 Missing card
After you have presented, put up and drilled a set of flashcards on the board, test the children’s aquisition of this vocabulary by removing one flashcard at a time and leaving an empty space. Begin with the first flashcard and continue removing them in order until there are no flashcards left on the board. The objective is for the children to try and remember the order of the words represented by the flashcards. To make the activity more cognitively challenging, remove the flashcards in a random order, rather than in the order that you presented and drilled them.
4 Memory game
A variation on the activity described above is to play a memory game as you present and drill a set of words. After drilling the words two or three times, turn the cards over, one at a time, until the children can see only the back of the flashcards. To make the activity less cognitively challenging, turn the flashcards over in the order they are on the board.
5 Show quickly and hide
After you have presented and drilled your target vocabulary, choose a flashcard of one of the words, without the children seeing it, and hide it behind your back. Then quickly move it to your left or right so that the children can catch a quick glimpse of it. Then hide it behind your back again and ask the children to name the flashcard.
6 Reveal a tiny bit
A variation of the activity above is to hide a flashcard by placing another flashcard turned over in front of it. Then, in slow motion, reveal a tiny detail or area of your flashcard, and ask the children to guess which flashcard it is. Continue revealing a small amount at a time until the children are able to correctly guess which flashcard it is and repeat the word.
7 Point to
After you have shown the children a flashcard and started drilling it, display it in a place where the children can easily see it in the room. Introduce all the target flashcards and display them round the room. Then play a ’point to’ game by saying, for example, ’Point to the apple. Yes, that’s right — the apple! Point to the apple.’ To make the activity even more fun, associate another action to the pointing activity, for example, ’Stand on one leg and point to the ’Touch your toes and point to the
8 Flashcard hide-and-seek
Start by presenting and drilling your target vocabulary. Then, choose three helpers and three players. Ask the players to leave the room for a few seconds. Next, ask your helpers to hide the flashcards around the room. Invite the players back in and challenge them to find the flashcards. Involve the rest of the class by allowing them to guide the players, saying, ’Hot!’ (if the players are standing near the flashcard), ’Boiling!’ (if they are really close to finding it), ’Cold!’ (if they are standing far away from the flashcard) and ’Freezing!’ (if they are heading in the opposite direction).
9 Go fish
Organise the children in a circle. Place the flashcards that you have drilled in the centre face up so that everyone can see them. Choose a player. Ask that child to go to the centre and ’fish’ (i.e. fetch) a particular flashcard. If the child chooses the correct flashcard, they get to choose the next player. This game can also be played as a group game.
10 Fly swatter game
Begin by presenting and drilling a vocabulary set. Then display the relevant cards on the board or on a wall in the classroom. Divide the children into two teams and choose a player from each team to stand at a set distance from the flashcards. Choose one representative for each group and give each one a plastic fly swatter. Say one word at a time. The quickest player to swat the corresponding flashcard earns a point. The winning team is the team with the highest score. To make the game even more challenging, speed up the rhythm at which you say the words. If you can’t get hold of fly swatters, get the children to swat the flashcards with their hands.