Motivation and Learning Helping your students to feel confident Al of us feel more confident and motivated about something when we know information about it and feel familiar with the subject or task, and young leamers are no different. They may also feel nervous about taking tests so itis important that you do not overemphasise the idea of an exam. Focus on their successes and on the award they will get after they have done it. You can help your young leamers to prepare for the tests by: ‘using tasks in class that are success oriented, in other words, that ensure all students can feel that they have achieved something praising your students’ work as much as possible. talking about the tests and giving your students an opportunity to ask you questions about them. ‘using simitar kinds of pictures to those that they will see in the test so they are aware of the fun element ‘* bringing in another teacher to ask questions or listen to so they get used to speaking or listening to other adults in English doing a short quiz about the test in class, such as a true/false activity. creating interest in the test by telling them about other children that may be taking it around the world Here are some ideas for developing motivation in your young learners. They are not in any particular order and will all help different learners in different ways. Give lots of praise when the children make an effort to speak in English. Always speak in English when you give instructions so the children get used to listening and understanding instructions in English. Provide dictionaries for them to use in class so they leam to be independent and make their own decisions. Always provide an opportunity for all the children to be successful. Praise them for attempting or completing a task, not just when they get it right Help weaker children by including something you know they will do well Use similar activities frequently so that children feel comfortable with them, Make instructions clear and simple. Give activities that are within your students’ ability — increase the level of difficulty only gradually Change the focus of your lesson regularly — mix up energetic activities with quiet ones, and activities that involve speaking and listening with ones that involve reading or writing, Keep activities short or divide them into lots of stages with goals at each stage. For stronger students, have some additional tasks which are more dificult to give them if they finish a task quickly.Multiple-choice Tasks Get lots of practice! Multiple-choice tasks are used at Movers and Flyers levels in both the Listening and Reading & Writing components. If they are unfamiliar with multiple-choice tasks, children can find them confusing and have trouble making a choice from the different possibilities and cope with all the information. It's Vital, then, to provide practice in this type of task and make the children aware of strategies to use ‘when completing multiple-choice exercises. Children have to concentrate on understanding both the text and the options so they can make the Fight choice. Strategies to teach and practise with them are: concentrate on the statement or question first, not the options. read the choices very carefully if two words look very similar, think about what each means and what the between them try all of the options to be sure that the other two are wrong, use all of the text or sentence to help you decide, not just one or two words. watch out for agreement: singular/plural; tense; nouns/pronouns. Building your students’ multiple-choice skills Rather than presenting your students with a full-blown multiple-choice task straight away, gradually develop their skills in dealing with this type of activity. Here's a possible route you could take. 1 Matching Questions and Answers Begin with simple activities matching questions and answers so the children become familiar with the task-type first. Use questions with simple one-word answers, such as: Where are you from? China How old are you? 9 The questions and answers should be cut up on separate cards. You can make sets of cards for groups to work with, or have one question or answer per pair of students, so they have to go around the class looking for their partner by finding the right question or answer to match their card. Mixed-up Dialogues Extend to mini-dialogues. Use sentences, rather than just words. Start with short dialogues, but you can gradually make them longer so the children have to deal with more ‘options’. For example: Girl; What are you doing, Pedro? Boy: I'm buying a book for Marcos. Girl: Why, is it his birthday? Boy: Yes, he's having a party on Saturday. ‘Again, this type of activity can be given on cards, or on a worksheet with the questions and answers jumbled up.3. Easy Options (Once the children have become familiar with this kind of activity you can extend it to providing choices by having one question and two answers. Start by making the options quite different, 0 that itis relatively easy to identify the best answer. For example, Have you got a pet? a) Yes, | ike elephants. b) Yes, | have a fish. 4, Double Choice {As the last step before showing your students a full multiple-choice task, offer two options ‘which are more similar. For example, Where did you go on Saturday? a) | went to the beach. ) I go to the beach, In this way you will also start helping the children to think about tenses and how to look for clues in the language to help then decide which is the correct answer. Team Games You can do both of these last two ideas on worksheets or as games, sticking the questions and options up around the classroom, or in teams: each team has to choose the right answer and tell you before they get the next question; the team with the most correct answers wins, Try to find ways to make this type of activity as fun as possible for your students, although as they get nearer to taking the test, they will need practice at doing these activities on their own as well.Teaching Grammar to Young Learners This is a list of ideas of ways to present grammar to young leamers. Some may be suitable for different age groups or levels. + Use a target structure when telling a story. Get children to add to the story by creating other sentences using the same structure. ‘+ Mini dictations where children draw what you describe and highlight one particular structure such as present continuous, prepositions, adjectives, etc. Extend this by giving the children other scenes and asking them to make up sentences like yours. + Large picture posters used with true/false statements, questions, instructions, small objects to place in the correct location, etc. + The children draw a picture on the board / paper, each contributing one element to the picture, and then together the class creates a story about it. This story can then be manipulated (change the person or gender; change the tense, add adjectives etc.) + Give instructions which involve a physical response (run, jump, sing) and add adverbs (quickly, loudly, happily). Students give each other similar instructions + Bring in objects for children to describe to each other, or to feel / smell / taste and describe. Do the same with sounds or music. + Organise classroom surveys about habits, routines, leisure activities, school activities, holidays, etc. Children describe each other using the information they've gathered, for example by producing bar charts, writing a mini-profile or giving a mini-presentation. + Set up situations for children to act out, using props, dressing-up clothes, etc. Encourage children to learn the dialogue. + Play repetition games like '! went to market and | bought. + Use rhymes and songs which repeat the same structure again and again. Repeat them until the children have learnt them off by heart. Jazz chants are a good example of this. + Describe a poster, but make deliberate mistakes which your students have to correct. Gradually encourage them to correct you with a complete sentence.Using Dictionaries Encouraging the use of dictionaries is an important part of helping children to learn a language. Itis something that will help them with their learning throughout their education. Provide a range of young- learner-friendly dictionaries in your classroom and where possible, encourage parents to buy one for their children to use at home. You can also find websites with picture dictionaries. Children should be encouraged to use them during class time and at home as a way of promoting their learning; one of the most positive aspects of being able to use a dictionary is that it helps to develop autonomy and confidence in the leamer. You can start with sets of picture dictionaries for younger children and move on to English-English dictionaries once the children become more proficient. Classroom Ideas Here are some ideas on how to use dictionaries in the classroom: ‘= Children can make up their own picture dictionary. The picture dictionaries could be simply a picture with the word written next to it for young children. For leamers with a higher level of English, you can include more language by getting them to write a sentence or a definition next to the picture, + Provide dictionaries when the children are doing group or pair work. You can use dictionaries that focus on picture support and progress to dictionaries that provide written definitions when the children are at an appropriate level to cope with less support from pictures. ‘+ Make up a questionnaire about the elements in a dictionary to introduce how to use one. This could be a way to develop their awareness of the content and teach the children how to get the most out of a dictionary. Get the children to check their spelling by using an English dictionary. Using picture dictionaries, get children to find one new word they'd like to leam and to check its pronunciation with you. They can then practise using this word or ‘teach’ it to their classmates. ‘Using dictionaries is a good way to build up basic reading skills; at the lower levels learners have to recognise letters and learn about spelling pattems; once they have progressed onto English-Englsh dictionaries, they need to read and understand simple definitions, as they do in the Cambridge Young Learners English tests.Testing the kids’ vocabulary built up Here is an idea to see how many words the kids’ actually know. You can use them thematically. As in the Cambridge vocabulary list for each level. 1. Itis a game played in pairs or more. For the Starters level: Write on the board 6 to 8 letters. ‘Ask the kids to make up a word that starts with that letter, xs dt mon ek ' r s—Sad d—Dog and so on For the Movers and Flyers level: ‘As the kids’ level goes higher, | will ask them to make more elaborate words. | will set up points and rules for the game EX: Not allowed to make words with 3 letters letters 3 points S letters 4 points 6 letters 5 points ett 2. There is another way to play this game. You give 7 consonants and 4 vowels and ask them to make words within these letters. They are not allowed to use the letters twice. Bese wee, W =o = J kot @ e oo w Word world market date late made ete. 3. The third way is to make a longer word with ten or to fifteen letters but you have to unscramble it. They either have to find it or make up a word out of these words. EX: my word is neighborhood Hhgrooodenibtma If the kids find it, that is great. If they don’t, they will at least make other words Like bathroom, garden, habit, bath, groom etc.