Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified and teach in Zhenluoying Zhen? Are you interested in teaching English in Beijing? Check out ITTT’s online and in-class courses, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English ONLINE or abroad! ITTT offers a wide variety of Online TEFL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language.
Teaching EFL in Kindergarten Teaching young kids can be very rewarding. Children can develop a special trust bond with their teachers. At times they spend a large part of their days away from homes hence school become very important to their formation whether in their mother tongue or not. A special focus needs to be placed when teaching young children English. Even though research has showed that L1 students don?t learn their native languages through drilling, memorizing or simple repetition of phrases. L1 acquisition happens through social engagement as pointed by Halliday (1975) and Vygtosky(1978) so it would only be natural to think that L2 acquisition would happen the same way for young children. Too often course material is formatted for students who already have proficiency in their own language or is divided into various drilling, copying, and grammar theories. Three or four year old children don?t possess the motor skills nor have a full grasp of their own language let alone understand structured grammatical concepts. Advantage of teaching young people is that the cortex of a child is more flexible and adaptable than that of an adult, this a theory stated by Mac Laughlin. kids also possess a lower embarrassment level then adults. They don?t fear of making mistakes. This makes for over all easier background for learning new concepts. Even though children can acquire new concepts a lot easier, their attention span is a lot shorter than their older classmates. This in hand requires a lot more innovation and preparation from the teacher. Very young students need to have engaging meaningful activities yet they cannot be over bearing. It is normal for them to only be able to focus for 10 minutes at a time. students at this age learn the most through play. They learn through touching, feeling, seeing therefore it is important to incorporate these aspects into a lesson plan. Games, books, songs should be introduced to class in brief sessions that are full of visual aids. Children, if allowed to play, can fallow teacher?s lead a lot easier. They will retain a lot more information if they aren?t allowed to loose their attention span. Boredom is teacher?s number one enemy across board but it plays even greater role when it comes to young learners. As one approaches a kindergarten class he or she should have in mind that it will take a lot of energy. Keeping up with kids can be exhausting but will be a lot easier if class time is carefully planned out. The reward of teaching young children is the impact that your involvement and contributions will make for them in the future. Children pick up languages fast but it cannot be confused or expected to happen over night. One must not forget that these young students are also in the processes of acquiring their L1. As a teacher it is imperative not to be get stressed out and down. Being animated and playful will get you fart. Incorporating it with academics will produce results you can see.
