| Kotesol
Column - Handle With Care! |
The Beat October 2002 Teaching English to Young Learners
The young learner market in South Korea has grown considerably over the past decade. The vast majority of westerners who come to Korea to teach English usually find themselves at a private institute, with the daunting task of walking into a classroom full of energetic children. A lack of solid experience, little or no knowledge of pedagogy, and training that usually consists of spending a day watching other similarly unqualified teachers in action – only makes the task seem all the more intimidating. In this column, I‘ll present some of the basic language teaching principles involved with young learners, and some of their practical classroom applications. Second Language Acquisition Extensive research on second language acquisition reveals that young learners learn a second language similar to the way they learn their first language. They can benefit from what is known as a “silent phase”, where they simply listen to the language and watch it in use without being required to actively use it themselves. They tend to pay peripheral attention to language forms in a spontaneous way, whereas adults tend to focus their full attention and awareness on these forms. Researchers such as Krashen (1982) and Littlewood (1984) have shown that there appears to be a “natural order” to language acquisition that applies to almost all learners and follows a similar route irrespective of teaching focus or techniques. For example, the third person “-s” ending for simple present verbs is one of the last structures to be “naturally” acquired, yet it is one of the first structures to be introduced to learners as part of a syllabus. Teachers often find themselves pulling their own hair out in frustration when their young students practice the third person “-s” ending for a whole week, and then one of them says “My grandmother live in Daegu.” Intellectual Development Children up to about the age of 11 are still in a stage known as “concrete operations”. To use a well-flogged example – when a child looks at two glasses holding the same quantity of water, one of which is tall and thin and the other short and wide, the child naturally presumes that the taller glass holds more water. While it might seem difficult to apply this analogy to language learning, just remember that young learners will naturally form conclusions about language based on what seems to be obvious to them, and what seems obvious to them is usually not what is obvious to adults, equipped with greater cognitive and critical thinking skills. Children
are also very much centered on the “here and now” and the functional
purposes of language. They have little appreciation for adult notions of “correctness”
and will repeat the same mistakes in terms of form if it appears they are consistently
getting a message across communicatively. Explaining language “rules”
and engaging in even slightly abstract talk about language will mean very little
to them at all. * Consider applying a silent phase for beginners. Total Physical Response methods are some of the best ways of doing this. Have the students move about and respond physically to English rather than pushing them to produce it orally from the first lesson. If your institute “doctrine” allows it, I would recommend giving your new young learners anywhere from one to three months to engage in a silent phase style of learning. * Don‘t over-focus on form or grammatical accuracy, as your young learners will simply tune out. Try to correct based on meaning and not form. If you want young learners to grasp a grammatical item, try presenting it to them through patterns and meaningful repetition, but try not to actually talk about the language or its mechanics. * Remember that the “order of learning” as prescribed by a textbook or syllabus is not necessarily in line with a “natural” order of acquisition. Be patient and understand that your learners will probably need more time for various pieces of language to cement in their minds. * Keep your lessons and your approach simple. Try to relate the language to situations of “here and now”, and be prepared for the possibility that a young mind cannot grasp all concepts or ideas as an adult mind can. Understand that your young students are most likely to use language that appears to have an immediate and relevant communicative function. *KOTESOLmeets on the
last Saturday of every month. |
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© 2002 Busan Beat |