Teach English in Gangxi Zhen - Weihai Shi

Learning a language can be quite a competitive task for young students. Many of them may run into vocabulary issues, some of them will find it hard to use learned material in simple conversations, others will experience difficulties in writing, reading, listening and so on. When it comes to language learning process of kids, troubles can be numerous. But there is one point, that can be even more difficult to manage than previously mentioned, and it can also help teachers fight these issues if managed properly. It is motivation and encouragement of their young learners. If we want to understand how to encourage kids to study, we need to take a look at the difference between motivation of adult learners and young ones. Adults usually have a clear understanding of the reason they attend classes, so they usually do not need to be motivated to study. In most cases a good teacher will just need to “break the ice”, expose students to the language and get them involved in various studying activities. But the situation with kids is absolutely different. They usually attend the classes because their parents decided to get them there. That is why a teacher has to make his lessons varied and really interesting to create a strong motivation. So, how can we do that? Let’s divide the “plan of motivation” into several components: engaging young learners, activities management, managing learners’ interests and careful evaluation. I found such division as the most efficient one during my work. Firstly, when you start your lesson, you have to draw your students’ attention, adjust their language perception and create a friendly rapport in the classroom. For instance, let’s take a lesson, where students practice the alphabet: simply by using a memory game, where they have to add one letter with each student. The first one says “A”, the next one says “A, B, …”, the next one says “A, B, C, …” and so on till the whole alphabet is completed by one student. This game can easily get young learners involved in the process, as far as they need to keep focused on what other students say. Sometimes you can stop your students in the middle of the alphabet if there are not many people in the classroom in order not to make them bored with the activity. You can use “Alphabet relay” with the second half of letters. There is a great variety of activities to use and teachers have to keep that in mind. As previously mentioned, the activities to engage your students are countless, especially with the development of Internet. And here comes the second aspect of successful motivation – activities management. Young learners have an extremely short attention span. According to researches of child developmental experts, their attention varies from two to five minutes, and sometimes reaches the point of seven minutes. But that doesn’t mean, that teachers have to strictly divide their lesson into seven-minute activities. Playing with activities types and their duration will keep your students away from predicting your plan and get them more interested in the process. For instance, at the same “alphabet lesson” teacher can ask students to repeat the alphabet along with him, after that they can sing the alphabet song, find the letters on a whiteboard, stick the cards with the letters to the board with magnets in a correct order and so on. But don’t make the pace of your lesson too high, as it can cause various understanding issues. While changing the activities, teachers have to bear in mind the way they choose them. Students’ interests can be really helpful, as they get the kids involved even more and make your lessons more fun and efficient. It is easier to study with things pleasant for you, no matter what age you are. For example, you can practice the same “alphabet relay” game and ask your students to name a superhero starting with each letter. You can use animals, colors and other cartoon characters instead. You can also ask your students to create their own superhero or animal and give it a weird name, that can even consist of a word, created by kids. The last component of successful motivation is careful evaluation. It can be named as the most important point, because mostly kids look up to you, consider your opinion as the only correct one and basically, you are the only “natural” source of the language for them during the classes. So, you always have to keep your assessment positive, fair and stimulating. You need to stay away from correcting each mistake, because it can cause intimidation and loss of confidence of your students. Sometimes, giving them an ability to use the language with mistakes can help them during the Activate phase. Always focus on things they are good at rather than on their weaknesses. Do not find your “favorites” among the students, appreciate every of them and pay attention to everyone. The stimulation can also be useful. You can divide your students into teams during your lesson and make it some kind of a competition. A team with greater amount of points wins. But there are some groups of students, where competition atmosphere can become a bit hostile. So, it is better to understand your students firstly and then decide what is the right way of stimulation. As a conclusion, I can say, that motivating students in a correct way can solve a great number of issues during the lesson. Just keep it interesting, stimulating and well-managed.