the school where i took the TESOL certification course, English For Life, sends out a monthly newsletter. This month they included an email interview i did about my experiences with kindergarten children in Korea. of course there was some editing for the newsletter, but my original responses made me smile when i wrote them. here you go. enjoy.
During the course of the month-long intensive TESOL training in Greenville, SC last summer, we spent a few days covering everyone's favorite topic: the antichrist. Or children, whatever you want to call it. Specifically children that 1) do not speak your language, 2) have no desire to learn your language, and 3) really don't even know what a language is or that others exist. The instructor for this particular section of our course asked what each person had learned after the lesson. My answer to the class was crystal clear: I DO NOT want to teach children. So, as fate would have it, I signed a 12 month contract that obligates me to spend the entire working week teaching English to the above referenced "children". Children are very cute, especially when they are from other cultures. I have even caught myself thinking "I'd like to have a few of my own one day." However, the truth is that they will eat you alive if you turn your back for even a second. For the first few weeks I dreaded going to my classes. To make matters worse, my Korean co-teachers would not be joining me in the classroom. They had their own classes to teach. So there I was, alone with 15 Korean five year olds who think I'm crazy because the words coming out of my mouth sound like gibberish. Apparently they interpreted this as a green light to tear my classroom apart. Then one day the realization came to me that if I don't figure out how to deal with my current situation, it will be a very long and miserable year. I began to ask myself what children enjoy doing. They like to be loud. They like to run around. They like to color. How could I combine these three activities into an educational 40 minutes? And then the light bulb came on. I created a game that involved yelling, running, and colors. We went outside where I had cut out big letters spelling different colors and tacked them to trees. I also had made big flash cards with four different colors on them. I managed to get the children into a group and then I held up a color flash card. I yelled the color as loud as I could. Their eyes lit up and they yelled the color as well. Then I ran to the tree with the color. They followed. This was all the instruction that was needed. When I held up the next color flash card, they hesitated for a second and then yelled the color and ran to the next tree. We did this for 30 minutes. Here's what I learned:
1) When working with small children, no activity is too simple.
2) Incorporate what children do best: yell, run, color.
3) Even though an activity seems simple and repetitive, it is actually reinforcing the target material. Children need repetition for understanding.
4) When a child falls down and starts crying, just give it a minute, he'll get over it.
In regards to #4, working with children I have learned that they react largely by parents'/other adults' reactions. So, when they fall I try clapping for them instead of screaming or looking in horror. Then sometimes they get up clapping too :) Unless of coarse it really hurt.
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