English Teaching Resources for Young Learners
by Anna Sawa
Teaching resources support teachers and make their lessons more attractive. Good teaching materials and a head full of ideas is the way to create a successful lesson for young learners. Here are presented the most common resources that are used in a process of teaching English as a foreign language.
Songs and rhymes
The most common teaching resources are songs, rhymes and poems for kids. Some of them are prepared for children who learn English as a foreign language, others are traditional English pieces. What is important, they not only help children remember vocabulary and structures, but also practice listening and speaking skills. Teachers can use them in different everyday situations, like beginning / end of the classes, tiding up after activities or washing hands before the meals.
To make songs or rhymes more understandable, they should be pictured with gestures and movement. Music and motion are the best way for children to assimilate a foreign language.
Read more about how children assimilate a foreign language.
Audiovisual materials
Nowadays, audiovisual resources are significant part of teaching young learners. Linking pictures to the language has a great influence on teaching results. A wide range of audiovisual materials is available on DVDs, TV or the Internet. They can become a great addition to the foreign language lessons. These resources will fulfil a didactic function, if the students are properly prepared for the lessons with audiovisual materials. Particularly key vocabulary should be taught and a main idea of audiovisual material should be discussed as preparation before watching.
Storybooks
A foreign language teacher’s resources pack should not be missing from storybooks for young learners. Storybooks for children should be illustrated with big and readable pictures which are as important for your students as the text. The language of the story should be as simple as possible. Then children will follow the story, if they know only the key vocabulary. Repetitive and catchy phrases enable young learners take part in telling the story.
Read more about why tell stories to children.
Games
Children learn a foreign language through games and teacher-directed play in a natural way. Planning your lessons it is a good idea to use teaching resources as board games, memory or domino games. Teachers working with young leaners can adapt well-known games to children which they play using their mother tongue as well. Teachers of English should draw their attention to the language aspect – naming pictures, asking questions, reacting to the language which is taught.
Toys
Toys are the teaching resources which English teachers can find in each kindergarten or primary classroom. They can be used during English lessons as well. Glove or finger puppets, teddy bears and dolls are great teaching resources to act out stories. Building blocks, jigsaw puzzles, cars, balls, etc. are useful to manipulate, name, guess from the shape or count.
Try these activities with your students: Pass the toy, Finger puppets rhyme or Five little monkeys swinging in the tree.
Posters
Posters and wall charts subserve a context of teaching subjects. These resources are useful to introduce new vocabulary or phrases – the teacher can point to different elements of the poster, name them, ask questions and encourage students to short statements in a foreign language according to given pattern.
Flashcards
Flashcards are the most popular teaching resources in English classes. They can be very helpful in teaching a foreign language. Flashcards facilitate presentation new vocabulary, songs, chants and stories. What is more, they can be used to practise and revise lexical items.
Read more about flashcards activities and download free flashcards.
Digital resources
An interactive whiteboard, a projector, a laptop and access to the Internet in the classroom facilitate uncontainable possibilities to communicate in English with your students’ peers and prepare language projects together. New technologies enable using teaching resources from the Internet as well.
Collecting language teaching materials draw attention to their durability, operational safety, attractiveness to your students and possibility to use them on various teaching occasions.