Preschool Travels - April 2004
Tuesday, 13th April 2004 - Kameda
The first classes of the new school year. The three year olds are waiting for me when I arrive. Many of them are new at the school and I am new to them, one boy is scared and cries. As I write this I wonder what has been happening in his life to make him so nervous at such a young age. But at the time the best thing I can do is to be friendly and warm and natural.
I notice a teacher with a large bag. She is just passing through the hall but I stop her and admire her bag which looks like it contains a futon. I then introduce the children to ‘Big Big Small’. I crouch down on the ground and scrunch myself up in a ball. I then slowly unfold and stand up. As a do so I chant “big”. As I get as big as I can (standing on one leg with the other and bother arms outstretched) I say “small” and jump back to my starting pose. The children have all joined in, and some of them are chanting along with me.
I’ve always been curious about Total Physical Response (TPR), in that I’ve wondered about pushing children to say the words as they do the actions. I’m sure speaking while performing an action will help the language be internalised faster but generally I hang back from demanding that children speak. I think it is more important that they have the choice.
I know that as an adult I don’t like being told what to say and do. I remember a while back attending a presentation where we were told to find a partner for some exercise. I had no objection to that but really baulked when I was told the exact words I should use to greet a partner. In the process of making the exercise clear the presenter totally alienated me to the extent that I ended up slipping away via a fire escape.
I’ll never know what I missed and what I could have learnt, but I’m happy about that. I exercised a choice children are seldom given. I honoured my feelings. I like to do my best to help children honour theirs. So I’ll encourage children, but I won’t push them.
Having said this I continue to look for ways to get them to use English, after all, that’s why I’m supposed to be there. This class I found a new way to do “here”.
In the past I’ve had children sit in a circle and pass toy animals around the circle. Despite modeling the word “here” with a teacher very few children vocalise the word. This time I found myself doing something different. I gave a gorilla to a teacher and got her to give it back to me, saying “here”. I did this with the teachers a couple of times and then tried with a girl. She said, “here” and gave me the gorilla. I went around the entire circle of some thirty children and over half of them spoke. The personal attention increased their focus.
At the end of the class I was surrounded by a cluster of children saying goodbye and wanting to shake or touch my hand. I was a hit.
The second class with the four year olds was less smooth, but I got another idea. The children all knew me but had forgotten the idea of “How are you?” When I asked them, they echoed the phrase back. A little disappointing, so I went to my own big bag and dug out my microphone.
I have a toy microphone that I always use for questions. I’m increasingly careful, nowadays, to make sure that it is never associated with repetition. I even avoid saying “hello” when I have the mike. I want it to be clear that the reply is going to be different.
I used the microphone and asked a couple of teachers. The first, hesitated and replied, ‘I’m fine, thank you.” The second went with, “Great!”. This one word response is what I introduce children to first. The idea of varying the response comes later.
Some of the children were clamouring for the mike. In the past, when the children are in a circle, I’ve uses ’spin and Stop’ to select one at random. But this time the children were in a bunch at one end of the hall I felt I wanted to use a new structure.
I got the children to stand in a line. I then gave the microphone to one of the teachers and got her to act as interviewer. I got my timer and set a time so the children could understand they were racing the clock. The idea was to answer the teacher, race to the back of the line and sit down.
I stayed at the back of the line so that I could talk to the children. This worked pretty well. In the past I’ve tried line-ups with me standing at the front of the line but by delegating the language pattern to a classroom teacher it allowed me to be more flexible and also engage the interest of those children who had performed the task.
I’ll be using this method more in the future and also suggesting to homeroom teachers that they can practice this way when I am not there.
With the last class I selected the wrong language target. My idea was to take in a flute and play a tune that they knew badly. I hoped to introduce the word “wrong” and get them to call out when I made a mistake.
Why I wanted to introduce them to the language of “right” and “wrong”. I’ve no idea why. Shameful, really. Children get these millstone ideas thrown on them quickly enough, as it is. These labels are limiting and life reducing.
The problem with them is that they are external. They are judgments.
The whole process was false. If I play a tune badly on purpose does that make it right or wrong.
Notice that making a mistake, or failing to meet one’s expectations is not wrong. It need not be labeled negatively. One of the best things I’ve done is to show a now five year old boy that mistakes are nothing to be feared. He is a dynamic English learner because he has passion for it. He is constantly extending himself and trying out new things. He often says, “I made a mistake!” It’s his way of saying “oops!”
“Oops!” is playful in a way that “wrong!” is not. “Oops” is uplifting, “wrong!” is damning.
It was only on the way home that noticed this.
“Oops!”
Thursday, 15th April 2004 - Suibara
Thank goodness I took my flutes. I had expected to be doing two classes, one with the 3 year-olds and one with the 4 and 5 year-olds combined. But when I arrived the 3 year-olds were listening to a teacher playing a guitar and I only saw them later to wave at as I was leaving for home.
So I had one class for one hour instead of the usual 30 minutes. A reminder of the importance of being flexible. It went well enough. In addition to introducing them to the term ‘oops’ I also demonstrated how a Native American flute works.
This is double chambered and the air is guided from one chamber to another by the ‘bird’ an object which is strapped onto the top of the flute. Without the bird the flute won’t make a note.
There was enough interest that they were willing to watch while I put a flute together.
In addition to playing flutes I introduced them to the days of the week, focusing on getting them to echo the word Sunday. I used a page from a calendar to sing the days of the week and then read Cookies Week by Cindy Ward and Tomie dePaola (Scholastic). In the story Cookie climbs the curtains and as luck often has it the hall we were in had curtains at the door. I used the book to be Cookie and got it to ‘climb’ the curtains. When Cookie fell from the curtains I closed the book.
One useful skill to practise is the ability to be be able to close a book and then open it again on the next page smoothly without looking. This is useful when reaching the climax of a picture book. The children know the story hasn’t finished and can be surprised and pleased when you reopen the book and the page has changed. A simple but effective slight of hand.
Friday, 30th April 2004 Shirone
I was late setting off. I took a new road. It didn’t help. The three year olds were all sat huddled together waiting for me to arrive. I hadn’t met them before. Almost immediately one began to cry. But not for long. I was in the moment. I had my hat and I put it on my head, or rather I tried to put it on my head. Somehow it kept going over my head and landing in a hand held behind my back
This trick isn’t really very difficult, especially if you use a floppy hat and it is well worth spending a little time practicing so you can catch the majority of throws. Getting all the throws isn’t necessary or even a good idea. The children really get a kick out of seeing a shocked and surprised face after the hat lands on the floor.
I use the trick to introduce the concepts of ‘off’ and on’. Children like it when I put my hat on my head and then when they say “Off!” I tip my head back and catch the hat behind me, or not as the case might be.
My timing was good. Especially my pauses. Often a good way to build rapport with children is to smile and say nothing. We had several pauses where we just enjoyed ourselves. In fact they latched on to prepositions of place so quickly that I actually introduced In, Out , Under and All that. Usually I only use this song after several lessons as it has a lot of hand gestures, but I figured they’d enjoy it and they did. They also enjoyed practicing under by going under my basket.
I have a large basket, the kind used for washing. It has various uses, one being a receptacle for throwing a big dice when we are counting jumps and hops. Children find it funny when I carry the basket by putting it upside down on my head. They also like to go under it themselves. I walk around and gently lower it so that it is just over them. It only takes one to want a turn going under the basket and usually they all want one.
In fact the class went so well I even got them to form a circle. This is very ambitious with three year olds as it can take up a lot of time. But they managed it pretty well. I then went around the group offering them a toy gorilla and saying “Here!” and encouraging them to say “Here!” when giving it back. Almost half of them were very vocal. Their. teachers were surprised. The children had never seen me before and they were communicating with me.
We were off to a good start. The memory has blotted out what I did with the other two classes. They went fine, but nothing particular springs to mind right now.