Teaching Listening and Speaking to Young Learners
Today I want share with you about Teaching Listening and Speaking to Young Learners.
So, here we go ....
LISTENING
Of the four skills in English, young learners make the most of the lesson through listening. They learn to understand the materials through listening, get the instruction and explanation through listening, learn to pronounce words through listening, and practice better through listening to teachers’ praises and feedbacks. Therefore, listening skills become very crucial emphasis in the teaching of English to young learners.
Learning how to listen can also teach students how to communicate their ideas. This is because students who listen pick up more knowledge to reflect on and think critically about before they respond. Plus, for dual language learners in your class, learning how to listen can help students pick up their second language faster.
The importance of active listening also branches into social-emotional development. Active listening promotes mindful thinking, which can reduce anxiety and depression in students. It can also help students build relationships because as they engage themselves in conversation, their peers are more likely to view them as open and interested. And finally, practicing active listening can promote empathy—a skill that can enrich a student’s life both in and outside of the classroom.
The following are examples of activities that will involve students actively in listening activities:
1. Song
If it’s true that listening skills are the most important outcomes of early language teaching (Demirel 2004), that explains the constant demand for methods that successfully improve listening skills of learners. Songs can be one of the most enjoyable ways to practice and develop listening skills. Any syllabus designed for teaching English as a Second/Foreign Language (ESL/EFL) to young learners (YLs) typically contains songs, chants, and rhymes (Bourke 2006). Musical expression is an essential part of the human experience, and children respond enthusiastically to songs and welcome them.
Klein (2005) argues that teaching YLs is different from teaching adults. YLs tend to change their mood every other minute, and they find it extremely difficult to sit still. On the other hand, children show greater motivation than adults to do things that appeal to them. It therefore helps if the teacher is inventive and selects a wide variety of interesting activities, especially with songs.
Most primary school teachers generally use songs as a teaching technique, and Cameron (2001) claims that the use of songs and rhymes is also important for YLs in foreign language classrooms. Likewise, John - stone (2002) claims that teachers of YLs may make an important contribution to children’s early language education by introducing their classes to recorded songs. Demirel (2004) makes the strongest claim when he argues that the most effective way to teach listening comprehension, pronunciation, and dictation to YLs is through teaching songs.
Paul, (2008: 58-59), suggests the following ways of how teachers can use songs (and chants) in class:
1. Singing
The children sing songs that have catchy melodies and useful language content
2. Activities
The children combine actions with songs. This is usually the most effective way to use songs, especially with younger children. Any songs can be combined with actions.
3. Chants
Almost any sentence or expression can be put into a chant. If possible, chants should also be combined with actions.
4. Background
There are songs in the background when children play games. This can be an effective way for children to remember patterns without focusing on them too much, and to pick up chunks of language in songs.
5. Between lesson
We encourage parents to play English songs in the car and encourage both the parents and the children to play them at home between lessons. They acquire these advantages through these very enjoyable activities.
2.Stories
It is a wonderful technique to teach, English through stories. Paul, (2003: 74) argues that stories can be a supplementary material when teaching English to young learners particularly when the stories can be integrated to the course. Teachers can read it to children from storybooks, memorize the stories then tell it to children, or play it on a tape.
Teachers tend to interact more with students when retelling a story after memorizing it from a storybook. However, when reading stories from storybooks, teachers can also interact with the students by varying the intonation or by changing the voice for each different characters of the story.
There are some activities that teachers can involve when they are telling stores. These activities are designed to engage students in the story telling time and to avoid a teacher-dominated classroom activity. The activities are:
a) The children draw characters or scenes from the story.
b) Teachers tell the story with puppets, children then retell the story with their own puppets.
c)Children arrange pictures from the scene of the story, or touch/jump on the correct pictures as teachers tell the story. This activity can also be modified by asking students to guess what the story will be by arranging pictures from the scene before teachers tell them the story.
d) Each child has a word card. When her word is mentioned in the story, she has to do something about it, like raising her card, make funny noise, or put up her hand.
e) The teacher stops sometimes during the story to ask students what they think is going to happen next.
3. Dictation
Dictation exercise is always an important technique of teaching listening because it trains students’ comprehension in differing English sounds. Dictation doesn’t have to be dull and boring in which teachers simply state the words and students write the words in their notebooks, it can be so much fun and interesting if we apply it in language games. Some of the listening games that involved the principles of dictation are Chopstick Spelling and Bingo.
a) Chopstick Spelling
• Dictate letters or double-letter sounds and have all of the children write the letters on pieces of paper.
• Divide the children into teams (in small classes, there could be one child only in each team), and give one child from each team some chopsticks.
• Ask the children to tear or cut up their pieces of paper, separating each letter or double-letter sound, and all the children from the team mix their letters together.
• Place a long row of flash cards along the board ledge or in another clearly-seen position.
• Each team then races to spell the words on the cards, carrying one letter at a time wit chopsticks to a place that is at an equal distance from each team.
• The game is played as a relay. When one child has carried a letter, she gives the chopsticks to the next child on the team who then carries the next letter.
b) Bingo
* Each of the children is given or draws a bingo card. One of the children (or the teacher) dictates words and the children choose which square to write them in. each of the words that were dictated is then put into a box or a hat. The child who dictated the letters, or the other children, draws the word from the box or hat one at a time, and the children mark them off on their cards. A child who gets a whole row, column, or diagonal, call out, Bingo!
This game can also be played this way:
* Pictures can be put in a place where the children can see them, such as along the board ledge. The children write the words or sentences that correspond to those pictures in the squares on their bingo card. There can be more pictures than squares so the children can choose which ones to write. All the pictures are then put in a box or hat, and drawn out in the same way as before. Paul (2003: 187)
SPEAKING
Speaking is one of the subjects where the students are expected to be able to use language (English) in their daily communication. The aim of teaching speaking is to provide students with an ability to express themselves in the target language to cope with basic interactive skill like exchanging greeting and thanks and apologies, to express his needs, and to request information and services (Brown & Yule, 2000). Through speaking, everyone can express their minds, ideas and thought freely and spontaneously. However, to communicate in target language is not easy, especially if students have little understanding about linguistic competence of the target language, lack of vocabulary and confidence which make them tend to be afraid of using the language. As stated by Harmer (2007), students are often reluctant to speak with their classmates because they are shy especially when a teacher asks them to give personal opinions.
Some of the strategies used in teaching speaking are such cooperative activities as role-play, creative tasks, and drilling (Anjaniputra, 2013).
1. Role Play
Role play technique is an excellent activity for speaking in a relatively safe environment of the classroom (Nunan, 2003). Cameron (2001) states that role play is a learning activity that should be appropriate for students and social culture experience because the activity should give learners opportunities to use language they know and should start with simple dialogues before moving on to more advanced interactions. According to Shi (2006), Role play is an appropriate method to get students to imagine they are someone else and play that part. Students pretend to be another person who involve in a particular situation. Furthermore, role play is any speaking activities in which when one acts as someone else, he/she has to put themselves into an imaginary occasion (Budden, 2006).
2. Drilling
Drilling is a way of standardizing pronunciation of a language item and developing fluidity (the ability to introduce language quickly and easily) (Houston, 2013). Harmer (2007) also points that drilling is mechanical ways in getting students to demonstrate and practice their ability to use specific language item in a controlled manner. Furthermore, Budden (2013) states that a drill is a classroom technique used to practice new language. It involves teachers in modeling a word or a sentence and learners in repeating it. According to Thornbury (2005), drilling has some advantages including: allowing students to pay attention to new materials presented by teachers, emphasizing words, phrases, or utterances on students’ mind, moving new items from working memory to long term memory, and providing a means of gaining articulator control over language.
3. Games
A game is an activity with rules, a goal and an element of fun
(Hadfield, 1998). Khameis (2007) mentions that games are good
teaching tools that can be used to develop students’ language learning
and practice communication. Furthermore, Klippel (1994, p. 32) says
that guessing games are true communicative situation and such are very
important to practice foreign language with fun and excitement. Stephen
(1993, p. 244) states that, “real guessing games provide the students with
much practice in formalizing questions, an essential skill that does not
always receive sufficient attention.” Moreover, Patricia (1998) says that
guessing games can be used to develop or reinforce concept, to add
diversion to regular activities, or just to break the ice. In the other words,
this game is interesting for students to be used for learning which also
motivate them to practice with fun.
4. Picture Describing
A picture is worth a thousand words, and this is particularly true for teaching English as a second language. There are four reasons why pictures are good to be used in teaching. First, pictures provide shared experience for students in a classroom. Second, they provide common grammatical aspects students can use and practice in the classroom. Third, pictures may result in the task variations in speaking. Fourth, they are also interesting for learners (Raimes, 1983). Moreover, by using pictures, students can focus on the picture to get the idea (Arsyad, 2005, p. 128) and it also gives motivation to students to use their ability (Wright, 1989, p. 17). Furthermore, Harmer (2007, p. 42) also states that when students tell or describe the picture, they can easily construct the story. In short, it can be concluded that using describing picture strategies can help students in developing their speaking skill. It also motivates students in learning process.
5. Discussion Group
Discussion is an excellent tool for developing students’ reasoning skills because it gives them access to their thought processes and an opportunity to guide students to a higher level of thinking (Ozer, 2005). Kelly and Stafford (1993) say that a small discussion group can be an effective learning situation in which students learn both through instructions from their teachers and from interaction with each other. The group also provides opportunities for individuals to speak in front of others and to receive feedback from teachers and peers. Oradee (2012) statesthat communicative activities such as discussion can be effectively used in the language classroom. According to Ozer (2005), there are some advantages of using discussion group for students’ learning. First, it can increase students’ comfort with the specialized language and methods of a field. Second, it develops critical thinking. Third, it also helps students to develop problem-solving skills. Hollander (2002) says using picture can reduce the students` shyness, nervousness and inhibition, stimulate a new way of thinking, and expand the students` knowledge, understanding of their strength and weakness.
References:
Maulidar, K., Gani,S,A., Samad, I, A. 2019. TEACHER’S STRATEGIES IN TEACHING SPEAKING FOR CADETS. English Education Journal. file:///C:/Users/astrid/Downloads/13258-35429-1-SM.pdf
https://americanenglish.state.gov/files/ae/resource_files/50_3_3_sevik.pdf
http://staffnew.uny.ac.id/upload/132310012/pengabdian/teaching-list-speak-yl.pdf
https://www.waterford.org/education/active-listening-in-the-classroom/
Komentar
Posting Komentar