Extra information- FOREIGN LANGUAGE TEACHING IN THE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

FOREIGN LANGUAGE TEACHING IN THE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

Pre-school students (ages 2 to 4): These students are in a sensitive period for language development. They absorb languages effortlessly and are adept imitators of speech sounds. Because they are very self-centered, they do not work well in groups, and they respond best to activities ad learning situations relating to their own interests and experiences. Although they have a short attention span, they have great patience for repetition of the same activity or game. Pre-schoolers respond well to concrete experiences and to large-motor involvement in language learning.

Kindergarten and Primary students (grades 1 and 2): Most of these children are still pre-operational, and they learn best with concrete experiences and immediate goals. They like to name objects, define words, and learn about things in their own world. Primary-age children learn through oral language; they are capable of developing good oral skills, pronunciation, and intonation when they have a good model. They learn well, especially beginning in first grade, through dramatic play and role play. Because of their short attention spans, they need to have a great variety of activities, but the teacher must keep in mind that children of this age tire easily. They require large-muscle activity, and they are still rather unskilled with small-muscle tasks. Teachers of primary students must give very structured and specific directions and build regular routines and patterns into the daily lesson plan.

Intermediate students (ages 8-10, grades 3 to 5): Children at this age are at a maximum of openness to people and situations different from their own experience. For these students, a global emphasis is extremely important, because it gives them an opportunity to work with information from all parts of the world: as intermediates develop the cognitive characteristics of the concrete operations stage, they begin to understand cause and effect. Students in intermediate grades can work well in groups. They can begin a more systematic approach to language learning, but they continue to need first-hand, concrete experiences as a starting point and continue to benefit from learning that is embedded in context.

Transescent students (ages 11-14, grades 6 to 8): During the middle and,
junior high school years, students are undergoing more dramatic developmental changes than experienced at any other time in life, and on widely differing timetables. The transescent must learn to deal with a variety of experiences: emerging sexuality in a changing and often unpredictable body; reaching a cognitive plateau for a time, and then finding new, adult intellectual tools; multiplying and rapidly shifting interests; a fluid and flexible self-concept; a need to rework interpersonal relationships with adults; turbulent emotions; extreme idealism; a need to assert independence; and a powerful peer group. A major goal of all schooling for children of this age is the encouragement of positive relationships and positive self-image. Transescent children need the opportunity for broad explorations, as well as introduction to the demands of academic disciplines.