Great Ways to Start a Preschool English Class

1. Line up to Enter
Depending on what the drop off policy is in your preschool, you can use this activity to greet each student at the start of the day. Have your class line up outside the classroom and enter one at a time. As children enter, ask each a question or have a short casual conversation with each child. This will give each of your students individualized attention which is so necessary at that age and, if done consistently, will give you a good read on how comfortable your students are with some of the basics of English conversation.

2. Puppet Time
Who doesn’t love puppets? They are especially appealing to young students, and your class will love if you start the day with a puppet on your hand. If you choose to start the day with a regular classroom friend or mascot, let the puppet greet your students at your first circle time. You can also add to the personality appeal of your puppet by having it make frequent mistakes in its language use. Have the puppet say simple mistakes like, “Hello. How are me?” and let the kids relish in correcting their silly puppet friend.

3. Stylized Hellos
Though English speakers say hello just about every day, that doesn’t mean saying a daily hello in your preschool class has to be boring. Give your hello of the day a theme, and have your students say hello in that same theme. The theme could tie in to whatever lesson you are teaching right now. For example, if you are having a cowboy theme, have students say howdy instead of hello. If you are doing a unit on body parts, have students shake hands to greet you and each other. There are endless ways you can stylize your hellos to match your current language unit.

4. Simple Stylized Hellos
Your stylized hellos don’t have to tie into a current theme that you are teaching. You can do a simple stylized hello by just having your students say hello in a particular manner – fast, slow, high-pitched, etc. It’s a great way to review specific adjectives and adverbs with your students in a fun and low pressure way.

5. The Word of the Day
Just like a favorite children’s television show, you can start your class by introducing your kids to the word of the day. It doesn’t have to be a complicated word, but it can be. (Never underestimate young learners.) The key is explaining the word to your students in a way that they can understand. For example, if you wanted to teach them the word soft, you could pass around several soft items (a stuffed animal, a blanket, a cotton ball, etc.). The more your students can get their hands on something, the more easily they will remember the word you are trying to teach. Then give prizes to any students who notice when you use the word throughout the day.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

5 Rules to Help you handle your Child’s Behavior

Image
5 Rules to Help you handle your Child’s  Behavior Is your child being disrespectful? Are you witnessing  behaviors  such as cursing, yelling, arguing, ignoring you, and refusing requests? Now is the time for you to wake up. Wake up and get into action of controlling the situation before it becomes out of your hands. Set limits and control them. This decision takes time so be patient. Don’t expect your child’s  behavior  to change directly after once you change how you respond to your kid’s disrespectful  behavior . Does your child ignore consequences? When your child starts developing disrespectful  behavior  then this can usually mean that your child is having difficulties in problem-solving skills and lack knowledge on how to be respectful and have limits. Kids usually think they know what they are doing and most of the time with kids are separated from their pare...
Keep reading

Nursery/Kindergarten - The secret to a successful adaptation

Image
Nursery/Kindergarten - The secret to a successful adaptation A child who comes to the nursery for the first time feels alone, lost and helpless. How can you help him? For most children, going to a nursery or kindergarten is the first separation from their parents. They see it as confronting an unfamiliar space, in which parents leave it to strangers. What does the period of adaptation of the child to the nursery or nursery look like? - we prefer to use the term adaptation, and the question that arises is: Who has a harder time living that period? The parent or a child? It is difficult for everyone to fall apart: to the parent - if he or she has never separated from the child, to the child - because he or she feels anxious about the parent. What should the adaptation for the kindergarten look like? ● The first arrival is purely “administrative” - the parent talks to the kindergarten director. ● On the second visit, there is a child with the parents - to see...
Keep reading

How to protect my child from getting sick during seasonal changes?

Image
Seasonal changes are considered by most mothers as their biggest nightmare or the annoying alarm that their kids will be sick for the next few weeks, and they are always blame themselves and think that maybe they can do something more to protect their kids from this illness. Seasonal changes:  Seasonal changes are critical because weather is unpredictable and viruses are more and spreading faster than usual stable climate. And because children are more vulnerable to viral infections and temperature swings so they are the most common group who get sick especially preschool age (from birth to 5 years).  Dubai has two distinct seasons – summer and winter. Summer in Dubai begins from around the last week of April and ends around the 1st week of October. This period is characterized by very hot weather. Rainfall is scarce during the summer months. However, the windy conditions ensure there are frequent dust Storms. Temperatures regularly climb above 38 °...
Keep reading