Teach English in HAlAgaitunong Muchang - Xilinguole Meng — Xilin Gol

Can you remember a story from your childhood? Chances are you can. Even if it is not your favorite story, you can probably recall the characters, plott, the setting, or the moral of a childhood story. Stories are moments from childhood which adults hold onto throughout their life. Stories are fun, exciting, and captivating. All ages can appreciate stories. Stories are also a wonderful and useful tool for teaching English. Stories can be used to teach reading by having the students read the story to themselves. High level students can then answer questions from a worksheet to check reading comprehension, vocabulary and grammar. Stories can teach new grammar, vocabulary, and punctuation. Students can learn pronunciation when reading the story out loud. After the story is read, the teacher can direct the students in drilling new vocabulary and pronunciation. When the teacher reads the story out loud, the students practice listening skills as well as hearing a model for proper pronunciation and rhythm of English. After listening to or reading a story, the students depending on their level, can then practice English by writing their own creative story based on the previous story. Exercises such as gap fill and word search are teaching tools that can accompany a story. Arts and craft projects can be adapted from the story read or listened to by the students for creative learning purposes. A teacher can even create a game to accompany the story. Or some stories even have a game already made if the teacher is using online materials, a teacher workbook, or other materials and resources. Teachers can utilize stories in order to make the lesson more fun and engaging. According to James Asher, learning is increased or accelerated by stimulating both the left and right hemispheres of the brain. Meaning that is movement or art is added to the learning, there is an increase in the student’s learning. Stories can incorporate both hemispheres of the brain to increase the students’ learning experience. The use of movement is particularly important for the young learners. Stories are a helpful teaching aid for all ages. However, it is important for the teacher to be aware of cultural significance when selecting a story. For older students, the teacher can select stories with content which might be more entertaining to the students’ interests. Stories can also be overwhelming with too much new vocabulary or grammar. It is important for the teacher to pre-read the stories before making the final selection for the students. The teacher should make sure the story is a good fit with the topic or topics of the lesson plan. Based on the content of this course, Certificate in Teaching English to Young Learners, I thought of a few examples for teaching the young learner English with the use of a story. Old MacDonald had a farm is a classic childhood song, however, it is also a story and can be found as a printed book. The teacher can read the story to the students, and depending on the level, the students can also read the story themselves. The teacher teach new vocabulary based on farms and farm animals. The students can also learn what sounds animals make in English. The students can learn colors by coloring in a printout of a farm with farm animals. The students can work on spelling by labeling all of the animals and objects on the farm. A word search or gap fill exercise could be used for farm vocabulary. The student could select their favorite farm animal and draw pictures and describe the animal: what color is it, does it fly, what does it eat, ect. The students could also present their animal to the class. The teacher can also play the song Old MacDonald had a farm. They teacher can provide written lyrics for the song for further teaching points. The list of possibilities for teaching based on a story are endless! Stories teach listening, reading, writing and speaking. Stories can be used as an English teaching tool for all ages and all levels of English.