Teach English in Xiyi Gongye Yuanqu - Xuzhou Shi

The role of a kindergarten teacher is very challenging yet highly rewarding. First time, they have direct and regular contact with a language that is completely foreign to them. This new environment needs to ensure that the children are completely at ease and ready to begin their language learning. As a rule, kindergarten students don’t respond well to teachers who run their classrooms like drill sergeants. You need plan your lessons a little differently to keep them following along and having fun. Below are some ideas for activities that you can add in your lessons. Nursery Rhymes Nursery rhymes are great because they’re already geared towards kindergarten-aged kids. Telephone With your students standing in a single-file line, whisper a phrase into the ear of the very last student. That student will then whisper that phrase into the next student’s ear, and they whisper to the next student and so on. This is a great activity to practice pronunciation and is especially useful if you have a daily expression that your students learn. Hot Potato Hot potato is another energetic activity that works really well with kindergarten students. Simply designate an object like an eraser, ball or anything that’s lightweight and easy to handle as your hot potato. The good thing about this activity is that you can modify it to cover a number of kindergarten-related English topics. For example, the student holding the hot potato can… Introduce themselves Ask another student to introduce themselves Make a statement or answer a question related to the material they’ve been learning—examples include students saying their favorite animal, favorite food, time they woke up and more Ask another student a question Here are must-have qualities of a good kindergarten EFL teacher: Passion In Their Work Like other professions, passion is crucial when it comes to the early childhood development job. Teaching kids can be frustrating, especially when kids become difficult and defiant. During such moments, it requires someone who gets motivated to do even more and feel that they are making a difference in kids’ life. If teaching kids does not ignite the passion inside for a teacher, then this is not their career. Flexibility To be an effective kindergarten teacher, one has to be flexible. Kid’s change really first depending on what is going in the class, internal or outside. So one should be very attentive to their mood and make an adjustment to keep them engaged. Sometime, the class could be filled with kids who are ready to learn, but in the next few minutes, things change, and the whole look sleepy and bored. In such cases, the teacher must be flexible and change classroom instruction. If the plan was to have an outdoor class, but there is rain, then the teacher should make quick adjustments. That is what flexibility quality is all about. Creativity Dealing with kids requires the teacher to be very creative. Preschool kids are very impatient can easily get disrupted and bored during the lesson. So the teacher should ensure that are kids having fun every time they in school. A creative teacher is able to bring in innovative ideas that will keep the children engaged so as to understand classroom instruction. A kindergarten teacher should be able to utilize creative ideas to make sure that kids are learning even with limited resources. He/she should be able to use available resources to make sure that kids have understood classroom instruction. Creativity also helps a kindergarten teacher to understand when to change the topic or subject by reading kids’ moods. Cultural Awareness A successful EFL / ESL teacher should be sensitive of cultural differences and traditions. Teachers should learn the culture of their students to gain a deeper understanding of their way of thinking and background. It also helps if the teacher tries to learn the language of the students to better understand the culture. Meaningful Lessons A successful teacher should develop lessons that appeal to students’ interests and goals. Students should have the opportunity to use the language in genuine tasks and gain fluency without worry of mistakes. Students are excited to be in a foreign teacher’s class and will respond more positively to meaningful tasks that allow them to “use” the language. It is best to associate new information with something students already know, and avoid too much grammatical explanation or activities without a clear purpose. A good kindergarten teacher is one who’s energetic and comes prepared with a lot of activities. Kindergarteners aren’t able to sit quietly at their desks for extended periods of time, so they really need to move around and have fun in order to get the most out of their English learning experience. Understand the Curriculum The easiest way to prepare for and convey any lesson is to understand it inside and out, and the easiest way to do that is to understand the curriculum as a whole. Don’t just look into what you are doing today, or tomorrow. Look ahead and browse to see what you are doing in the classroom weeks and months down the road. Build and Stick to Routines If there is one thing I cannot stress enough in a Kindergarten environment, it’s routines. Routines are essential to young learners and have proven time and time again to be the most effective way of helping them engage in lessons, as well as class management. If you have routines in place they will basically manage your class for you. Have a routine you follow daily (EX: morning song, lesson time, playtime, Arts & Crafts time, lunch.) as well as a routine for your lesson plan (EX: Warm-up, elicit vocabulary, model & drill, activity, concept check). This will keep their attention, and you keep your classes/work day smooth and hassle-free. Not to mention ensure they are learning from every class.